Teratology (from the
Greek (
genitive ), meaning monster, or marvel and , meaning word, speech) as early as 17th century referred to a discourse on prodigies and marvels, of anything so extraordinary as to seem abnormal. In 19th century, it acquired a meaning closer related to biological deformities, mostly in the field of botany. Currently, its most instrumental meaning is that of the medical study of teratogenesis,
congenital malformations or grossly deformed individuals. Monster is a
pejorative term for a grossly deformed individual, although it is interesting to note that, etymologically, this word is related to demonstration, and used to simply mean something worth looking at, for being unusual, without necessarily being pejorative. Another term for this is dysmorphology, which literally means "the study of abnormal form."
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