philoprogenitive

Philoprogenitive (a combination of phil-, meaning "loving" or "having an affinity for," and Latin progenitus, meaning "begot" or "begotten") can refer to the production of offspring or to the loving of them. Nineteenth-century phrenologists used the word to designate the "bump" or "organ" of the brain believed to be the seat of a parent's instinctual love for his or her children. Despite the word's scientific look and sound, however, it appears, albeit not very frequently, in all types of writing - technical, literary, informal, and otherwise.