Where does great- come from?

It is traced to Middle English.

great-

Word Rarity Common

Frequency: Zipf frequency 5.88 in modern English

Scrabble Score

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prefix

"great-uncle (an uncle of one's mother or father)"
"great-grandfather (the father of one's grandfather)"
"great-great-grandfather (a grandfather of one's grandfather)"
"great-great-great-grandfather, etc."
"(informal) fourth-great-granduncle, etc. (same as great-great-great-great-granduncle)"
"(informal) fourth-great-grandfather, etc. (same as great-great-great-great-grandfather)"

From Middle English gret- (“great-”), from gret (“great”). More at great.

grand-

How to pronounce great-

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