Meanings
nouninheritance powder (countable and uncountable, plural inheritance powders)
plural inheritance powders
- countablehistoricaluncountableAny of several poisons used for murder, but especially arsenic and, to a lesser extent, thallium.
`Arsenic was very popular in the old days [...] Inheritance powder, they called it. Pure, deadly, white, dissolves in any weak acid.'
2016, Kerry Greenwood, Murder and Mendelssohn, Sydney: Allen and Unwin, page 316
Origin
So called because one person might murder another to gain an inheritance.
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
APA
inheritance powder. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/inheritance%20powder
MLA
“inheritance powder.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/inheritance%20powder. Accessed November 4, 2026.
Chicago
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “inheritance powder,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/inheritance%20powder.
Source: inheritance powder on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.