genealogy Genealogy () is the study of families, family history, and the tracing of their lineages. Genealogists use oral interviews, historical records, genetic analysis, and other records to obtain information about a family and to demonstrate kin ...

and wills, a person's issue means all their lineal descendants.

Lineal descendants

''Issue'' typically means a person's

lineal descendant A lineal or direct descendant, in legal usage, is a blood relative in a person's direct line of descent – the children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, etc. In a legal procedure sense, lineal descent refers to the acquisition of estate ...

s—all genetic descendants of a person, regardless of degree. Issue is a narrower category than

heir Inheritance is the practice of receiving private property, titles, debts, entitlements, privileges, rights, and obligations upon the death of an individual. The rules of inheritance differ among societies and have changed over time. Offi ...

s, which includes spouses, and collaterals (

sibling A sibling is a relative that shares at least one parent with the other person. A male sibling is a brother, and a female sibling is a sister. A person with no siblings is an only child. While some circumstances can cause siblings to be raised ...

cousin A cousin is a relative who is the child of a parent's sibling; this is more specifically referred to as a first cousin. A parent of a first cousin is an aunt or uncle. More generally, in the kinship system used in the English-speaking world, ...

aunt An aunt is a woman who is a sibling of a parent or married to a sibling of a parent. Aunts who are related by birth are second-degree relatives. Alternate terms include auntie or aunty. Aunt, auntie, and aunty also may be titles bestowed b ...

s, and uncles). This meaning of ''issue'' arises most often in wills and trusts. A person who has no living lineal descendants is said to have died without issue. A

child A child () is a human being between the stages of childbirth, birth and puberty, or between the Development of the human body, developmental period of infancy and puberty. The term may also refer to an unborn human being. In English-speaking ...

or children are first-generation descendants and are a subset of issue.

References

Descent Family history Legal terminology {{law-stub

Lineal descendants

See also

References