inheritance

English

Alternative forms

• enheritance (obsolete)
• enheritaunce (obsolete)
• inheritaunce (obsolete)

Etymology

Recorded since 1473, inherit +‎ -ance. More at inherit.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɪnˈhɛɹətəns/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Noun

inheritance (countable and uncountable, plural inheritances)

1. The passing of title to an estate upon death.
2. (countable) That which a person is entitled to inherit, by law or testament.
3. (uncountable, especially linguistics, biology) The act or mechanism of inheriting; the state of having inherited

   The Indo-European languages share various similarities as a result of their inheritance from a common ancestor.

4. (biology, genetic algorithms) The biological attributes passed hereditarily from ancestors to their offspring.
5. (programming, object-oriented programming) The mechanism whereby parts of a superclass are available to instances of its subclass.

Hyponyms

Hyponyms (computing)

• classical inheritance
• dual inheritance
• dynamic inheritance

• multiple inheritance
• parasitic inheritance
• prototypal inheritance

• static inheritance
• Swiss inheritance

Derived terms

• inheritance law
• preheritance

Related terms

• inherit
• inheritable
• inheritor

Translations

passing of title

• Bulgarian: наследяване (bg) n (nasledjavane)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 继承 (zh) (jìchéng)

• Czech: dědičnost f
• Dutch: erfenis (nl), nalatenschap (nl)
• Finnish: periminen (fi)
• Irish: oidhreacht f
• Polish: dziedziczenie (pl) n
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Portuguese: herança (pt) f
• Proto-Norse: ᚨᚱᛒᛁᛃᚨ n (arbija)
• Romanian: moștenire (ro) f
• Russian: насле́дование (ru) n (naslédovanije)
• Scottish Gaelic: oighreachd f
• Serbo-Croatian: nasleđivanje (sh) n
• Slovak: dedenie
• Spanish: herencia (es) f
• Tagalog: mana, manahan

that which a person is entitled to inherit

• Bashkir: мираҫ (miraś)
• Berber:

  Tashelhit: ⴰⵢⴷⴰ (ayda)

• Bulgarian: наследство (bg) n (nasledstvo)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 遺產／遗产 (zh) (yíchǎn), 遗产 (zh) (yíchǎn)

• Dutch: erfenis (nl), erfdeel (nl) n
• Esperanto: heredo
• Faroese: ættararvur m
• Finnish: perintö (fi) (which is inherited); perintöosa (minimum required by law)
• French: héritage (fr) m
• Galician: herdanza f
• Gothic: 𐌷𐌻𐌰𐌿𐍄𐍃 m (hlauts)
• Greek:

  Ancient: κληρονομία f (klēronomía)

• Hungarian: örökség (hu)
• Irish: oidhreacht f
• Italian: eredità (it) f
• Japanese: 遺産 (ja) (いさん, isan)
• Kabuverdianu: erdansa
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Latin: herctum n
• Maori: whakareretanga
• Ngazidja Comorian: mafa
• Old English: yrfe m
• Polish: spadek (pl) m
• Portuguese: herança (pt) f
• Romanian: moștenire (ro) f
• Russian: насле́дство (ru) n (naslédstvo)
• Scottish Gaelic: oighreachd f
• Serbo-Croatian: nasledstvo (sh) n
• Slovak: dedičstvo
• Spanish: herencia (es) f
• Swahili: urithi (sw), mirathi (sw)
• Swedish: arv (sv) n
• Tagalog: mana, manahan
• Thai: มรดก (mɔɔ-rá-dòk)
• Turkish: miras (tr), bırakıt (tr), tereke (tr)
• Ukrainian: спадок m (spadok)
• Walloon: eritaedje (wa) m, eritance (wa) f
• Welsh: etifeddiad m, etifeddiadau m pl
• Yiddish: ירושה f (yerushe)

biological attributes passed to offspring

• Bulgarian: наследственост (bg) f (nasledstvenost)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 遗传 (zh) (yíchuán)

• Czech: dědičnost f
• Dutch: erfelijkheid (nl)
• Faroese: ættarbregði n
• Finnish: perimä (fi)
• German: Erbschaft (de)
• Irish: oidhreacht f
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Italian: ereditarietà (it) f
• Polish: dziedziczenie (pl) n
• Portuguese: herança (pt) f
• Romanian: moștenire (ro) f
• Russian: насле́дование (ru) n (naslédovanije)
• Swahili: urithi (sw)
• Swedish: arv (sv) n
• Walloon: eritance (wa) f

programming: mechanism for making parts of superclass available to subclass

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 继承 (zh) (jìchéng)

• Czech: dědičnost f
• Dutch: overerving f
• Finnish: perintä (fi)
• French: héritage (fr)
• Italian: ereditarietà (it) f
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Japanese: 継承 (ja) (keishō)
• Polish: dziedziczenie (pl) n
• Portuguese: herança (pt) f
• Romanian: moștenire (ro) f
• Russian: насле́дование (ru) n (naslédovanije)
• Slovak: dedičnosť (sk)
• Ukrainian: наслідування n (nasliduvannja)

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

• German: ^{(please verify)} Erbschaft (de)
• Italian: ^{(please verify)} eredità (it)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}
• Serbo-Croatian: ^{(please verify)} nasljeđivanje (sh) n (1,2,3)
• Telugu: (vArasatvamu)^{(please verify)} వారసత్వము (te) (vārasatvamu)

References

• Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “inheritance”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.