alt Hacker NewsDirectionally correct but badly done can poison an idea. Frames sucked and never got better.
Along with other issues, this gave rise to AJAX and SPAs and JS frameworks. A big part of how we got where we are today is because the people making the web standards decided to screw around with XHTML and "the semantic web" (another directionally correct but badly done thing!) and other BS for about a decade instead of improving the status quo.
So we can and often should return to ancestor but if we're going to lay blame and trace the history, we ought to do it right.
Your history is off, and you are mixing different eras and browser standards with other initiatives.
Frames gave place to (the incorrect use of) tables. The table era was way worse than it is today. Transparent gif spacers, colspan... it was all hacks.
The table era gave birth to a renewal of web standards. This ran mostly separately from the semantic web (W3C is a consortium, not a single central group).
The table era finally gave way to the jQuery era. Roughly around this time, browser standards got their shit together... but vendors didn't.
Finally, the jQuery era ended with the rise of full JS frameworks (backbone first, then ember, winjs, angular, react). Vendors operating outside standards still dominate in this era.
There's at least two whole generations between frames and SPAs. That's why I used the word "ancestor", it's 90s tech I barely remember because I was a teenager. All the other following eras I lived through and experienced first hand.
The poison on the frames idea wore off ages ago. The fact that websites not made with them resemble their use is a proof of that, they just don't share the same implementation. The "idea" is seen with kind eyes today.