ATAVISM • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Atavism

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/ˈætəvɪzəm/ Listen

noun

Atavism n.

(a)

The recurrence, or a tendency to a recurrence, of the original type of a species in the progeny of its varieties; resemblance to remote rather than to near ancestors; reversion to the original form.

(b)

(Biol.) The recurrence of any peculiarity or disease of an ancestor in a subsequent generation, after an intermission for a generation or two. "Now and then there occur cases of what physiologists call atavism, or reversion to an ancestral type of character."

Recurrence of or reversion to a past style, outlook, approach, or manner.

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Etymology of 'Atavism'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Atavism" Quotes from Famous Books

... chord, extracting from the sombre facts of city life a throbbing, many-tinted romance, even as out of that foul coal-tar some, who know the secret, craftily distil most delicate perfumes and colours exquisite. The bard of the future ... h'm! Will he ever appear? As an atavism, perhaps. Take away from modern poetry what appeals to primitive man—the jingle and pathetic fallacy—and the residue, if any, would be better ...

— Fountains In The Sand - Rambles Among The Oases Of Tunisia • Norman Douglas

... is the love idea in him, that it has suscitated all that is inherent and essential in the character. It sent him to Boulogne so that he might fight a duel; and the other day a nun left her convent for him. Curious atavism, curious recrudescence of a dead idea of man! Say, is it his fault if his pleasures are limited to clandestine visits; his fame to a summons to appear in a divorce case; his danger to that most pitiful of modern ignominies—five shillings a week? ...

— Mike Fletcher - A Novel • George (George Augustus) Moore

... long as the matrimonial candidate himself is not a criminal, the ancestral criminality should constitute no bar to the marriage. It is not likely to show itself atavistically in the children. Altogether a good deal of nonsense has been written about atavism. And people forget that the same rules of heredity that are applied to physical conditions cannot be applied to spiritual and moral qualities, the latter being much more dependent upon environment ...

— Woman - Her Sex and Love Life • William J. Robinson

... Coke, rascal though he was, and pot-bellied withal, was no Falstaff. Rather did he suggest the present-day atavism of some robber baron of the Middle Ages, whose hectoring speech bubbled forth from a stout heart. But the ragged ex-President heeded him not. After a moment of placid scrutiny of his enraged countenance by those bright, watchful ...

— The Stowaway Girl • Louis Tracy

... remotest ages, to the depths of the geological night, and does not hesitate to regard these cruelties as "remnants of atavism," the lingering furies of an ancient strain, and he ventures a profound and ...

— Fabre, Poet of Science • Dr. G.V. (C.V.) Legros

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