offspring
- 01 B2 Upper Intermediate
the children of a person or the young of an animal.
the immediate progeny of a human or animal parent. Often used as a collective singular or plural noun.
Simple“The birds were busy finding worms to feed their hungry offspring.”
In context“Biologists observed that the female bear was fiercely protective of her offspring during their first winter in the wild.”
- 02 C1 Advanced
the people who come from a specific family line over many years.
the descendants of a person or family line, spanning multiple generations.
Simple“The museum has a portrait of the duke and all his offspring.”
In context“The legal document specified that the estate should be divided equally among the legitimate offspring of the deceased.”
SynonymsAntonymsforebears - 03 C2 Proficiency
something that is created or produced as a result of an effort.
a figurative result, product, or outcome of a particular process or creative effort.
Simple“The new law was the offspring of many months of hard work.”
In context“The revolutionary design was the offspring of a unique collaboration between architects and environmental scientists.”
- 04 C1 Advanced
a computer process that is started by another process.
a process initiated or spawned by a parent process within an operating system.
Simple“If the main program crashes, the offspring processes might keep running.”
In context“The system administrator noticed that the server was struggling because too many offspring processes were consuming the available memory.”
SynonymsAntonyms
Usage offspring produce · produce offspring
“This arrangement can make sisters more closely related to one another than they are to their own offspring.”
“He sounded a little like a proud father wanting to play down the achievements of his offspring – and failing.”
From Middle English ofspring, from Old English ofspring (“offspring, descendants, posterity”), equivalent to off- + spring. Compare Icelandic afspringur (“offspring”). More at off, spring.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.