ADOPTION by matrimony, is the taking the children of a wife or husband, by a former marriage, into the condition of proper or natural children; and admitting them to inherit on the same footing with those of the present marriage. This is a practice peculiar to the Germans: among whom, it is more particularly known by the name of einkindschaft; among their writers in Latin, by that of unio prolium, or union of issues. But the more accurate writers observe, that this is no adoption. See ADFILATION.