FILIATION

filiation (fil-ee-ay-sh<<schwa>>n).1. The fact or condition of being a son or daughter;

relationship of a child to a parent. • Despite Bentham’s protest (see below), filiation is usual in this

sense. — Also termed filiality.

“In English we have no word that will serve to express with propriety the person who bears

the relation opposed to that of parent. The word child is ambiguous, being employed in another

sense, perhaps more frequently than in this: more frequently in opposition to a person of full age,

an adult, than in correlation to a parent. For the condition itself we have no other word than

filiation: an ill-contrived term, not analogous to paternity and maternity: the proper term would

have been filiality: the word filiation is as frequently, perhaps, and more consistently, put for the

act of establishing a person in the possession of the condition of filiality.” Jeremy Bentham, An

Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation 276 n.2 (1823).

2. Judicial determination of paternity. See PATERNITY; filiated father under FATHER.

[Cases: Children Out-of-Wedlock 30–75. C.J.S. Children Out-of-Wedlock §§ 41, 46–52, 67,

70–141.][Blacks Law 8th]