HERITAGE

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does heritage mean? 

• HERITAGE (noun)
  The noun HERITAGE has 4 senses:

1. practices that are handed down from the past by tradition

2. any attribute or immaterial possession that is inherited from ancestors

3. that which is inherited; a title or property or estate that passes by law to the heir on the death of the owner

4. hereditary succession to a title or an office or property

  Familiarity information: HERITAGE used as a noun is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• HERITAGE (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Practices that are handed down from the past by tradition

Classified under:

Nouns denoting cognitive processes and contents

Context example:

a heritage of freedom

Hypernyms ("heritage" is a kind of...):

practice (knowledge of how something is usually done)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Any attribute or immaterial possession that is inherited from ancestors

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

heritage; inheritance

Context example:

the world's heritage of knowledge

Hypernyms ("heritage" is a kind of...):

attribute (an abstraction belonging to or characteristic of an entity)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "heritage"):

birthright (personal characteristics that are inherited at birth)

background (a person's social heritage: previous experience or training)

birthright (a right or privilege that you are entitled to at birth)

upbringing (properties acquired during a person's formative years)

Sense 3

Meaning:

That which is inherited; a title or property or estate that passes by law to the heir on the death of the owner

Classified under:

Nouns denoting possession and transfer of possession

Synonyms:

heritage; inheritance

Hypernyms ("heritage" is a kind of...):

transferred possession; transferred property (a possession whose ownership changes or lapses)

Meronyms (parts of "heritage"):

heirloom ((law) any property that is considered by law or custom as inseparable from an inheritance is inherited with that inheritance)

Domain category:

jurisprudence; law (the collection of rules imposed by authority)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "heritage"):

primogeniture (right of inheritance belongs exclusively to the eldest son)

borough English (a former English custom by which the youngest son inherited land to the exclusion of his older brothers)

accretion ((law) an increase in a beneficiary's share in an estate (as when a co-beneficiary dies or fails to meet some condition or rejects the inheritance))

bequest; legacy ((law) a gift of personal property by will)

birthright; patrimony (an inheritance coming by right of birth (especially by primogeniture))

devise ((law) a gift of real property by will)

heirloom (something that has been in a family for generations)

Sense 4

Meaning:

Hereditary succession to a title or an office or property

Classified under:

Nouns denoting acts or actions

Synonyms:

heritage; inheritance

Hypernyms ("heritage" is a kind of...):

acquisition (the act of contracting or assuming or acquiring possession of something)

 Context examples 

They often have a common genetic heritage which may be reflected in their experience of health and disease.

(Ethnic Group, NCI Thesaurus)

He could not immediately forego his wild heritage and his memories of the Wild.

(White Fang, by Jack London)

We may well say that 'our lot is cast in a goodly heritage.'

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

"Their heritage must be clean, and he is, I am afraid, not clean. Your father has told me of sailors' lives, and—and you understand."

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

It is their inborn heritage to strive to devour, and to strive not to be devoured. When they depart from this they sin.

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

As if loveliness were not the special prerogative of woman—her legitimate appanage and heritage!

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Where the real sex feeling begins, timidity and distrust are its companions, heritage from old wicked days when love and violence went often hand in hand.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The heritage of law was hers, and right conduct, to her, was the fulfilment of the law.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

A social group characterized by a distinctive social and cultural tradition maintained from generation to generation, a common history and origin and a sense of identification with the group; members of the group have distinctive features in their way of life, shared experiences and often a common genetic heritage; these features may be reflected in their experience of health and disease.

(CDISC SDTM Ethnic Group Terminology, NCI Thesaurus/CDISC)

No man who looked upon that motley crowd could deny that, for good or evil, the love of the ring was confined to no class, but was a national peculiarity, deeply seated in the English nature, and a common heritage of the young aristocrat in his drag and of the rough costers sitting six deep in their pony cart.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)