variants
also forbear
as in ancestor
a person who is several generations earlier in an individual's line of descent
his forebears came to America on the Mayflower
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Recent Examples of forebear
Space aficionados often compare the drive to explore other worlds to the impulse that sent humans on voyages around the world, depicting our forebears’ curiosity about our own planet as an innate imperative curiosity that defines us as an alpha species.
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Michael Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times, 16 Oct. 2024
Fruit flies—those ever-present insects whirling around your kitchen fruits—became our irradiated, space-traveling forebears.
—Barrett Klein, Smithsonian Magazine, 15 Oct. 2024
Fish, shellfish, and other aquatic animals and plants sustained our forebears who lived near rivers, lakes and oceans.
—Kate Wong, Scientific American, 25 June 2024
Carreira’s is the kind of small, still-waters debut that nonetheless confidently sets out its maker’s store for future work — a clarion call for a new generation of social-realist cinema, sadly not as far removed from the previous one as their forebears might have hoped.
—Guy Lodge, Variety, 18 Oct. 2024
See all Example Sentences for forebear 
Michael Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times, 16 Oct. 2024
Fruit flies—those ever-present insects whirling around your kitchen fruits—became our irradiated, space-traveling forebears.
—Barrett Klein, Smithsonian Magazine, 15 Oct. 2024
Fish, shellfish, and other aquatic animals and plants sustained our forebears who lived near rivers, lakes and oceans.
—Kate Wong, Scientific American, 25 June 2024
Carreira’s is the kind of small, still-waters debut that nonetheless confidently sets out its maker’s store for future work — a clarion call for a new generation of social-realist cinema, sadly not as far removed from the previous one as their forebears might have hoped.
—Guy Lodge, Variety, 18 Oct. 2024
See all Example Sentences for forebear
Recent Examples of Synonyms for forebear
Noun
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John Churchill, the first Duke of Marlborough and an ancestor of Winston’s, drew his sword to protect the prince from the panicking crowd, and Samuel Pepys, the celebrated diarist and Royal Navy administrator, witnessed the sinking.Sam Knight, The New Yorker, 4 Nov. 2024
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How brujas use spirituality to honor the ancestors on Día de Muertos.Christian Orozco, Los Angeles Times, 2 Nov. 2024
Noun
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One of the drivers in the original crash, her father and both police officers were standing in front of the cars involved when Geer crashed into the back of the Tacoma, police said in the affidavit.Lauren Penington, The Denver Post, 14 Nov. 2024
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Their father — whose name has not been confirmed — tried to cling on to them but they were swept away by the tide of water, state news agency EFE reported.Reuters, NBC News, 13 Nov. 2024
Noun
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My grandfather, a rabbi who died this year, made it out of Europe before the Holocaust.Sammy Roth, Los Angeles Times, 5 Nov. 2024
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Harris regularly visited India as a child and spent time with her grandfather, P. V. Gopalan, a freedom fighter in India.Yash Roy, The Hill, 4 Nov. 2024
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Cite this Entry
“Forebear.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/forebear. Accessed 23 Nov. 2024.
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