Etymology

excrescence

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Today it means: Something, usually abnormal, which grows out of something else. Full definition →

Latin excrescentia
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The story

  1. Latin · derived fromexcrescentia“abnormal growths”
  2. English todayexcrescence

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).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.