Daily Ancestorabavus
Abavus is Latin for great-great-grandfather, the father of a great-grandfather; more loosely it can mean a forefather.
Abavus is one step above proavus (great-grandfather) and two above avus (grandfather). Lewis and Short explains it as the grandfather's grandfather and also gives the looser sense forefather or ancestor.
When the sense is loose, the word only says the man was an ancestor, so count the generations from other records before you place him in a pedigree.
As seen in a recordLatin family note in a will, Austria, 1800s
Abavus noster Matthias Pruckmayr, colonus in Oberau
How to cite this page
Daily Ancestor. "abavus." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/latin/abavus. Last checked 2026-10-12.