Inheritance /(?)/

In·her·it·ance

Inheritance

n.
  1. The act or state of inheriting; as, the inheritance of an estate; the inheritance of mental or physical qualities.
  2. That which is or may be inherited; that which is derived by an heir from an ancestor or other person; a heritage; a possession which passes by descent.
    When the man dies, let the inheritance Descend unto the daughter.
  3. A permanent or valuable possession or blessing, esp. one received by gift or without purchase; a benefaction.
    To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away.
    — 1 Pet. i. 4.
  4. Possession; ownership; acquisition.
    To you th' inheritance belongs by right Of brother's praise; to you eke 'longs his love.
  5. Transmission and reception by animal or plant generation. (Biol.)
  6. A perpetual or continuing right which a man and his heirs have to an estate; an estate which a man has by descent as heir to another, or which he may transmit to another as his heir; an estate derived from an ancestor to an heir in course of law. (Law)
    Men are not proprietors of what they have, merely for themselves; their children have a title to part of it which comes to be wholly theirs when death has put an end to their parents' use of it; and this we call inheritance.