atavic

American  

[uh-tav-ik] / əˈtæv ɪk /

adjective

1. atavistic.

---

Etymology

Origin of atavic

1865–70; atav(ism) + -ic ( def. ), modeled on French atavique

Example Sentences

He is bound to those who follow him, and to the atavic influences which he possesses; he serves for their temporary resting-place, and he transmits them to his descendants.

From Project Gutenberg

The grandson of Erasmus Darwin had little appreciation of the views of him of whom, through atavic heredity, he was the intellectual and scientific child.

From Project Gutenberg

Violent and muscular at first, the struggle is becoming, more and more, pacific and intellectual, notwithstanding some atavic recurrences of earlier methods or some psycho-pathological manifestations of individual violence against society and of social violence against individuals.

From Project Gutenberg

And while he threw the ears with contempt into a flower border in the garden, Gabriel thought with delight of the atavic force which had resuscitated in a Catholic church, the pagan offering: the homage to the divinity of the firstfruits of the earth fertilised by the spring.

From Project Gutenberg

With atavic cunning he sat upon the outside and waited for the triumph of death.

From Project Gutenberg