those from whom a person is descended in a straight line. The word is derived from the Latin ancestor, contracted from antecessor, q. d. "goer before."
Most nations have paid honours to their ancestors. It was properly the departed souls of their forefathers that the Romans worshipped under the denominations of lares, lemures, and household gods. Hence the ancient tombs were a kind of temples, or rather altars, whereon oblations were made by the kindred of the deceased.
The Russians have still their anniversary feasts in memory of their ancestors, which they call roditoli sabot, q. d. "kinsfolk's Sabbath;" wherein they make formal visits to the dead in their graves, and carry them provisions, eatables, and presents of divers other kinds. They interrogate them, with loud lamentable cries, What they are doing? How they spend their time? What it is they want? and the like.
The Quoas, a people of Africa, offer sacrifices of rice and wine to their ancestors before ever they undertake any considerable action. The anniversaries of their deaths are always kept by their families with great solemnity. The king invokes the soul of his father and mother to make trade flourish and the chase succeed.
The Chinese seem to have distinguished themselves above all other nations in the veneration they bear their ancestors. By the laws of Confucius, part of the duty which children owe their parents consists in worshipping them when dead. This service, which makes a considerable part of the natural religion of the Chinese, is said to have been instituted by the emperor Kung, the fifth in order from the foundation of that ancient empire. Bibl. Un. tom. vii. The Chinese have both a solemn and ordinary worship which they pay their ancestors. The former is held regularly twice a year, viz. in spring and autumn, with much pomp. A person who was present at it gives the following account of the ceremonies on that occasion: 'The sacrifices were made in a chapel well adorned, where there were five altars furnished with censers, tapers, and flowers. There were three ministers, and behind them two young acolytes. The three former went with a profound silence, and frequent genuflexions, towards the five altars, pouring out wine; afterwards they drew near to the fifth, and when they came to the foot of the altar, half bowed down, they said their prayers with a low voice. That being finished, the three ministers went to the altar; the officiating priest took up a vessel full of wine, and drank; then he lifted up the head of a deer or goat; after which, taking fire from the altar, they all lighted a bit of paper; and the minister of the ceremonies turning towards the people, said with a loud voice, That he gave them thanks in the name of their ancestors for having so well honoured them; and in recompense he promised them, on their part, a plentiful harvest, a fruitful field, good health, and long life, and all those advantages that are most pleasing to men.
The Chinese gave their ancestors another simpler and more private worship. To this end they have in their houses a niche or hollow place, where they put the names of their deceased fathers, and make prayers and offerings of perfumes and spices to them at certain times, with bowing, &c. They do the like at their tombs.
The Jews settled in China are said to worship their ancestors like the heathens, and with the same ceremonies, except that they offer not swine's flesh. Near their synagogue they have a hall, or court of ancestors, wherein are niches for Abraham, Isaac, &c. The Jesuits also conformed, and were permitted by their general to conform to this and many other superstitious customs of the Chinese.
There is one peculiarity of another kind, wherein the Chinese show their regard for their ancestors; in proportion as any of their descendants are preferred to a higher degree or dignity, their dead ancestors are at the same time preferred and ennobled with them. The kings Ven Van, Veu Van, and Chou Cum, who were descended from vassal kings, when they mounted the imperial throne, raised their ancestors from the vassal or depending state wherein they had lived to the dignity of emperors; so that the same honours were for the future rendered them as if they had been emperors of China. The same example was followed by the subsequent kings, and now obtains among the Anchilos grandees and literati: all now worship their ancestors according to the rank which they themselves hold in the world. If the son be a mandarin, and the father only a doctor, the latter is buried as a doctor, but sacrificed to as a mandarin. The like holds in degradations, where the condition of the fathers is that of their sons.