inheritance

noun

1. Money, property, or possessions that someone receives after another person dies.

   B1

   countable or uncountable

   • "She received a small inheritance from her grandfather."B1
   • "He used his inheritance to buy a house."B2
   • "Inheritance laws vary from country to country."B2

2. A characteristic, quality, tradition, or situation passed from parents or earlier generations to later ones.

   B2

   uncountable

   • "Music is an important part of our cultural inheritance."B2
   • "Eye color is a genetic inheritance."B1

3. In computing, a feature that allows a class or object to receive properties and methods from another class or object.

   C1

   uncountabletechnical

   • "Inheritance allows a new class to reuse code from an existing class."C1