KINSFOLK

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does kinsfolk mean? 

• KINSFOLK (noun)
  The noun KINSFOLK has 1 sense:

1. people descended from a common ancestor

  Familiarity information: KINSFOLK used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• KINSFOLK (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

People descended from a common ancestor

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Synonyms:

family; family line; folk; kinfolk; kinsfolk; phratry; sept

Context example:

his family has lived in Massachusetts since the Mayflower

Hypernyms ("kinsfolk" is a kind of...):

ancestry; blood; blood line; bloodline; descent; line; line of descent; lineage; origin; parentage; pedigree; stemma; stock (the descendants of one individual)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "kinsfolk"):

people (members of a family line)

homefolk (the people of your home locality (especially your own family))

house (aristocratic family line)

dynasty (a sequence of powerful leaders in the same family)

gens; name (family based on male descent)

 Context examples 

Have you ever heard anything from your father's kinsfolk, the Eyres?

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Have you no kinsfolk, then?

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

"Well," resumed Mr. Rochester, "if you disown parents, you must have some sort of kinsfolk: uncles and aunts?"

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)