Forebear
noun, verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 An ancestor.
"One day, among the days, he bethought him of this and fell lamenting for that the most part of his existence was past and he had not been vouchsafed a son, to inherit the kingdom after him, even as he had inherited it from his fathers and forebears; by reason whereof there betided him sore cark and care and chagrin exceeding."
- 2 a person from whom you are descended wordnet
- 1 Obsolete spelling of forbear. alt-of, obsolete
Antonyms
All antonymsExample
More examples"One day, among the days, he bethought him of this and fell lamenting for that the most part of his existence was past and he had not been vouchsafed a son, to inherit the kingdom after him, even as he had inherited it from his fathers and forebears; by reason whereof there betided him sore cark and care and chagrin exceeding."
Etymology
Late 15th century, from fore- + beer (“one who is or exists”, literally “be-er”).
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.