atavism.
The reappearance of an ancestral characteristic in an organism after several generations of absence; a throwback.
Meaning & usage
The reappearance of an ancestral characteristic in an organism after several generations of absence; a throwback.
The recurrence or reversion to a past behaviour, method, characteristic or style after a long period of absence.
A reversion to past primitive behavior, especially violence.
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₂éd Proto-Italic *ad Proto-Italic *ad- Latin at- Proto-Indo-European *h₂éwh₂os Latin avus Latin atavus Proto-Indo-European *-id- Proto-Indo-European *-yéti Proto-Indo-European *-idyéti Proto-Hellenic *-íd͏̌d͏̌ō Ancient Greek -ῐ́ζω (-ĭ́zō) Proto-Indo-European *-mos Proto-Indo-European *-mós Ancient Greek -μός (-mós) Ancient Greek -ῐσμός (-ĭsmós)bor. Latin -ismusbor. French -isme French atavismebor. English atavism Borrowed from French atavisme.. By surface analysis, at- (“to”) + Latin av(us) (“grandfather, ancestor”) + -ism. Compare ancestorism.
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.