Word.ws English Dictionary

heirs presumptive

heirs presumptive is the plural of heir presumptive.

Meaning of heir presumptive

Noun

heir presumptive (plural heirs presumptive)

  1. Someone who will become an heir (usually to a monarchy) only if no-one with a higher-ranking claim is born.
    • I am quite aware that your premature decease would leave me heir-presumptive to the title-
      ”Heir-presumptive? . . . Oh, I see. My mother might peg out and my father marry again. Calculating brute.”1935, Dorothy L. Sayers, Gaudy Night

Questions about heirs presumptive

What is heirs presumptive the plural of?
Heirs presumptive is the plural of heir presumptive.

Words near heirs presumptive in the dictionary

  1. heirs and successors
  2. heirs apparent
  3. heirs at law
  4. heirs by custom
  5. heirs general
  6. heirs presumptive
  7. heirs-at-law
  8. heirship
  9. heirships
  10. heis
  11. Heise

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: heirs presumptive (page history and authors); heir presumptive (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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