Excrescence
noun ·Moderate ·College level
Definitions
- 1 Something, usually abnormal, which grows out of something else.
"I have again and again intimated that I desire the hair to be arranged closely, modestly, plainly. Miss Temple, that girl’s hair must be cut off entirely; I will send a barber to-morrow: and I see others who have far too much of the excrescence—that tall girl, tell her to turn round."
- 2 (pathology) an abnormal outgrowth or enlargement of some part of the body wordnet
- 3 A disfiguring or unwanted mark or adjunct.
"Being bussum buddies, the two friends often communicated with mere exchange of psychic forces, verbal communication having been rendered unnecessary excrescence."
- 4 something that bulges out or is protuberant or projects from its surroundings wordnet
- 5 The epenthesis of a consonant, e.g., warmth as [ˈwɔrmpθ] (adding a [p] between [m] and [θ]), or -t (Etymology 2).
Antonyms
All antonymsExample
More examples"I have again and again intimated that I desire the hair to be arranged closely, modestly, plainly. Miss Temple, that girl’s hair must be cut off entirely; I will send a barber to-morrow: and I see others who have far too much of the excrescence—that tall girl, tell her to turn round."
Etymology
From Middle English, early 15th century, in sense “(action of) growing out (of something else)”. Borrowed from Latin excrescentia (“abnormal growths”), from excrescentem, from excrēscere, from ex- (“out”) (English ex-) + crēscere (“to grow”) (English crescent). Sense of “abnormal growth” from 1570s, from earlier excrescency (1540s in this sense).
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.