forefather.
An ancestor.
Meaning & usage
An ancestor.
A cultural ancestor; one who originated an idea or tradition.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English forefader, forfader, vorvader, from Old English forefæder (“forefather”), but possibly also merged with Old Norse forfaðir. Equivalent to fore- + father. Compare Dutch voorvader (“forefather”), German Vorvater, Vorfahr (“forefather”), Danish forfader (“forefather”), Swedish förfader (“forefather”).
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.