ancestry
Americannoun
noun
-
lineage or descent, esp when ancient, noble, or distinguished
-
ancestors collectively
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of ancestry
1300–50; Middle English, equivalent to ancestre ancestor + -y 3; replacing Middle English aunce ( s ) trie < Anglo-French
Explanation
Have a family tree hanging on the wall? Then you know a bit about your ancestry, or family history and lineage. If you think ancestry sounds like ancestor, then you're headed in the right direction. Ancestry is basically a history of ancestors, a trail of where your family started and all the descendants that followed. But ancestry goes much further than just your great-great-grand uncle's brother. You can also use the word ancestry to refer to the background of things other than people — such as the ancestry of a building or the ancestry of a nation.
Vocabulary lists containing ancestry
It's All in the Family
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Central America and the Caribbean - Introductory
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Central America and the Caribbean - Middle School and High School
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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.
One of them is Steffanie Castaneda, a 45-year-old from Jupiter, Fla. She began pursuing Italian citizenship five years ago through her family ancestry.
From Barron's • Jun. 7, 2026
Goodwin agrees with Konstantin Kisin that Englishness is related to ancestry.
From BBC • Jun. 5, 2026
That, she said, has provoked a "backlash" which has led to ethno-nationalism – the idea that a national identity can only be derived through ancestry.
From BBC • Jun. 4, 2026
Notably, many of the earlier Neolithic Dutch samples from further north – such as the Swifterbant culture, well-known for maintaining a hunter-gatherer economy alongside some adoption of agriculture – carried close to 100% hunter-gatherer ancestry.
From Science Daily • May 30, 2026
Political scientists are divided over whether the twenty- five million people of Mexican ancestry in the United States represent an exception to the classic immigrant success story.
From "Class Matters" by The New York Times
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.
