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patriarchal |
2 definitions found From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) [web1913]: Patriarchal \Pa`tri*ar"chal\, a. [Cf. F. patriarcal.] 1. Of or pertaining to a patriarch or to patriarchs; possessed by or subject to patriarchs; as patriarchal authority or jurisdiction; a patriarchal see a patriarchal church. 2. Characteristic of a patriarch; venerable. About whose patriarchal knee Late the little children clung. --Tennyson. 3. (Ethnol.) Having an organization of society and government in which the head of the family exercises authority over all its generations. {Patriarchal cross} (Her.), a cross, the shaft of which is intersected by two transverse beams, the upper one being the smaller. See Illust. (2) of {Cross}. {Patriarchal dispensation}, the divine dispensation under which the patriarchs lived before the law given by Moses. From WordNet r 1.6 [wn]: patriarchal adj : characteristic of a patriarchy [ant: {matriarchal}]
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