ancestornoun/ˈæn.sɛs.tɚ/

• 1

  One from whom a person is descended, whether on the father's or mother's side, at any distance of time; a progenitor; a forefather; a forebear.

  • Whether modern, industrial man is less or more warlike than his hunter-gatherer ancestors is impossible to determine. The machine gun is so much more lethal than the bow and arrow that comparisons are meaningless.
• 2

  An earlier type; a progenitor.

  • This fossil animal is regarded as the ancestor of the horse.
  • Some of the descendants of this cyclopean ancestor left their burrows and started to swim.
• 3

  lawOne from whom an estate has descended;—the correlative of heir.

• 4

  One who had the same role or function in former times.

  • The Magpies are unbeaten and enjoying their best run since 1994, although few would have thought the class of 2011 would come close to emulating their ancestors.
• 5

  human-scienceslinguisticssciencesA word or phrase which serves as the origin of a term in another language.

ancestorverb/ˈæn.sɛs.tɚ/

• 1

  To be an ancestor of.

  • Her own grandfather had been a Virginian, a descendant of Pocahontas, of course, Pocahontas having been created by Divine Providence for the specific purpose of ancestoring Virginians.
  • But he could have completed it: Lucas Quintus Carothers McCaslin Beauchamp. Last surviving sone and child of Tomey's Terrel and Tennie Beauchamp. March 17, 1874 except that there was no need: not Lucius Quintus &c &c &c, but Lucas Quintus, not refusing to be called Lucius, because he simply eliminated that word from the name; not denying, declining the name itself, because he used three quarters of it; but simply taking the name and changing, altering it, making it no longer the white man's but his own , by himself composed, himself selfprogenitive and nominate, by himself ancestored, as, for all the old ledgers recorded to the contrary, old Carothers himself was