Wait, How Are We Related Again? (How to Work Out Different Types of Cousins)

 Back in the spring of 1997, our family held the 'Great Laity Gathering' (GLG) in Marazion, Cornwall. It was organised by some of the American cousins, and was tons of fun!

One of the most useful tips I picked up from that event, was how to work out how any two people are related.

It's stood me in good stead all these years, and it's extremely helpful now that more and more people are doing genetic genealogy too, as it's a good way to take a fantastic resource like Blaine Bettinger's tool and simplify down to a nice, clean, 'If X is your ..... and my ..... we must be ???cousins'.

We can all grasp pretty easily what a cousin is (or a 'first cousin' to give it the proper name).

First cousins are two people who share one set of grandparents (or at least one single grandparent). 

Simple, straightforward, fairly easy to look on a family tree and trace a little triangle that shows 'these to people come from this one couple/person'. 

What happens when it gets more complex though? When more generations are involved, or when the two people we're comparing relate differently to the common ancestor?

The tip I learned from relatives at the GLG was:

Think of the family tree as though it was a map: Imagine it has a North (going up the tree as you go back in history), South (as you come down the tree and forward in time), East and West as the family spreads out sideways into bigger and bigger triangles (or lozenges).

For every 1 generation step up from grandparents, that's another degree of cousinship, so for example:
Two people share one set of great-grandparents, then they're second cousins, because we've gone up one more step from grandparents to great-grandparents.

Suppose two people share 4th great grandparents (three steps higher up from second cousins), they're fifth cousins.

There's also a quick cheat to this one as well if you're in a real hurry:
Add on 1 to the number of grandparents to know how many degrees of cousinship, i.e.

Great-Grandparents          2nd cousins

2nd Great-Grandparents   3rd cousins

3rd Great-Grandparents    4th cousins

4th Great-Grandparents    5th cousins

5th Great-Grandparents    6th cousins

...and so on.

That works just fine for comparing any two people who have the same relationship to the common person. If you and I happen to share Thomas Spencer from Coventry as a 2nd great grandparent, 
...well, first off, have we compared notes yet? - and if not, when are you free for a chat?
...but that aside, we would be 3rd cousins.

Suppose though that my 2nd Great-Grandad Thomas Spencer, is your 3rd Great-Grandad, but you aren't my nibling (there's currently only one on that side of the family, who is naturally the most amazing kid in the world, but 8mts IS pushing it a little for these purposes just now), then we know that there's an East or a West move somewhere in the trail between us, to account for why we're out of step with each other.

When this happens, what we do is look for the lower number of the two. In this example, that's the relationship between Thomas and me, which tells us that we're some kind of 3rd cousin.

To find out what kind of 3rd cousin we are, we need to work out how many generations the gap between Thomas and my relationship is, compared to yours and Thomas'. If Thomas is your 3rd Great-Grandad, then there's only one step of difference between us, meaning that we are 3rd cousins once removed.
If we were comparing me and your child, that would be 3rd cousins twice removed, and so on.

Sounds a lot, right? For visual thinkers, here's this particular example drawn out:

Pretty neat, eh? If nothing else, a fun party trick that you can use at your next family event to entertain Aunty Meg and her 4th cousin twice removed, your cousin Bailey*.

* In case of cousin fishers:
1) Hi! Let's compare notes;
2) You didn't loose your mind, Aunty Meg and Bailey don't belong to us. They're entirely fictional.

 

Just 28 Days (on time and DNA testing)

We're finally really getting down to doing our DNA testing. I can hardly believe the thing we've talked of for so long (especially for himself and his Italian side) is actually happening.

In the end, we decided that the best one for us at this time is the My Heritage kit (which is currently on special offer as it happens). We got a fantastic deal and the test is beautifully low-tech in that it's a really simple cheek swab.

Should you have an opportunity to try one, I highly recommend it. I think most of us have had those times where a place or activity has been somehow familiar and then we've later gone on to find that we had ancestors in that place or doing that activity. It's like it resonates with something deep within us. Stating my bias here, I'm extremely interested in the notion of collective/generational memory. I also highly recommend reading some of the scientific investigations around it if you're interested too. They're an absolutely riveting read.

It was very peculiar to sit there last night, watching a digital clock display on the computer counting off the seconds to one minute either side, rolling that swab around.
Of course there's nothing to see and very little sensation - it's a bit like if you've ever had a piece of cotton wool brush against the inside of your cheek, but it's a strange and oddly confronting thing to sit and think 'what would even my grandparents think of this?'
We are in an age of more scientific privilege than ever before and progress is so swift. Isn't it frightening to think that there are now University graduates who couldn't, without help tell you what the relationship is between a cassette tape and a pencil?!
...these are just a few of the thoughts that raced through my head while performing my test.

It was such a small thing and a large thing at the same time. Stupidly, I felt a little under-dressed for the occasion sat at my desk in sweater and jeans. Though for the life of me, I couldn't tell you what would have felt more appropriate. As though somehow, magically, it might improve the test I also felt as though I should be thinking 'good thoughts' of all my ancestors (though truly, I haven't yet found an ancestor I haven't at least fallen for a little bit). It's a huge responsibility in some ways too. I found myself thinking: "What if my DNA's broken, or damaged? What if there's not enough of it? What if it doesn't carry enough information to be worthwhile?" I had to give myself a stern talking to on that and as with this blog, I called to mind the future ghost of some downward descendant who's often with me when I'm tracking our family's history and remember that as much as genealogy is a pursuit for one's own edification and pleasure, potentially some point down the track, it may also prove to be a tiny treasure for those who come after, particularly for those of us who bridge the gap between the analogue and digital eras.

Now there's just that four weeks wait for results. That in itself is an odd thing. In today's world it seems like such a long time, and yet, four short weeks ago from today I was back to work following time off for our wedding (separate post on that sometime soon. You've probably noticed it takes me a while to get the words to come together) and four weeks from now it will almost be Samhain and the Celtic New Year, which is one of my most favourite holidays in the world.
I'm also remembering back to childhood. There was a book that used to be put out (by Royal mail I think) that covered all kinds of interesting and educational activities that, if you liked the look of them, you could send 28p and however many stamps and in "just 28 days" you'd receive a parcel - honest-to-goodness exciting post. That time just used to seem to fly by, so I think I'm going to have to remind myself that it's "just 28 days" and contain my soul in patience. After his and my results arrive we have to do it all over again for the other members of our family who've kindly agreed to test as well.

I'm excited with the potential learning opportunities from this experience. On my father's side, my cousin has kindly agreed to test, which is lovely as we are sadly low on males to test on our Laity side now. I'm aware of other males who have tested up our common lines, particularly the Spencer/Spencer-Churchill side & I believe there is someone out there who tested some Hobbins Men also. On my mother's side, my two second cousins have agreed to test with me. This will be interesting for all of us as their maternal grandmother and my maternal grandmother (Olive and Edna Dawson respectively) were identical twins, so we're expecting that between us, we may have some very interesting results.


Have you done any DNA testing? What was your experience like?