A line of descent from ancestors; the family lineage or genealogy that traces who your relatives are.
Compound of 'blood' (from Old English 'blod', related to bleeding and kinship) and 'line' (from Latin 'linea'). In medieval times, blood was believed to carry hereditary traits and identity, making bloodline a natural metaphor for family descent.
Royalty became obsessed with bloodlines partly because they believed 'blue blood' (a term from Spanish nobility) was literally different—we now know genetics doesn't work that way, but the word reveals how much people once valued pure ancestry.
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