Definition
A fact, situation, or personal characteristic, which may be desirable or undesirable, resulting from the circumstances into which a person was born, and which is therefore entirely beyond their control.
In Context
- "[H]e said to himself that he was a very good-looking man, and could have adorned a much higher sphere in life than that in which the accident of birth had placed him."
- ""You're no brother of mine," she broke in. "At most it is an accident of birth I disown. I'll have no relationship with you of any sort.""
- "An accident of birth had made him a citizen of the United States—his father having owned a ranch which lay north instead of south of the Rio Grande."