Proper terminology in this area often confuses attorneys. I always have to refer to a chart similar to this.
Need to Know
- Donald R. McClarey
Donald R. McClarey
Cradle Catholic. Active in the pro-life movement since 1973. Father of three, one in Heaven, and happily married for 43 years. Small town lawyer and amateur historian. Former president of the board of directors of the local crisis pregnancy center for a decade.
Eh, that cousin explainer thing at the top wouldn’t chance to have copies available for purchase anywhere, would it?
Way too complicated. Much easier to just explain how we’re related!
I have sometimes said that I would not make a good Hobbit since I have no knack for genealogy.
I have four second cousins that are as closely related to me as first cousins. How? My grandfather and their grandfather were brothers. My grandmother and their grandmother were sisters. My dad and my uncle’s two first cousins from this arrangement were double cousins – they had exactly the same family tree.
My dad’s grandmother was born 21 years after her half brother. He was born in partitioned Poland. They ended up in western Pennsylvania. His father died. His mother remarried and had my great aunt and my grandmother. Both of my grandmother’s parents died when she was young. Her half brother adopted her sister but not her and she held a grudge against him all her life. Not his children or their children…but her half brother. I never met him.
Years ago I decided I was going to figure out the cousin thing. I wanted to know how you determine first and second cousins, and degrees. I did it because I have two cousins of the same age and school, and we were constantly asked what degree of cousins we were. I would just explain how our parents were related. Anyway, after that everyone started asking me about their families, and I became the cousin expert.
Okay: you’re related to a first cousin, succeeding generations are still first cousin but (one generation/”once”, etc. ) removed
Ex: your first cousin’s grandson is your FIRST cousin 2 generations/twice removed.
Your kids and your first cousin’s kids are second cousins to each other. That relationship stays for them, your kid will always be second cousin to that person with the same once/twice removed for the cousin’s kids.
Ex. My grandkids and my sister’s grandkids are second cousins. My grandkids and their second cousin’s kids are still second cousins but once removed.
Think of it as tiers: to each other in the same generation, you share a tier. Your offspring go down one, two etc steps from that tier.
Once you get it, you’ll never forget.
This information is only useful if you’re doing genealogy or if you’re a member of the royal family. But it’s fun!
I am my own 9th and 10th cousin. And that’s not including whatever the result is of 3 generations of my Dad’s family marrying 1st cousins in the early 1700s. (I still don’t have that straight, as each generation named its sons either Thomas or Robert, leading to basically, an incoherent mess of subsequent genealogy. Gives me a headache just to think of it.)
I have a second cousin who was married to the president of one of the Federal Reserve Banks. I have another who was remanded to state prison in Alabama at the age of 46 (and I don’t think this was his first rodeo). All of us are descended from the same set of great-grandparents.
[…] Analysis, Punditry, News, and Anecdotes:Need to Know: The Cousin Explainer – Donald R. McClarey, J.D., at The American CatholicHow To Make Your Son Not Gay – Lila […]
I have always enjoyed the song: “I’m my own grandpa.”
Ouch! My brain hurts! How about “we’re all brothers and sisters in Christ”? Or maybe I’m just being lazy. 🙂
My mother was an only child. Her mother had 2 brothers, one childless, the other had three children. To make it easier for my brother and me to understand, her cousins were introduced to us as Uncle John, Aunt Jean and Aunt Kay. We still keep up with “Aunt” Kay’s children. So are we second cousins?