Emily Dickinson Lexicon
Definition for FAM'I-LY
FAM'I-LY, n. [L. and Sp. familia; Fr. famille; It. famiglia. This word is said to have originally signified servants, from the Celtic famul; but qu.]
- The collective body of persons who live in one house and under one head or manager; a household, including parents, children, and servants, and as the case may be, lodgers or boarders.
- Those who descend from one common progenitor; a tribe or race; kindred; lineage. Thus the Israelites were a branch of the family of Abraham; and the descendants in of Reuben, of Manasseh, &c., were called their families. The whole human race are the family of Adam, the human family.
- Course of descent; genealogy; line of ancestors. Go and complain thy family is young. Pope.
- Honorable descent; noble or respectable stock. He is a man of family.
- A collection or union of nations or states. The states of Europe were, by the prevailing maxims of its policy, closely united in one family. E. Everett.
- In popular language, an order, class or genus of animals or of other natural productions, having something in common, by which they are distinguished from others; as, quadrupeds constitute a family of animals, and we speak of the family or families of plants.
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