Search the Dictionary

Any one of the popular dialects descended from, or akin to, Sanskrit; -- in distinction from the Sanskrit, which was used as a literary and learned language when no longer spoken by the people. Pali is one of the Prakrit dialects.

To descend by gravity; to sink. [R.] Boyle.

To exceed in weight; hence, to incline or descend, as the scale of a balance; figuratively, to exceed in influence, power, etc.; hence; to incline to one side; as, the affirmative side preponderated. That is no just balance in which the heaviest side will not preponderate. Bp. Wilkins.

Going before; preceding; hence, preventive. "Prevenient grace descending." Milton.

remote ancestors will never achieve anything worthy to be remembered with pride by remote descendants. Macaulay.

o the throne by primogeniture. In exceptional cases, among the female children, the crown descends by right of primogeniture to the eldest daughter only and her issue. Blackstone.

Descending far below the surface; opening or reaching to a great depth; deep. "A gulf profound." Milton.

Descendants of the human kind, or offspring of other animals; children; offspring; race, lineage. " Issued from the progeny of kings." Shak.

A species is a class of individuals, each of which is hypothetically considered to be the descendant of the same protoplast, or of the same pair of protoplasts. Latham.

d achievements of gods and heroes, the reigns of the Manus, and the transactions of their descendants. The principal Puranas are eighteen in number, and there are the same number of supplementary books called Upa Puranas.

The descendants of a common ancestor; a family, tribe, people, or nation, believed or presumed to belong to the same stock; a lineage; a breed. The whole race of mankind. Shak. Whence the long race of Alban fathers come. Dryden.

parts ascending in the air, till, encountering the cold, it be condensed into clouds, and descends in drops. Ray. Fair days have oft contracted wind and rain. Milton.

A falling back or descending a second time; a relapse. W. Montagu.

One of the descendants of Jonadab, the son of Rechab, all of whom by his injunction abstained from the use of intoxicating drinks and even from planting the vine. Jer. xxxv. 2-19. Also, in modern times, a member of a certain society of abstainers from alcoholic liquors.

mbers of a lower into others of a higher denomination, as cents to dollars. -- Reduction descending (Arith.), the operation of changing numbers of a higher into others of a lower denomination, as dollars to cents.

Bending or flying back; reflected. "The ray descendent, and the ray reflectent flying with so great a speed." Sir K. Digby.

The descending, and commonly branching, axis of a plant, increasing in length by growth at its extremity only, not divided into joints, leafless and without buds, and having for its offices to fix the plant in the earth, to supply it with moisture and soluble matters, and sometimes to serve as a reservoir of nutriment…

tant of Roumania; also, the language of Roumania, one of the Romance or Romanic languages descended from Latin, but containing many words from other languages, as Slavic, Turkish, and Greek.

To flow, as a liquid; to ascend or descend; to course; as, rivers run to the sea; sap runs up in the spring; her blood ran cold.

ect preservation of the roots and forms of the primitive language from which they are all descended, is a most important assistance in determining their history and relations. Cf. Prakrit, and Veda.