Thursday, April 03, 2008

Cousins

I have always wondered what the term "once removed" referred to when talking about cousins. I did a Goggle search that led me to the Wikipedia definition. It turns out that my definition of second and third cousin was wrong. According to this chart, my cousin's child is my first cousin, once removed. I always thought that a cousin's child was my second cousin. But a second cousin is my mother's/father's cousin. "Once Removed" refers to once removed from my generation. Also, according to the chart, my parents uncle/aunt is my Grand Uncle/Aunt. I always referred to them as my Great Uncle/Aunt. So now I know a little bit more about my family tree.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

My definitions were the same as yours. Now I see it is much more complicated. This just came up on our trip to NY where we visited sites related to FDR, Eleanor Roosevelt and Teddy Roosevelt. They are all related. Eleanor was FDR's 5th cousin once removed. You have to go back pretty far to find there common relative. Eleanor was Teddy's niece.

We sure have alot of once and twice removed cousins. And alot of first and second cousins. Pretty much anyone who's name ends with "sen" could be a cousin.

OB

Karen said...

It's easier to ignore all the details. A cousin is a cousin otherwise it's way too confusing!