the.com/birthmark
A signature you didn't sign, written in ink your body chose.
means A permanent mark or discoloration on the skin that is present from birth, caused by clusters of pigment cells or blood vessels.
from A plain compound of "birth" and "mark," both deep Germanic words. "Birth" traces back through Old Norse "byrth" to a root shared with "bear," in the sense of carrying and bringing forth; "mark" comes from Old English "mearc," meaning a boundary, sign, or trace — the same root that gives us "march" as a borderland. So a birthmark is, quite literally, a sign carried from the moment of being borne into the world. The old superstition that such marks were "maternal impressions" — desires or frights of the mother stamped onto the child — was once taken seriously but has no basis in fact.
- true name
- Doctors call them nevi, from Latin for birthmark
- strawberry kind
- Hemangiomas often grow fast then vanish by childhood
- port wine
- Caused by dilated blood vessels, can last lifelong
- royal myth
- Folklore blamed them on mothers' unmet cravings
- twins
- Sometimes nearly identical, marking shared genetic blueprints
mikhail gorbachev — soviet leader with distinctive wine-colored birthmark on his forehead, visible throughout his political career from 1985-1991
port-wine stain — most common vascular birthmark affecting about 3 in 1,000 people, typically on face or neck, darkens with age