many-to-one

The many-to-one fields are defined by the tag <many-to-one> :

<entity name="Contact">
    ...
</entity>

<entity name="Order">
    ...
    <many-to-one name="contact" ref="Contact"/>
</entity>

In this case, the object contact has an n: 1 relationship with an object Order . This relationship is unidirectional.

The entity Order contains a reference to Contact :

public class Order extends AuditableModel {
    ...
    @ManyToOne(fetch = FetchType.LAZY, cascade = { CascadeType.PERSIST, CascadeType.MERGE })
    private Contact customer;

    public Contact getCustomer() {
        return customer;
    }
    public void setCustomer(Contact customer) {
        this.customer = customer;
    }
    ...
}