porphyrogenitism

English

Etymology

From porphyrogenite +‎ -ism.

Noun

porphyrogenitism (uncountable)

  1. (rare) The principle of succession in royal families, especially among the Eastern Roman emperors, by which a younger son, if born after the accession of his father to the throne, was preferred to an elder son who was not so born.
    • 1851, Francis Palgrave, The History of Normandy and of England:
      The doctrine of Porphyrogenitism, congenial to popular sentiment, and not without some foundation in principle, prevailed influentially and widely in many countries.
    • 1915, The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, volume 2:
      The only legitimate spouse for a Ptolemy was a princess of the royal house, and generally a daughter not of a crown prince, but of a consecrated king. The evidence of this porphyrogenitism in the dynasty is quite clear.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “porphyrogenitism”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)

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