Dictionary

demihuman en · NOUN

Etymology

From demi- + human.

Meanings

1. A member of a human-like race; in fantasy, sometimes distinguished from the more bestial humanoid races.
   • In the AD&D game, humans are more motivated by ambition and the desire for power than the demihuman races are. Thus, humans advance further and more quickly. Demihumans can attain significant levels in certain classes, but they do not ... 1995, David Zeb Cook, Jean Rabe, Warren Spector, Steven E. Schend, Dungeon master guide for the AD&D game, TSR:
   • Halflings look upon other demihuman and humanoid races as stock for the stew pot. 1991, Roger E. Moore, Dragon Magazine, TSR, →ISBN:
   • ... fact from the moment he first lays eyes on the demihuman M'ling, before he has any notion of Moreau or his surgical feats. "I had never beheld such a repulsive and extraordinary face before, and yet — if the contradiction is credible — I ... 2002, Gary Westfahl, George Edgar Slusser, No Cure for the Future: Disease and Medicine in Science Fiction and Fantasy, →ISBN:
   • We can watch this happen, on page and screen, in werewolves. We can safely say that the werewolf is a widespread figure, not exclusive to European mythology. But it is also not a generic manifestation of the global demihuman. 2009, S. K. Robisch, Wolves and the Wolf Myth in American Literature, University of Nevada Press, →ISBN, page 207:
   • No wonder Columbus was dubious. Though perfectly charming, in a Droopy-esque way. it would take a lot of imagination (or desperation) to convert this into a demihuman sex siren. 1986, BBC Wildlife, volumes 4-5, page 393:
   • features of a thousand faces upon that awful head: human faces, demihuman, reptilian, serpentine, batrachian, vulpine. […]and many others for which I have no ready descriptive terms. 2009, Brian Stableford, The Return of the Djinn and Other Black Melodramas, Wildside Press LLC, →ISBN, page 89:
   • Demihumans, like . . . yourself . . . the vampires . . . orcs, dwarves, trolls, demons, pixies, all of them have a stake in the fate of humanity . . .” 2010, Marc Mattaliano, The Demihuman Archives, Xlibris Corporation, →ISBN, page 120:
   • In one version we learn that the people who built Nan Madol settled at the site because they were "constantly afraid of the people of the center of Pohnpei," both the various demihuman, cannibalistic creatures and "real people" who resided ... 1995, Isla: A Journal of Micronesian Studies:

Forms