heir
Pronunciation Noun
  1. Someone who inherits, or is designated to inherit, the property of another.
    • c. 1590–1592, William Shakespeare, “The Taming of the Shrew”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358 ↗, [Act II, scene i]:
      I am my father's heir and only son.
  2. One who inherits, or has been designated to inherit, a hereditary title or office.
  3. A successor in a role, representing continuity with the predecessor.
    • 1725, Homer; [Elijah Fenton], transl., “Book I”, in The Odyssey of Homer. […], volume I, London: Printed for Bernard Lintot, OCLC 8736646 ↗:
      And I his heir in misery alone.
    • 1907, Robert William Chambers, chapter I, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, OCLC 24962326 ↗:
      "I wish we were back in Tenth Street. But so many children came […] and the Tenth Street house wasn't half big enough; and a dreadful speculative builder built this house and persuaded Austin to buy it. Oh, dear, and here we are among the rich and great; and the steel kings and copper kings and oil kings and their heirs and dauphins. […]"
Synonyms Translations Translations Translations Verb

heir (heirs, present participle heiring; past and past participle heired)

  1. (ambitransitive) To inherit.
    • 1950, quoted in Our Garst family in America (page 27)
      […] Leonard Houtz & John Myer to be executors to this my last will & testament & lastly my children shall heir equally, one as much as the other.



This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.003
Offline English dictionary