recapitulation: Meaning and Definition of

re•ca•pit•u•la•tion

1. the act of recapitulating or the state of being recapitulated.
2. a brief review or summary, as of a speech.
3. the theory that the stages an organism passes through during its embryonic development repeat the evolutionary stages of structural change in its ancestral lineage.
4. the modified restatement of the exposition following the development section in a sonata-form movement.