great-grandfather
Americannoun
-
great-grandfathers
plural
Usage
What does great-grandfather mean? A great-grandfather is the father of a person’s grandparent (the grandfather of a person’s parent). When a father’s child has their own children, that father becomes a grandfather. When those children have their own children, he becomes a great-grandfather. Should great-grandfather be capitalized?Great-grandfather should be capitalized when it’s used as a proper name, as in Please tell Great-grandfather that I miss him. But great-grandfather does not need to be capitalized when it’s simply used as a way to refer to him, as in Please tell my great-grandfather that I miss him. Example: My kids were lucky enough to get to know three of their great-grandfathers.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of great-grandfather
First recorded in 1505–15
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.
See Examples For:
So, historically, most of the people here, their grandfather or their great-grandfather crossed the border illegally, undocumented, and they ran away from the Border Patrol and had to figure out life on their own.
From Slate ● Sep. 28, 2026
Her great-grandfather, Ted Watkins, was a revered leader in Watts in the 1960s.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 23, 2026
His great-grandfather moved to the village and used a patch of land in the nearby peninsula for grazing, he said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 9, 2026
Simmons, a self-confessed family history buff, said his great-grandfather studied in London between 1839 to 1844.
From BBC ● Aug. 7, 2026
And many a time he wished he’d never had a father, nor a grandfather, nor a great-grandfather, if Miss Lark was going to make such a fuss of it.
From "Mary Poppins" by P. L. Travers
And in that way, he’s a bit like his great-grandfathers.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 17, 2026
Mwaba comes from a family of miners - his great-grandfathers and one grandfather worked down the mines and his father above the ground.
From BBC ● Jul. 25, 2025
We search for clues and craft paragraphs that give a hint to how soldiers and sailors — who could have shared a beer with our fathers, grandfathers or great-grandfathers — lived their short lives.
From Seattle Times ● May 28, 2023
"People have to know what our great-grandfathers, our grandfathers and grandmothers went through... as many are beginning to forget what May 9 is and what it stands for."
From Reuters ● May 7, 2023
A gift for a great-grandfather from North Dakota, maybe for all great-grandfathers.
From "Crash" by Jerry Spinelli
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.
