Hereditary

How to spell hereditary

10 letters · 5 syllables

How to pronounce hereditary

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does hereditary mean?

1. adjectivePassed down from one generation to the next, whether a biological trait, a title, or a possession.

Hereditary in a sentence

• The doctor asked whether the condition was hereditary in her family.

• The crown passes by hereditary succession to the eldest child.

Where does hereditary come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin hereditarius, meaning 'relating to an inheritance', which was built on hereditas, the Latin word for an inheritance or estate passed on at death. At the root sits heres (with the stem hered-), the Latin word for an heir, the person who takes possession of property when its owner dies. English adopted hereditary in the early fifteenth century, at first in the strictly legal sense of property, titles, and rights handed down from parent to child, and only later did it broaden to describe biological traits passed through the bloodline. The same Latin heres lives on in the everyday words heir, heritage, and inherit, which is a useful memory hook: all of them keep that 'her' opening, and hereditary simply adds the buried syllables 'ed-it-ary' that writers so often slur over. The trickiest part of the spelling is exactly those unstressed middle vowels, since the ear hears something like 'huh-RED-i-tree' and gives no clue that an 'a' belongs before the final 'ry'.

How the word is built

• hered- (from Latin heres, hered-: heir)
• -it- (linking)
• -ary (adjective suffix: relating to)