bloodline
Americannoun
-
bloodlines
plural
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of bloodline
Explanation
Your bloodline is your heritage or ancestry. In other words, your bloodline includes your parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and so on. You might talk about the bloodline of a show dog, bragging about the pedigree of your funny-looking terrier. Sometime a horse's bloodline is also a selling point, particularly when someone is betting on a race horse. You have a bloodline too, although the word more often describes the heritage of a famous or royal family. The Old English root word blod, means "blood." By the 13th century, blood also meant "family" or "heritage."
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Under the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause, they must do so without regard to bloodline.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 17, 2026
The “Game of Thrones” prequel boasts many dragons, most of them bound to the Targaryen royal bloodline.
From Salon ● Jun. 24, 2026
"Nobody discusses infertility, nobody discusses egg donation because it isn't the bloodline."
From BBC ● Mar. 7, 2026
The Kim family has ruled North Korea with an iron grip for decades, and a cult of personality surrounding their "Paektu bloodline" dominates daily life in the isolated country.
From Barron's ● Feb. 26, 2026
When his actions are recognized as skilful, they strike men much more and bind them to him more strongly than does antiquity of bloodline.
From "The Prince" by Niccolò Machiavelli
"You're losing bloodlines as well. So it's all got an impact. It has to be thought about."
From BBC ● Aug. 2, 2026
The reunion focused primarily on descendants of Willie Rosenthal’s son, the Rev. Taylor Rosenthal Sr., his 10 children and each of their respective bloodlines.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 21, 2026
In Cleveland, I found relatives whose faces felt like mirrors of mine, an eerie recognition that happens when bloodlines reintroduce themselves after decades of distance.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 5, 2025
“When it was introduced, every breeder jumped on it for its bloodlines because of its fragrance and foliage,” Carruth said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 25, 2025
Atlanta—the Imperial City of the KKK’s Invisible Empire, in Klan jargon—was also home to Stetson Kennedy, a thirty- year-old man with the bloodlines of a Klansman but a temperament that ran opposite.
From "Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything" by Steven D. Levitt
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
