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Forebear (also spelled, less commonly, as forbear) was first used by our ancestors in the days of Middle English. Fore- means "coming before," just as in forefather, and -bear means "one that is." This -bear is not to be confused with the -bear in the unrelated verb forbear, which comes from Old English beran, meaning "to bear or carry." The -bear in the noun forebear is a combination of be-, from the verb be (or, more specifically, from been, an old dialect variant of be), and -ar, a form of the suffix -er, which we append to verbs to denote one that performs a specified action. In this case the "action" is simply existing or being—in other words, -bear implies one who is a "be-er."
Synonyms
Examples of forebear in a Sentence
Paige Williams, The New Yorker, 17 June 2024
Later, Russia repealed this immunity, and many of Jantzen’s forebears joined other Mennonites in relocating to Nebraska.
—Mark Jenkins, Washington Post, 14 June 2024
Google has a history of users experiencing glitches, bugs, and other oddities in Pixel phones — even dating back to some of the earliest Pixel generations and their Nexus forebears.
—Antonio G. Di Benedetto, The Verge, 13 June 2024
Photo: Max Scavengers Reign reflects many of its sci-fi forebears, among them the films and comics that emerged after 2001: A Space Odyssey.
—Kambole Campbell, Vulture, 31 May 2024
See all Example Sentences for forebear 
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'forebear.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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“Forebear.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/forebear. Accessed 2 Jul. 2024.
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