Anancestor, also known as aforefather,fore-elder, or aforebear,[1] is aparent or (recursively) the parent of anantecedent (i.e., agrandparent,great-grandparent, great-great-grandparent and so forth).Ancestor is "any person from whom one is descended. In law, the person from whom anestate has beeninherited."[2]
Two individuals have agenetic relationship if one is the ancestor of the other or if they share a common ancestor. Inevolutionary theory, species which share an evolutionary ancestor are said to be ofcommon descent. However, this concept of ancestry does not apply to somebacteria and other organisms capable ofhorizontal gene transfer. Some research suggests that the average person has twice as many female ancestors as male ancestors. This might have been due to the past prevalence ofpolygynous relations and femalehypergamy.[3]
Assuming that all of an individual's ancestors are otherwise unrelated to each other, that individual has 2n ancestors in thenth generation before them and a total of 2g+1 − 2 ancestors in theg generations before them. In practice, however, it is clear that most ancestors of humans (and any other species) are multiply related (seepedigree collapse). Considern = 40: the human species is more than 40 generations old, yet the number 240, approximately 1012 or one trillion, dwarfs thenumber of humans who have ever lived.
Some cultures confer reverence to ancestors, both living and dead; in contrast, some more youth-oriented cultural contexts display less veneration of elders. In other cultural contexts,ancestor worship or, more accurately,ancestor veneration is when people seekprovidence[further explanation needed] from their deceased ancestors.[4][5]
