Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Capable of being passed from one generation to the next; hereditary.
  • adjective Capable of inheriting or taking by inheritance.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Capable of being inherited; inheritable; in Scots law, passing by inheritance to heirs at law: as, heritable rights or possessions, consisting of land and all things attached to or connected with it, and sometimes of other things made descendible by succession, in distinction from movable rights or property, consisting of things not so attached or descendible.
  • Capable of inheriting or taking by descent.
  • noun In Scots law, a possession or right which may be inherited, or which may descend by succession.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Capable of being inherited or of passing by inheritance; inheritable.
  • adjective Capable of inheriting or receiving by inheritance.
  • adjective (Scots Law) rights of the heir; rights to land or whatever may be intimately connected with land; realty.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective able to be inherited, passed from parents to their children

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective capable of being inherited

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old French, from heriter, to inherit, from Late Latin hērēditāre; see inherit.]

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Examples

  • As evolution is defined as heritable allelic changes over time, if sufficient time does not pass, evolution may not happen.

    Evolution 2008

  • A trait or disease is called heritable if monozygotic twins are more similar to each other than dizygotic twins.

    PhysOrg.com - latest science and technology news stories 2009

  • It means that they have view of religion as a strongly 'heritable' characteristic, much more so, I would argue, than is empirically the case in developed capitalist democracies.

    Those Evil Muuuuslems Garry 2006

  • In some States he descended as realty, in others as personalty, while in others still, he constituted a separate kind of heritable estate, which was especially provided for in the canons of descent and statutes regulating administration.

    Bricks without Straw A Novel 1880

  • In some States he descended as realty, in others as personalty, while in others still, he constituted a separate kind of heritable estate, which was especially provided for in the canons of descent and statutes regulating administration.

    Bricks Without Straw Albion Winegar Tourg��e 1871

  • Bouchard and colleagues used the words "heritable" and "heritability" to describe their results.

    The Genius in All of Us 2009

  • "heritable" should never be used so casually in a New York Times article, for the very simple reason that it does not mean what non-scientists think it means.

    The Genius in All of Us 2009

  • And heritability itself is a funny thing that isn't as heritable as people often imagine.

    ADHD's roots are complex Johnjoe McFadden 2010

  • Providing an assessment of heritable risk factors and information to patients and their relatives concerning the consequences of a condition, the probability of developing or transmitting it, and ways in which it can be prevented, treated and managed.

    Glossary 2010

  • Race defined as, he categorization of humans into populations or groups on the basis of various sets of heritable characteristics.

    EXTRALIFE – By Scott Johnson - BSG at the UN 2009

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