SUCCESSION

noun Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French or Latin; Anglo-French, from Latin ~-, successio, from succedere Date: 14th century 1. the order in which or the conditions under which one person after another succeeds to a property, dignity, title, or throne, the right of a person or line to succeed, the line having such a right, 2. the act or process of following in order ; sequence , b. the act or process of one person's taking the place of another in the enjoyment of or liability for rights or duties or both, the act or process of a person's becoming beneficially entitled to a property or property interest of a deceased person, the continuance of corporate personality, unidirectional change in the composition of an ecosystem as the available competing organisms and especially the plants respond to and modify the environment, 3. a number of persons or things that follow each other in sequence, a group, type, or series that succeeds or displaces another, ~al adjective ~ally adverb