Since the 17th century, “mulatto” refers to first-generation offspring of a non-White person and a White person. The term derives from the Latin word “mulus” (mule), the hybrid offspring of a horse and a donkey. Like the racial sciences from which the term emerged, it suggests an incommensurability between two so-regarded different species of mankind. Like the mule, then, this results in an abnormal offspring, presumed infertile. Mulattos were deemed to represent the “horrors” of miscegenation (see also “Half-blood”), but because of their so-called White blood they were believed to be more intelligent—and often more attractive—than Black people. Today such ideas still remain in subtle ways in daily speech.