Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Insurance \In*sur"ance\, n. [From {Insure}.]
   1. The act of insuring, or assuring, against loss or damage
      by a contingent event; a contract whereby, for a
      stipulated consideration, called premium, one party
      undertakes to indemnify or guarantee another against loss
      by certain specified risks. Cf. {Assurance}, n., 6.

   Note: The person who undertakes to pay in case of loss is
         termed the insurer; the danger against which he
         undertakes, the risk; the person protected, the
         insured; the sum which he pays for the protection, the
         premium; and the contract itself, when reduced to form,
         the policy. --Johnson's Cyc.

   2. The premium paid for insuring property or life.

   3. The sum for which life or property is insured.

   4. A guaranty, security, or pledge; assurance. [Obs.]

            The most acceptable insurance of the divine
            protection.                           --Mickle.

   {Accident insurance}, insurance against pecuniary loss by
      reason of accident to the person.

   {Endowment insurance} or {assurance}, a combination of life
      insurance and investment such that if the person upon
      whose life a risk is taken dies before a certain specified
      time the insurance becomes due at once, and if he
      survives, it becomes due at the time specified.

   {Fire insurance}. See under {Fire}.

   {Insurance broker}, a broker or agent who effects insurance.
      

   {Insurance company}, a company or corporation whose business
      it is to insure against loss, damage, or death.

   {Insurance policy}, a certificate of insurance; the document
      containing the contract made by an insurance company with
      a person whose property or life is insured.

   {Life insurance}. See under {Life}.



   {Life buoy}. See {Buoy}.

   {Life car}, a water-tight boat or box, traveling on a line
      from a wrecked vessel to the shore. In it persons are
      hauled through the waves and surf.

   {Life drop}, a drop of vital blood. --Byron.

   {Life estate} (Law), an estate which is held during the term
      of some certain person's life, but does not pass by
      inheritance.

   {Life everlasting} (Bot.), a plant with white or yellow
      persistent scales about the heads of the flowers, as
      {Antennaria}, and {Gnaphalium}; cudweed.

   {Life of an execution} (Law), the period when an execution is
      in force, or before it expires.

   {Life guard}. (Mil.) See under {Guard}.

   {Life insurance}, the act or system of insuring against
      death; a contract by which the insurer undertakes, in
      consideration of the payment of a premium (usually at
      stated periods), to pay a stipulated sum in the event of
      the death of the insured or of a third person in whose
      life the insured has an interest.

   {Life interest}, an estate or interest which lasts during
      one's life, or the life of another person, but does not
      pass by inheritance.

   {Life land} (Law), land held by lease for the term of a life
      or lives.

   {Life line}.
       (a) (Naut.) A line along any part of a vessel for the
           security of sailors.
       (b) A line attached to a life boat, or to any life saving
           apparatus, to be grasped by a person in the water.

   {Life rate}, the rate of premium for insuring a life.

   {Life rent}, the rent of a life estate; rent or property to
      which one is entitled during one's life.

   {Life school}, a school for artists in which they model,
      paint, or draw from living models.

   {Life table}, a table showing the probability of life at
      different ages.

   {To lose one's life}, to die.

   {To seek the life of}, to seek to kill.

   {To the life}, so as closely to resemble the living person or
      the subject; as, the portrait was drawn to the life.

Source : WordNet®

life insurance
     n : insurance paid to named beneficiaries when the insured
         person dies; "in England they call life insurance life
         assurance" [syn: {life assurance}]