ancestor
Americannoun
-
a person from whom one is descended; forebear; progenitor.
-
Biology. the actual or hypothetical form or stock from which an organism has developed or descended.
-
an object, idea, style, or occurrence serving as a prototype, forerunner, or inspiration to a later one.
The balloon is an ancestor of the modern dirigible.
-
a person who serves as an influence or model for another; one from whom mental, artistic, spiritual, etc., descent is claimed.
a philosophical ancestor.
-
Law. a person from whom an heir derives an inheritance.
noun
-
(often plural) a person from whom another is directly descended, esp someone more distant than a grandparent; forefather
-
an early type of animal or plant from which a later, usually dissimilar, type has evolved
-
a person or thing regarded as a forerunner of a later person or thing
the ancestor of the modern camera
Other Word Forms
- ancestress noun
Etymology
Origin of ancestor
1250–1300; Middle English ancestre < Old French (with t developed between s and r ) < Latin antecessor antecessor
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Through an artistic probing of form, perhaps reflective of his ancestors’ Talmudic dialectic, he questioned traditional pieties and challenged an existing order.
We often wonder if our ancestors felt as we do, or if their inner lives belong to a foreign country where we can’t go.
Among this alien cast were the early ancestors of gnathostomes, or jawed vertebrates, which were still rare and unremarkable at the time.
From Science Daily
Based on the limited data currently available, the study suggests that circoviruses may have been infecting the ancestors of modern cetaceans early in their evolutionary history.
From Science Daily
Their findings suggest the specimen may not belong to any known human ancestor species and could represent an entirely new one.
From Science Daily
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
