Filiation

Also 6 filiacion. [a. F. filiation, ad. med.L. fīliātiōn-em, n. of action f. fīliāre, recorded in sense ‘to give birth to,’ f. L. fīli-us son.]

  1.  Theol. The process of becoming, or the condition of being, a son.

  Many Dicts. have a sense ‘adoption as a son,’ illustrated by the first of our quots. from Donne. The sense is etymologically justifiable, and may probably exist; but quot. 1628² seems to show that it was not intended by Donne.

a. 1529.  Skelton, Prayers, To the Father, 18.

1628.  Donne, Serm., vi. (1640), 56. God hath forgot all these paternities, all these filiations, all these incorporations, all these inviscerations of Israel into his owne bosome. Ibid., 57. God shall forget his former Paternities and our former Filiations.

1720.  Waterland, Eight Serm., 155. Those Expressions of Image, or Form of God, relate to Christ’s Sonship or Filiation.

1893.  Fairbairn, Christ in Mod. Theol., 491. Continuous incarnation is progressive filiation.

  2.  The designating (of a person) as a son; ascription of sonship.

1659.  Pearson, Creed, ii. 208. After our Saviours Nomination immediately followeth his Filiation.

  3.  The fact of being the child of a specified parent. Also, a person’s parentage; ‘whose son one is.’

1611.  Speed, Hist. Gt. Brit., IX. xix. § 4. Yee be borne within this Land; by reason whereof, as we deeme in our mindes, yee be more naturally inclined to the prosperity and Common-weale of the same: and all the three Estates of the Land haue and may haue more certaine knowledge of your birth and filiation aforesaid.

1799.  Malone, in Boswell’s Johnson, an. 1744. Mr. Cust’s reasoning, with respect to the filiation of Richard Savage, always appeared to me extremely unsatisfactory.

1855.  H. Spencer, Princ. Psychol. (1872), II. VIII. v. 569. Where polyandry prevails, and paternity is uncertain or wholly unknown, there is not likely to be so active a sympathy of men towards children as where the monogamous relation makes filiation clear.

  4.  The fact of being descended or derived, or of originating from; descent, transmission from.

1799.  Kirwan, Geol. Ess., 323. The resemblance observed between bituminated carbonated wood and mineral coal, arises from the similarity of their composition, both being formed of carbon and bitumen, but by no means evinces the filiation of the latter from the former.

1850.  Merivale, Rom. Emp. (1865), I. Pref. 13. The ideas and institutions of modern Europe are derived by more direct filiation from those of Rome than of Greece.

1874.  Mahaffy, Soc. Life Greece, vii. 199. There is not evidence enough to prove the custom at Athens, and to show the filiation of Aristophanes’ comedies from these choruses, though coruses were undoubtedly the origin of all developed drama in Greece.

  5.  The relation of one thing to another from which it may be said to be descended or derived; position in a genealogical classification.

1794.  Kirwan, Min., I. p. xv. The intricate filiation and connection of these productions.

1859.  Darwin, Orig. Spec., xiv. (1873), 371. The various degrees of difference between the languages of the same stock, would have to be expressed by groups subordinate to groups; but the proper or even the only possible arrangement would still be genealogical; and this would be strictly natural, as it would connect together all languages, extinct and recent, by the closest affinities, and would give the filiation and origin of each tongue.

1864.  H. Spencer, Illustr. Univ. Progr., 131. This he [Comte] asserts to be ‘the true filiation of the sciences.’

  6.  Formation of branches or offshoots; chiefly concr., a branch or offshoot of a society or language.

1777.  W. Dalrymple, Trav. Sp. & Port., 110. The order of Alcantara, was instituted a filiation of Calatrava.

1814.  Berington, Lit. Hist. Mid. Ages, v. (1846), 231. The northern dialects were more advanced. They were filiations from one Common Stock.

1832.  Blackw. Mag., XXXI. Jan., 65/1. The democratical party, with their numerous filiations, in the towns.

1890.  J. T. Fowler, Cistercian Statutes, 5. That great system of filiation and visitation which went so far to make up what has been called the ‘Cistercian idea.’

  7.  = AFFILIATION 3. lit. and fig.

1561.  in Child-Marriages (E.E.T.S.), 86. Margaret Wilkinson came to the Vicar of Budworth with a filiacion.

1839.  Ld. Brougham, Statesm. Geo. III. (ed. 2), 60. Upon application for a mandamus to the justices to make an order of filiation upon a foreign ambassador’s secretary, he somewhat hastily refused it.

  fig.  1791.  Boswell, Johnson, an. 1761. The filiation of a literary performance is difficult of proof.

1887.  Saintsbury, Hist. Elizab. Lit., xii. (1890), 448. The direct filiation of euphuism on Spanish originals is no doubt erroneous.