HEREDITARY • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Hereditary

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/hərˈɛdətˌɛri/ Listen

adjective

Hereditary adj.

Descended, or capable of descending, from an ancestor to an heir at law; received or passing by inheritance, or that must pass by inheritance; as, an hereditary estate or crown.

Transmitted, or capable of being transmitted, as a constitutional quality or condition from a parent to a child; as, hereditary pride, bravery, disease.

Synonyms: Ancestral; patrimonial; inheritable.

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Etymology of 'Hereditary'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Hereditary" Quotes from Famous Books

... American tribes, although the first colonists, bringing with them to this hemisphere the notions and opinions of their own countries, often dignified the chief men of those primitive nations with the titles of kings and princes. Hereditary influence did certainly exist, but there is much reason to believe it existed rather as a consequence of hereditary merit and acquired qualifications, than as a birthright. Rivenoak, however, had not even this claim, ...

— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper

... is the Hereditary Constable of the Palace," said Baldo. "It is now merely an honorary office. But the visitors' book is brought to him whenever there have been ...

— The Lady Paramount • Henry Harland

... much as she did social conventionalities, and was as free in denouncing them. The clergy, who from custom cling to old rites and ceremonies, were, in her opinion, "indolent slugs, who guard, by liming it over, the snug place which they consider in the light of an hereditary estate," and "idle vermin who two or three times a day perform, in the most slovenly manner, a service which they think useless, but call their duty." She believed in the spirit, but not in the letter of the law. The scriptural ...

— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell

... Guise as it stood out against the blue sky, M. La Tour told us an interesting tale about this tower, which is about all that is left of the royal palace built here or added to by Henry II, who was also hereditary Count of Anjou, and did much building and road making in the ...

— In Chteau Land • Anne Hollingsworth Wharton

... singular piece of apparent stupidity may be accounted for by the circumstance, that this reptile has no enemy whatever on shore, whereas at sea it must often fall a prey to the numerous sharks. Hence, probably, urged by a fixed and hereditary instinct that the shore is its place of safety, whatever the emergency may be, it there ...

— The Voyage of the Beagle • Charles Darwin

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