"antecedent" in the noun sense
1. ancestor, ascendant, ascendent, antecedent, root
someone from whom you are descended (but usually more remote than a grandparent)
2. antecedent
a preceding occurrence or cause or event
3. antecedent, forerunner
anything that precedes something similar in time
"phrenology was an antecedent of modern neuroscience"
4. antecedent
the referent of an anaphor a phrase or clause that is referred to by an anaphoric pronoun
"antecedent" in the adjective sense
1. antecedent
preceding in time or order
Source: WordNet® (An amazing lexical database of English)
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