Word.ws English Dictionary

ovist

UK/ˈəʊvɪst/

ovist noun: someone who believes that the complete embryo is contained preformed within the ovum; a proponent of ovism.

Noun

ovist (plural ovists)

  1. (historical) Someone who believes that the complete embryo is contained preformed within the ovum; a proponent of ovism.

Adjective

ovist (not comparable)

  1. Pertaining to ovism.
    • Applying the term ‘ovary’ to the female gonad, he contended that the ovum played the key role in reproduction, launching the ‘ovist’ school of thought, and giving rise to fierce embryological controversy.1997, Roy Porter, The Greatest Benefit to Mankind, Folio Society, published 2016, page 219

Forms of ovist

pluralovists

Origin of ovist

From Latin ōvum + -ist.

Questions about ovist

What does ovist mean?
Ovist means someone who believes that the complete embryo is contained preformed within the ovum; a proponent of ovism.
What part of speech is ovist?
Ovist can be a noun or an adjective.
How do you pronounce ovist?
Ovist is pronounced /ˈəʊvɪst/ (UK).
What is the plural of ovist?
The plural of ovist is ovists.

Words near ovist in the dictionary

  1. oviscaptes
  2. oviscapts
  3. ovism
  4. ovispirin
  5. ovispirins
  6. ovist
  7. ovistic
  8. ovistrip
  9. ovistrips
  10. ovists
  11. ovitrap

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: ovist (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “ovist.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/ovist. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.