▪ I. lineage Now only literary.
(ˈlɪnɪɪdʒ)
Forms: 4–7 li(g)n-, ly(g)nage, (5 len-, lyne-, lyngnage, 6 linn-, lyna(d)ge), 7– lineage.
[a. OF. lignage, linage = Pr. linhatge, Sp. linaje, Pg. linhagem, It. lignaggio, legnaggio:—L. type *līneāticum (see -age), f. līnea line n.2 The spelling lineage, which appears late in the 17th c., is prob. due to association with line n.2; the mod. pronunciation is influenced by lineal or L. līnea.]
1. a. Lineal descent from an ancestor; ancestry, pedigree.
| a 1330 Otuel 336 Tel me..Of what linage þou art come. c 1385 Chaucer L.G.W. 1820 Lucrece, Tarquinius that..sholdist as be lynage & be right Don as a lord & as a worthi knyght. c 1440 Generydes 3873 The Kyng of Egipte, born of highe lenage. 1489 Caxton Faytes of A. i. vii. 16 The gretenes of his lignage and hye blood of his persone. 1547–64 Bauldwin Mor. Philos. (Palfr.) 64 He, that to his noble linage addeth vertue & good conditions, is highly to be praised. 1586 Queen Elizabeth in Ellis Orig. Lett. Ser. i. III. 23, I am not of so base a linage, nor cary so vile a minde. 1606 G. W[oodcocke] Hist. Ivstine xli. 129 There was at the same time one Arsaces, though of unknown lynage, yet of approued valor. 1701 Rowe Amb. Step-Moth. iii. iii. 41 Thou art the Father of our Kings, The stem whence their high lineage springs. 1748 Richardson Clarissa (1811) VIII. 209, I have..been thought to disgrace my lineage. 1767 Blackstone Comm. II. 233 When the lineage is clearly made out, there is no need of this auxiliary proof. 1835 Lytton Rienzi i. i, The quiet and lowly spirit of my mother's humble lineage. 1852 Mrs. Stowe Uncle Tom's C. vii. 43 She was..so white as not to be known as of coloured lineage without a critical survey. 1875 Stubbs Const. Hist. I. xiii. 546 Norman lineage was vulgarly regarded as the more honourable. |
† b. said of animals and inanimate objects. Obs.
| c 1435 Torr. Portugal 493 Ther be hawkes, ase I herd seyne, That byn of lenage gene. 1607 Topsell Four-f. Beasts (1658) 253 These are said to refuse copulation with any other Horses that are not of their own kinde and linage. 1635 Swan Spec. M. v. §2 (1643) 153 White hoar-frost is of the house and linage of dew. 1693 Sir T. P. Blount Nat. Hist. 195 They proceed in the Main from the same Stock and Linage, and are all more or less of the Kindred of Salts. 1697 Dryden Virg. Georg. iii. 252 Distinguish all betimes, with branding Fire; To note the Tribe, the Lineage, and the Sire. |
2. quasi-concr. (Chiefly collect.) † a. The persons through whom one's ‘lineage’ (sense 1) is traced; one's ancestors collectively. [So F. lignage, in opposition to lignée = descendants.] Obs.
| 13.. K. Alis. 3068 Thow woldest geve vyl trowage; So dude never non of thy lynage. 1470–85 Malory Arthur v. x, Duke Iosue and Machabeus were of oure lygnage. 1500–20 Dunbar Poems xxiv. 402 My linage and forebearis war ay lele. 1557 North Gueuara's Diall Pr. 46 His linage was not of the lowest sort of the people..but were men that lyved by the swete of their browes. |
b. The descendants of a specified ancestor [= F. lignée]. † Also rarely applied to an individual descendant.
| 1303 R. Brunne Handl. Synne 2883 She wepte nat for any outrage But for of here come no lynage; Þat no fruyt of here myȝt spryng [Orig. pur defaute de ligne]. c 1375 Sc. Leg. Saints xxix. (Placidas) 254 Þat herytag þat to man I hicht & his lynag. ? a 1400 Arthur 269 Y am þeir Eyr & þeyre lynage. 1430–40 Lydg. Bochas i. vii. (1554) 10 Tencrease his lynage..He toke a wife that was but yong of age. 1485 Caxton Chas. Gt. 21 Pepyn..was chosen kyng of Fraunce when the lygnage of kyng cloys faylled. a 1548 Hall Chron., Hen. VI 183 With hym died..heires of greate parentage in the Southe parte, whose linages revenged their deaths. 1573 L. Lloyd Pilgr. Princes (1586) 167 b, Fully perswaded with himselfe that hee was of the linage of the Gods. 1623 tr. Favine's Theat. Hon. vi. iii. 118 Of this Mariage ensued a plenteous lignage, to witt, three Sonnes and foure Daughters. 1750 Johnson Rambler No. 34 ¶3, I am now arrived at that part of life in which every man is expected to settle and provide for the continuation of his lineage. 1838 Thirlwall Greece II. xii. 154 Callias, a seer sprung from the gifted lineage of Iamus. 1863 H. Cox Instit. i. vii. 65 The dignity of the peerage..was confined to the lineage of the person ennobled. |
| fig. 1863 Kinglake Crimea (1876) I. ii. 37 The ‘Eastern Question’, as it was called, had become consecrated by its descent through a great lineage of Statesmen. |
c. A family or race viewed with reference to its descent; a tribe, clan. spec. in Anthrop., patri- or matrilineal descent within a social group traced from a single ancestor; also occas. the traditional line of descent for the handing down of skills and knowledge pertaining to a particular craft or profession.
| ? a 1366 Chaucer Rom. Rose 258 She [Envye] is ful glad, in hir corage, If she see any greet linage Be brought to nought in shamful wise. 1387 Trevisa Higden (Rolls) III. 51 Þat was þe bygynnynge of þe þraldom of þe ten lynages of Israel. c 1400 Mandeville (1839) xxi. 224 The first Nacyoun or Lynage was clept Tartar. 1483 Caxton G. de la Tour d v b, The fait or dede whiche..the humayne lynage bought ful dere. 1532 Galway Arch. in 10th Rep. Hist. MSS. Comm. App. V. 405 Whatsoever man or woman shall make any comperacion betwixt lynadge and [l]inadge..shuld..forfayte an hundrid shillinges. 1604 E. G[rimstone] D'Acosta's Hist. Indies i. xxv. 80 From him sprang two families or linages. 1871 L. H. Morgan in Smithsonian Contrib. Knowl. No. 218. 151 There were but five other nations of the same immediate lineage of whom we have any knowledge. 1877 ― Anc. Society ii. 69 The gens came into being upon three principal conceptions, namely; the bond of kin, a pure lineage through descent in the female line, and non-intermarriage in the gens. 1934 R. H. Lowie Introd. Cultural Anthropol. xiv. 254 A clan including only descendants of a single ancestor is a ‘lineage’. Commonly it includes members of two or more lineages, but the concept remains the same. 1949 M. Fortes Social Struct. 62 Genealogies are cited to show that the founding ancestors of the lineages occupying the townships..came there some ten to twelve generations ago. 1951 R. Firth Elem. Social Organiz. ii. 53 The Tikopia lineages are patrilineal, membership being traced through the father along the male line to an original male ancestor. 1952 Gerth & Martindale tr. Weber's Anc. Judaism i. ii. 28 Cain is the tribal father of the smith and the musician... It may, thus, be assumed that at the time of the establishment of this lineage such artisans, in Palestine as in India, were guest people. 1957 M. Banton W. Afr. City vii. 123 Marriage is an arrangement between two lineages. 1963 Listener 7 Feb. 231/1 Arabic documents held by the mosques and the clerical lineages in Northern Nigeria and in Northern Ghana. 1971 World Archaeol. III. 217 Each village has a number of smiths of varying degrees of training and competence each assisted by novices who together form a lineage. |
| attrib. 1949 M. Fortes Social Struct. 65 Continuity in the social structure..is maintained by the lineage system. 1951 R. Firth Elem. Social Organiz. ii. 54 They and their immediate lineage members form a recognized class of ‘chiefly houses’. 1957 V. W. Turner Schism & Continuity in Afr. Soc. v. 152 They consolidate the rest of the..lineage membership against them. 1964 Gould & Kolb Dict. Social Sci. 391/2 Relations between the local groups, which may vary in size and locality over time, can none the less be seen as persistent and relatively stable. In this case lineages may compose a total structure or system, the lineage structure or the lineage system. |
Add: 3. Biol. A sequence of species each of which is considered to have evolved from its predecessor.
| 1940 J. S. L. Gilmour in J. S. Huxley New Systematics 469 The palaeobiologist..working with fossil material, expresses his phylogenetic judgments in terms of lineages. For example, Arkell and Moy Thomas..describe parallel lineages in the evolution of the Ammonites in Devonian rocks. 1951 G. S. Carter Animal Evolution i. 30 This conception is very different from that generally held a few years ago. A population was then thought of as consisting of many lines or lineages, each evolving more or less independently and replacing each other as the result of natural selection. 1983 E. C. Minkoff Evolutionary Biol. xvii. 278/2 A lineage is defined as a succession of species arranged in a continuous ancestor-to-descendant sequence. 1992 Discover May 30/2 Anthropologists..had assumed that all modern humans descended from Homo erectus, a hominid lineage that left Africa a million years ago. |
▪ II. lineage
var. linage.