biovular twins

Do you say "biovular twins" more or "fraternal twins" more for the opposite of "identical twins"?

keannu said:

Do you say "biovular twins" more or "fraternal twins" more for the opposite of "identical twins"?

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"Biovular" is rare. You'll find it mostly in the research literature. People normally refer to "non-identical twins."
Identical twins rarely, if ever, refer to themselves as "uniovular."

"Fraternal twins" is common here. I've never heard "biovular."

My sister and brother are twins. Everyone uses the term 'fraternal' for them - although this has always bothered me on grounds of etymology! ;-) I'd never met biovular before I read your post.

b

Afterthought: in fact I have to admit that at first I thought your thread was about oysters ;-)

b

My ex-husband had a twin sister. It was very hard to resist the urge to say "Are you KIDDING ME?" when people would ask if they were identical or fraternal.

Anyway, like the others (aside from Ray), I've never seen that other term before.

I just learned the expression "fraternal twins" from keannu and I went on to read on the internet that there is also the term "sororal twins". Is the latter equally common? Could two sisters be called "fraternal twins"?

birdeen's call said:

I just learned the expression "fraternal twins" from keannu and I went on to read on the internet that there is also the term "sororal twins". Is the latter equally common? Could two sisters be called "fraternal twins"?

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I've never seen that term before either. Here, two girls are still fraternal twins, despite the dodgy etymology.