Definition of "polygenetic" []

• Of or relating to polygenesis; polyphyletic. (adjective)
• Having more than one source or origin. (adjective)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Many soils older than the Holocene have experienced one or more major climate changes, and possess properties that may be the complex effect of several stages of soil development, and are called polygenetic or relict soils."
• ""polygenetic" view of both the Anabaptist and Baptist traditions, meaning they probably grew from multiple streams instead of a single source, he said."
• "Richard Popkin (1977) and Naomi Zack (2002, 13-18) contend that the 1754 version of the essay assumes, without demonstration, an original, polygenetic difference between white and non-white races."