Definition
Relationship by blood; consanguinity. Kin denotes the tie that exists between persons who share common descent, and the word is used both to describe the relationship itself and, collectively, the persons who share it. In legal contexts, kin is most significant in matters of inheritance, intestate distribution, and statutory disqualification rules, where the existence or degree of kinship determines rights, duties, or eligibility.
The term is sometimes used more broadly to include relationship by marriage (affinity), though its primary and stricter legal meaning is limited to blood relationship. Whether affinity qualifies as "kin" under a particular statute is a recurring interpretive question and depends on the specific text and jurisdiction.
Common Language
Modern common usage (Wiktionary): Persons of the same race or family; kindred; one or more relatives taken collectively; relationship by blood or affinity.
Historical common usage (Webster's 1913): Webster's 1913 treats "kin" in its main entry as a noun meaning persons of the same family or race, with a secondary entry for "-kin" as a diminutive suffix (as in lambkin or manikin). The noun sense aligns closely with legal usage.
The common and legal meanings are largely consistent, but legal usage sharpens the term in one critical direction: law requires precision about whether kin includes only consanguinity or also affinity. Ordinary speech treats both blood relatives and in-laws as "kin" without distinction. Statutory interpretation often turns on resolving exactly this ambiguity.
Common Confusion
Kin vs. Next of Kin: "Kin" refers broadly to the state or class of blood relationship. "Next of kin" is a term of art identifying the specific person or persons most closely related to a decedent, as determined by applicable rules of descent and distribution. A person may be kin without being the next of kin. The distinction matters acutely in intestate succession and in statutes conferring rights on "next of kin" as a defined legal category.
Kin vs. Kindred: The terms are functionally synonymous in most legal usage and historical dictionaries treat them interchangeably. "Kindred" is more common in older sources and formal statutory language; "kin" is the everyday shorthand. Researchers should search both when working in historical materials.
Why It Matters in Research
The primary research trap with "kin" is its apparent simplicity. Because the word appears in ordinary English with a meaning close to its legal sense, researchers may underestimate how much legal work the term is asked to do and how much variation exists in how courts and legislatures have defined its scope.
Three specific issues recur in corpus research:
First, the blood/affinity boundary. Historical cases frequently turned on whether a statute using "kin" or "kindred" extended to relatives by marriage. Bouvier notes that courts have held "kin" to include a son-in-law under a disqualification statute, and a second cousin under a juror disqualification rule. Neither result is obvious from the word alone. When reading historical cases involving disqualification, inheritance, or benefit statutes, always check whether the court addressed this boundary and how it resolved it.
Second, degree of kinship and the civil law computation. Both Black's editions and Burrill cite Kent's observation that "the nearness of kin is computed according to the civil law." This is not a trivial point. The civil law method of computing degrees of kinship differs from the canon law method, and early American intestacy law drew on both traditions in ways that varied by state. A researcher encountering degree-of-kinship calculations in 18th or early 19th century materials should not assume a single uniform method was applied.
Third, "kin" as a gateway term. In most historical legal dictionaries, "kin" is a short entry that points elsewhere — to "next of kin," to "kindred," to specific descent rules. It functions as a hub. When kin appears in a document, the operative legal content usually lies in one of those connected concepts. Follow the cross-references.
Historical Dictionary Support
The historical dictionaries present a consistent core definition — kin as blood relationship or consanguinity — with modest but meaningful variation at the edges.
Black's (both editions) and Burrill share nearly identical language and the same Kent citation, suggesting a settled basic definition by the mid-19th century. Bouvier adds interpretive depth by noting that courts have extended the term to cover affinity in specific statutory contexts, which neither Black's edition addresses directly. This makes Bouvier the most useful starting point when researching how "kin" has been construed in statutory disqualification or eligibility disputes.
Rapalje & Lawrence's entry, as reproduced in available sources, does not contain a discrete "kin" definition; the fragment provided concerns kindred and the right of representation in distribution, which is contextually related but not a definition of the term itself. Researchers relying on Rapalje for this term will need to look under "kindred" or "next of kin."
None of the historical dictionaries address what later became a significant question in social welfare and benefits law: whether "kin" in statutory language extends to non-biological caretakers or fictive kin. That development is modern and falls outside the corpus these sources cover.
Jurisdictional Note
Whether "kin" in a statute includes relatives by marriage (affinity) as well as blood depends on the statute's text and the jurisdiction's interpretive rules. Some states have expressly defined kin by statute to resolve the ambiguity; others leave it to case-by-case construction. Researchers working across jurisdictions should not assume uniformity.