relation

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A logical or natural association between two or more things; relevance of one to another; connection: the relation between smoking and heart disease.
2. n. The connection of people by blood or marriage; kinship.
3. n. A person connected to another by blood or marriage; a relative.
4. n. The way in which one person or thing is connected with another: the relation of parent to child.
5. n. The mutual dealings or connections of persons, groups, or nations in social, business, or diplomatic matters: international relations.
6. n. Sexual intercourse.
7. n. Reference; regard: in relation to your inquiry.
8. n. The act of telling or narrating.
9. n. A narrative; an account.
10. n. Law The principle whereby an act done at a later date is considered to have been done on a prior date.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. The act of relating or telling; recital; narration.
2. n. That which is related or told; an account; narrative: formerly applied to historical narrations or geographical descriptions: as, the Jesuit Relations.
3. n. A character of a plurality of things; a fact concerning two or more things, especially and more properly when it is regarded as a predicate of one of the things connecting it with the others; the condition of being such and such with regard to something else: as, the relation of a citizen to the state; the relation of demand and supply. Thus, suppose a locomotive blows off steam; this fact constitutes a relation between the locomotive and the steam so far as the “blowing” is conceived to be a character of the locomotive, and another relation so far as the “being blown” is conceived as a character of the steam, and both these relations together are embraced in the same relationship, or plural fact. This latter, also often called a relation, is by logicians called the foundation of the relation. The two or more subjects or things to which the plural fact relates are termed the relates or correlates; the one which is conceived as subject is specifically termed the subject of the relation, or the relate; the others the correlates. Words naming things in their character as relates are called relatives, as father, cousin. A set of relatives referring to the same relationship according as one or another object is taken as the relate are called correlatives: such are buyer, seller, commodity, price. The logical nomenclature of relations depends on the consideration of individual relations, or relations subsisting between the individuals of a single set of correlates, as opposed to general relations, which, really or in conception, subsist between many such sets. Relations are either dual—that is, connecting couples of objects, as in the examples above—or plural—that is, connecting more than two correlates, as the relation of a buyer to the seller, the thing bought, and the price. Every individual dual relation is either a relation of a thing to itself or a relation of a thing to something else. Logical relations are those which are known from logical reflection: opposed to real relations, which are known by generalization and abstraction from ordinary observations. The chief logical relations are those of incompossibility, coexistence, identity, and otherness. Real dual relations are of five classes:
4. n. Intimate connection between facts; significant bearing of one fact upon another.
5. n. Connection by consanguinity or affinity; kinship; tie of birth or marriage; relationship.
6. n. Kindred; connection; a group of persons related by kinship.
7. n. A person connected by consanguinity or affinity; a kinsman or kinswoman; a relative.
8. n. In mathematics:
9. n. A ratio; proportion.
10. n. A connection between a number of quantities by which certain systems of values are excluded; especially, such a connection as may be expressed by a plexus of general equations.
11. n. In music, that connection or kinship between two tones, chords, or keys (tonalities) which makes their association with each other easy and natural. The relation of tones is perceived by the ear without analysis. Physically it probably depends upon how far the two series of upper partial tones or harmonies coincide. Thus, a given tone is closely related to its perfect fifth, because the 2d, 5th, 8th, 11th, etc., harmonics of the one are respectively identical with the 1st, 3d, 5th, 7th, etc., of the other; while for converse reasons it is hardly at all related to its minor second. Tones that have but a distant relation to each other, however, are often both closely related to a third tone, and then, particularly if they are associated together in some melodic series, like a scale, may acquire a close relation. Thus, the seventh and eighth tones of a major scale have a close relation which is indirectly harmonic, but apparently due to their habitual melodic proximity. The relation of chords depends primarily on the identity of one or more of their respective tones. Thus, a major triad is closely related to a minor triad on the same root, or to a minor triad on the minor third below itself, because in each case there are two tones in common. Thus, the tonic triad of a key is related to the dominant and subdominant triads through the identity of one of its tones with one of theirs. As with tones, chords having but a distant relation to each other may acquire a relation through their respective close relations to a third chord, especially if habitually brought together in harmonic progressions. Thus, the dominant and subdominant triads of a key have a substantial but indirect relation; and, indeed, a relation is evident between all the triads of a key. The relation of keys (tonalities) depends properly on the number of tones which they have in common; though it is often held that a key is closely connected with every key whose tonic triad is made up of its tones. Thus, a major key is most intimately related to the major keys of its dominant and subdominant and to the minor key of its submediant, because each of them differs from it by but one tone, and also to the minor keys of its mediant and supertonic, because their tonic triads are also composed of its tones. Hence a major key and the minor key of its submediant are called mutually relative (relative major and relative minor), in distinction from the tonic major and tonic minor, which are more distantly related. When carefully analyzed, the fact of relation is found to be profoundly concerned in the entire structure and development of music. It has caused the establishment of the major diatonic scale as the norm of all modern music. It is the kernel of tonality, of harmonic and melodic progression, of form in general, and of many extended forms in particular.
12. n. In law:
13. n. A fiction of law whereby, to prevent injustice, effect is given to an act done at one time as if it had been done at a previous time, it being said to have relation back to that time: as, where a deed is executed and acted on, but its delivery neglected, the law may give effect to its subsequent delivery by relation back to its date or to its execution, as may be equitable.
14. n. Suggestion by a relator; the statement or complaint of his grievance by one at whose instance an action or special proceeding is brought by the state to determine a question involving both public and private right.
15. n. In architecture, the direct dependence upon one another, and upon the whole, of the different parts of a building, or members of a design.
16. n. Same as composite relation .
17. n. Same as aggregate relation .
18. n. a relation of such a sort that nothing can be so related to anything else, as the relations of self-consciousness, self-depreciation, self-help, etc.
19. n. Synonyms Narration, Recital, etc. See account.
20. n. Attitude, connection.
21. n. Affiliation.5 and Relation, Relative, Connection, When applying to family affiliations, relation is used of a state or of a person, but in the latter sense relative is much better; relative is used of a person, but not of a state; connection is used with equal propriety of either person or state. Relation and relative refer to kinship by blood; connection is increasingly restricted to ties resulting from marriage.
22. n. Kindred, kin.
23. To relate; bring into relation.

Wiktionary

1. n. The manner in which two things may be associated.
2. n. A member of one's family.
3. n. The act of relating a story.
4. n. set theory A set of ordered tuples.
5. n. set theory Specifically, a set of ordered pairs.
6. n. databases A set of ordered tuples retrievable by a relational database; a table.
7. n. mathematics A statement of equality of two products of generators, used in the presentation of a group.
8. n. The act of intercourse

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. The act of relating or telling; also, that which is related; recital; account; narration; narrative.
2. n. The state of being related or of referring; what is apprehended as appertaining to a being or quality, by considering it in its bearing upon something else; relative quality or condition; the being such and such with regard or respect to some other thing; connection.
3. n. Reference; respect; regard.
4. n. Connection by consanguinity or affinity; kinship; relationship.
5. n. A person connected by cosanguinity or affinity; a relative; a kinsman or kinswoman.
6. n. The carrying back, and giving effect or operation to, an act or proceeding frrom some previous date or time, by a sort of fiction, as if it had happened or begun at that time. In such case the act is said to take effect by relation.
7. n. The act of a relator at whose instance a suit is begun.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. (law) the principle that an act done at a later time is deemed by law to have occurred at an earlier time
2. n. an abstraction belonging to or characteristic of two entities or parts together
3. n. a person related by blood or marriage
4. n. an act of narration
5. n. (usually plural) mutual dealings or connections among persons or groups
6. n. the act of sexual procreation between a man and a woman; the man's penis is inserted into the woman's vagina and excited until orgasm and ejaculation occur