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GENEALOGICAL DICTIONARY
Page One  "A-M"
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                                              ABSTRACT - Summary of important points of a given text,
                                              especially deeds and wills.
                                              ACRE - See measurements.
                                              ADMINISTRATION (of estate) - The collection,
                                              management and distribution of an estate by proper legal
                                              process.
                                              ADMINISTRATOR (of estate) - Person appointed to
                                              manage or divide the estate of a deceased person.
                                              ADMINISTRATRIX - A female administrator.
                                              AFFIDAVIT - A statement in writing, sworn to before
                                              proper authority.
                                              ALIEN - Foreigner.
                                              AMERICAN REVOLUTION - U.S. war for independence
                                               from Great Britain 1775 -1783.
                                              ANCESTOR - A person from whom you are descended;
                                              a forefather.
                                              ANTE - Latin prefix meaning before, such as in ante-bellum
                                              South, "The South before the war"
                                              APPRENTICE - One who is bound by indentures or by l
                                              egal agreement or by any means to serve another person for
                                              a certain time, with a view of learning an art or trade.
                                              APPURTENANCE - That which belongs to something else
                                              such as a building, orchard, right of way, etc.
                                              ARCHIVES - Records of a government, organization,
                                               institution; the place where records are stored.
                                               ATTEST - To affirm; to certify by signature or oath
  

 


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                                               BANNS - Public announcement of intended marriage.
                                               BENEFICIARY - One who receives benefit of trust or
                                               property.
                                               BEQUEATH - To give personal property to a person in
                                               a will. Noun --bequest.
                                               BOND - Written, signed, witnessed agreement requiring
                                               payment of a specified amount of money on or before a
                                               given date.
                                               BOUNTY LAND WARRANT - A right to obtain land,
                                               specific number of acres of unallocated public land,
                                               granted for military service.
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                                               CENSUS - Official enumeration, listing or counting of
                                               citizens.
                                               CERTIFIED COPY - A copy made and attested to by
                                               officers
                                               having charge of the original and authorized to give copies.
                                               CHAIN - See measurements.
                                               CHATTEL - Personal property which can include animate
                                               as well as  inanimate properties.
                                               CHRISTEN - To receive or initiate into
                                               the visible church by baptism; to name at baptism; to give a
                                               name to.
                                               CIRCA - About, near, or approximate -- usually referring
                                               to a date.
                                               CIVIL WAR - War between the States; war between
                                               North and South, 1861 -65.
                                               CODICIL - Addition to a will.
                                               COLLATERAL ANCESTOR - Belong to the same
                                               ancestral stock but not in direct line of descent; opposed
                                               to lineal such as aunts, uncles & cousins.
                                               COMMON ANCESTOR - Ancestor shared by any two
                                               people.
                                               CONFEDERATE - Pertaining to the Southern states which
                                               seceded
                                               from the U.S. in 1860 - 1, their government and their
                                               citizens.
                                               CONSANGUINITY - Blood relationship.
                                               CONSORT - Usually, a wife whose husband is living
                                               CONVEYANCE - See deed.
                                               COUSIN - Relative descended from a common ancestral
                                               grandmother or grandfather.
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                                               DAUGHTER-IN-LAW - Wife of one's son.
                                               DECEASED - Dead.
                                               DECEDENT - A deceased person.
                                               DECLARATION OF INTENTION - First paper, sworn to
                                               and filed in court, by an alien stating that he wants to be
                                               come a citizen.
                                               DEED - A document by which title in real property is
                                               transferred from one party to another.
                                               DEPOSITION - A testifying or testimony taken down
                                               in writing under oath of affirmation in reply to                                                                                                                     interrogatories, before a competent officer to replace to                                                                                                       oral testimony of a witness.
                                               DEVISE - Gift of real property by will.
                                               DEVISEE - One to whom real property (land) is given
                                               in a will.
                                               DEVISOR - One who gives real property in a will.
                                               DISSENTER - One who did not belong to the established
                                               church, especially  the Church of England in the American
                                               colonies.
                                               DISTRICT LAND OFFICE PLAT BOOK - Books or
                                               rather maps which show the\par location of the land
                                               patentee.
                                               DISTRICT LAND OFFICE TRACT BOOK - Books
                                               which list individual entries by range and township.
                                               DOUBLE DATING - A system of double dating used in
                                               England and America  from 1582-1752 because it was
                                               not clear as to whether the year commenced  January 1
                                               or March 25
                                               DOWER - Legal right or share which a wife acquired
                                               by marriage in the real estate of her husband, allotted to
                                               her after his death for her lifetime.
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                                               EMIGRANT - One leaving a country and moving to
                                               another.
                                               ENUMERATION - Listing or counting , such as a
                                               census.
                                               EPITAPH - An inscription on or at a tomb or grave in
                                               memory of the one  buried there.
                                               ESCHEAT - The reversion of property to the state
                                               when there are no qualified heirs.
                                               ESTATE - All property and debts belonging to a
                                               person.
                                               ET AL - Latin for "and others".
                                               ET UX - Latin for " and wife".
                                               ET UXOR - And his wife. Sometimes written simply
                                               Et Ux.
                                               EXECUTOR - One appointed in a will to carry out its
                                               provisions. Female = Executrix 
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                                               FATHER-IN-LAW - Father of one's spouse.
                                               FEE - An estate of inheritance in land, being either fee
                                               simple or fee  tail. An estate in land held of a feudal lord
                                               on condition of the  performing of certain services.
                                               FEE SIMPLE - An absolute ownership without restriction.
                                               FEE TAIL - An estate of inheritance limited to lineal
                                               descendant heirs of\par a person to whom it was granted.
                                               FRANKLIN, STATE OF - An area once known but never
                                               officially recognized  and was under consideration from
                                               1784 - 1788 from the western part of  North Carolina.
                                               FRATERNITY - Group of men (or women) sharing a
                                               common purpose or interest.
                                               FREE HOLD - An estate in fee simple, in fee tail, or for                                                                                                    life.
                                               FRIEND - Member of the Religious Society of Friends; a
                                               Quaker.
                                               FURLONG - See measurements.
 



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                                               GAZETTEER - A geographical dictionary; a book giving
                                               names and descriptions of places usually in alphabetical
                                               order.
                                               GENEALOGY - Study of family history and descent.
                                               GENTLEMAN - A man well born.
                                               GIVEN NAME - Name given to a person at birth or
                                               baptism, one's  first and middle names.
                                               GLEBE - Land belonging to a parish church.
                                               GRANTEE - One who buys property or receives
                                               a grant.
                                               GRANTOR - One who sells property or makes
                                               a grant.
                                               GREAT-AUNT - Sister of one's grandparent
                                               GREAT-UNCLE - Brother of one's grandparent.
                                               GUARDIAN - Person appointed to care for and manage
                                               property of a minor orphan or an adult incompetent of
                                               managing his own affairs.

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                                               HALF BROTHER/HALF SISTER - Child by another
                                               marriage of one's mother or  father.  Siblings having
                                               only one parent in common.
                                               HEIRS - Those entitled by law or by the terms of a will
                                               to inherit  property from another.
                                               HOLOGRAPHIC WILL - One written entirely in the
                                               testator's own  handwriting. 
                                               HOMESTEAD ACT - Law passed by Congress
                                               in 1862 allowing a head of a family to obtain title
                                               to 160 acres of public land after clearing and
                                               improving it for 5 years.
                                               HUGUENOT - A French Protestant in the 16th and
                                               17th centuries. One of the  reformed or calvinistic
                                               communion who were driven by the thousands into 
                                               exile in England, Holland, Germany and America.


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                                               ILLEGITIMATE - Born to a mother who was not
                                               married to the child's father.
                                               IMMIGRANT - One moving into a country from
                                               another.
                                               INDENTURE - Today it means a contract in 2 or
                                               more copies. Originally made in 2 parts by cutting
                                               or tearing a single sheet across the middle in a
                                               jagged line so the two parts may later be matched.
                                               INDENTURED SERVANT - One who bound
                                               himself into service of another person\par for a specified
                                               number of years, often in return for transportation to
                                               this country.
                                               INFANT - Any person not of full age; a minor.
                                               INTESTATE - One who dies without a will or dying
                                               without a will.
                                               INVENTORY - An account, catalog or schedule,
                                               made by an executor or administrator of all the
                                               goods and chattels and sometimes of the real estate
                                               of a deceased person.
                                               ISSUE - Offspring; children; lineal descendants of a
                                               common ancestor.

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                                               LATE - Recently deceased.
                                               LEASE - An agreement which creates a landlord - tenant
                                               situation.
                                               LEGACY - Property or money left to someone in a will
                                               LEGISLATURE - Lawmaking branch of state or national
                                               government; elected group of lawmakers.
                                               LIEN - A claim against property as security for payment
                                               of a debt.
                                               LINEAGE - Ancestry; direct descent from a specific
                                               ancestor.
                                               LINEAL - Consisting of or being in a direct line of
                                               ancestry or descendants; descended in a direct line.
                                               LINK - See measurements.
                                               LIS PENDENS - Pending court action; usually applies
                                               to land title claims.
                                               LODGE - A chapter or meeting
                                               hall of a fraternal organization.
                                               LOYALIST - Tory, an American colonist who supported
                                               the British side during the American Revolution.
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                                               MAIDEN NAME - A girl's last name or surname before
                                               she marries.
                &nb