Race

Race Race, n. [F. race; cf. Pr. & Sp. raza, It. razza; all from OHG. reiza line, akin to E. write. See {Write}.] [1913 Webster] 1. The descendants of a common ancestor; a family, tribe, people, or nation, believed or presumed to belong to the same stock; a lineage; a breed. [1913 Webster]

The whole race of mankind. --Shak. [1913 Webster]

Whence the long race of Alban fathers come. --Dryden. [1913 Webster]

Note: Naturalists and ethnographers divide mankind into several distinct varieties, or races. Cuvier refers them all to three, Pritchard enumerates seven, Agassiz eight, Pickering describes eleven. One of the common classifications is that of Blumenbach, who makes five races: the Caucasian, or white race, to which belong the greater part of the European nations and those of Western Asia; the Mongolian, or yellow race, occupying Tartary, China, Japan, etc.; the Ethiopian, or negro race, occupying most of Africa (except the north), Australia, Papua, and other Pacific Islands; the American, or red race, comprising the Indians of North and South America; and the Malayan, or brown race, which occupies the islands of the Indian Archipelago, etc. Many recent writers classify the Malay and American races as branches of the Mongolian. See Illustration in Appendix. [1913 Webster]

2. Company; herd; breed. [1913 Webster]

For do but note a wild and wanton herd, Or race of youthful and unhandled colts, Fetching mad bounds. --Shak. [1913 Webster]

3. (Bot.) A variety of such fixed character that it may be propagated by seed. [1913 Webster]

4. Peculiar flavor, taste, or strength, as of wine; that quality, or assemblage of qualities, which indicates origin or kind, as in wine; hence, characteristic flavor; smack. ``A race of heaven.'' --Shak. [1913 Webster]

Is it [the wine] of the right race ? --Massinger. [1913 Webster]

5. Hence, characteristic quality or disposition. [Obs.] [1913 Webster]

And now I give my sensual race the rein. --Shak. [1913 Webster]

Some . . . great race of fancy or judgment. --Sir W. Temple. [1913 Webster]

Syn: Lineage; line; family; house; breed; offspring; progeny; issue. [1913 Webster]