Diabetes and Mellitus

"Diabetes" is usually attributed to the Greek physician Aretaeus, who lived in 200 BC.

He used the term "diabetes," meaning "to siphon or to flow through," for a disease in which the water that a person drinks runs rapidly through his or her body.

It was not until the end of the 18th century that the term "mellitus" was added to "diabetes."

An Englishman, John Rollo, and a German, Johann Peter Frank, first used the term "mellitus" (which means "sweet as honey") in the medical literature to describe the sweetness of the urine.

So "diabetes mellitus" literally means a medical condition in which the patient drinks too much water and urinates frequently. The urine is sweet because it contains sugar.