The static ancestors of a subprogram sub() are all the procedures in the program within which the procedure sub() is defined, i.e., the definition of the procedure sub() is nested. The definition of a procedure may be directly nested within only one procedure, called its static parent procedure. However, this static parent procedure may itself be nested within another procedure, and so on up to the main() program. All these procedures are considered to be static ancestors of the procedure sub(). Simply put, the static ancestors are those that strictly contain the subprogram in question.
The dynamic ancestors of a subprogram sub() are all the procedures called before sub() during the execution of a program, that have not yet finished executing. These are the procedures that are waiting for procedure sub() to finish executing before they can terminate. Simply put, dynamic ancestors are those that are called to reach the subprogram in question.