Cosmogony of Generic Structures

The problem of formation of generic structures in the Universe is addressed, whereby first the kinematics of inertial continua for coherent initial data is considered. The generalization to self--gravitating continua is outlined focused on the classification problem of singularities and metamorphoses arising in the density field. Self--gravity gives rise to an internal hierarchy of structures, and, dropping the assumption of coherence, also to an external hierarchy of structures dependent on the initial power spectrum of fluctuations.