Common Ancestors and Relationships to Nobility

I was thinking of taking a genealogy course that was oriented to Medieval studies and wondering if it would be of value to my own family research. I have trouble right now getting further back than the early 1600s, mostly because parish records where my Shepheard ancestors lived were destroyed in a fire at the churchwarden’s house in 1685. I am pretty sure that there were families I am related to that predated the earliest date of 1610 that I found in a will.

With regard to whether it would be useful for me to take the course, a friend commented to me: “[I]t depends.” The course I was looking to take deals with many different information sources from around the 1400s to 1600s. That time period is not really Medieval which is generally recognized as beginning around the 5^th century and lasting until the 15^th century. In fairness, the course is really an introduction to Medieval genealogy; that is, what you may learn will help you with finding and researching Medieval records.

But I digress. . .

My friend, who knows a lot about genealogy (she teaches it), and this course in particular, then went on to say that, “Almost all of us are descended from nobility at some point (math modelling tells us this must be true). There are virtually no documents for the time prior to 1066, unless you are of course a member of the Anglo Saxon royal circle . . . because historians have so little to go on. Some people claim to have discovered their ordinary families in sources such as manorial records and other sources used prior to 1600 or so, however even those sources tend to peter out the further back you go. To get back beyond 1370 would be very difficult.” So the course might be of value.

I got to wondering again, “So how is it that so many people can claim they are related to famous individuals such as Charlemagne?” I did a quick search on Ancestry for the man, born in AD 747 and died in 814 (exact dates used in the search) and found there are 126,224 Family Trees with him listed! I guess I should not have been surprised inasmuch as so many family historians of European heritage have been told they must be related to him so they all copy information from each other to show it.

 

Charlemagne (AD 747-814)

People have done some math on ancestral lines and deduced that, when we calculate the numbers of our direct ancestors they double with each generation, to the point that, after a few iterations, the total almost reaches what would have been the entire population of Europe at one point (Chang, 1999, Recent Common Ancestors of all Present-day Individuals). Obviously that is unlikely so we must consider the numerous times cousins married cousins and that there was a web of relationships, not a straight line. Many models suggest the number of people in all of our lines is much smaller and that we must all be related to just a few people from that time period and, ergo, to each other.

Maybe if you go back to the origin of our species in Africa that might be technically true. But in the context of family history studies, it is virtually impossible to say that we, or at least so many of “we” descend from one man or one woman or the same man or woman. And, if we did, why would it be this particular man – Charlemagne? And not, say, someone like Imhotep, “vizier, sage, architect, astrologer and chief minister” to the Pharoah during the 27^th century BC (according to the Encyclopaedia Britannica). He must have had a lot of children, too, who spread out across the world having families of their own.

We accept that humankind grew from just a few individuals hundreds of thousand or years ago – from “Eve” if you will (Who was “Adam”?) – over two million generations. Population grew to millions over the millennia. But then the models purport to show that a significant portion of the present-day population came down from some limited group about 20 generations ago. It’s curious how that is supposed to work.

There is no doubt that past royal families had many children of whom only a few could inherit titles and lands. The rest ended up marrying into the lower classes (Who else could they marry?) and producing other large families. We can thus all claim some connection to Charlemagne through these many lines. Or can we?

Many historians use these kinds of connections to show their relationship to Charlemagne. But are there records to prove those connections. I suspect, in almost all cases, there are not. Most of us have already found that people often lied when giving information about themselves. Prior to births, marriages and deaths becoming recorded on civil records in England, after 1837, many family relationships we find are very tenuous, especially if the people moved around. Just think what it might have been like 1400 years earlier when no records were kept. The time of Charlemagne was also before surnames were used complicating the identification of any individual or family.

In every civilization and society, since there have been civilizations and societies, there has always been one small group of people who took charge. In ancient Mesopotamia, they were predominantly religious leaders, held in high esteem when times were good, because they could apparently control the bountiful crops produced – with the help of a deity or two, of course. But when times turned tough, many of them were turfed out by angry, disenchanted citizens and new groups took power.

Charlemagne was one of these. He assumed the mantle of leadership during a failing Roman Empire. Through conquest he assimilated widespread regions, eventually taking over the Roman Catholic Church as well, the real source of power and control. His timing was fortuitous, arriving on the scene just as the world was coming out of the Dark Ages (a climatic cold period that had lasted hundreds of year and was characterized by persistent cold, frequent storms, major floods, epidemics affecting both humans and animals and harvest failures). Through force-of-arms and negotiation he was able to unite the many tribes who had spread across Europe seeking new and better living conditions.

Even in Charlemagne’s time the ruling class (mainly he and his family) were only a small percentage of the total population. And while many of his progeny may have expanded and married into the “common folk”, there were lots of other families of lesser importance who continued to have their own children and to spread into other areas.

I have devised a little diagram that tries to show what proportions of any population might be from a royal family or ruling class.

1.      We take some point in time – perhaps when we cease to find records that will demonstrate relationships. It doesn’t really matter when except it should be after societies were established. Some small portion of the populace would become the ruling class, or nobility as it later would be called. The greater proportion of the people would be “common-folk”, from higher-ranking professional types down through tradesmen to labourers or peasants.

2.      We can assume that each group expands at the same rate over time, notwithstanding plagues, famines, disease, etc. That may not be quite accurate as I believe many studies right up to present day indicate that the poorer classes generally had more children and might be expected to grow at a higher rate.

3.      We can agree that many of the progeny of the “nobility” will not inherit in the same manner, if at all, and will gradually move down the social ladder and mix with the commoners. Over time they may expand, joining with other families so their descendants will increase in number, if not in influence.

4.      There would be a gradual increase in the number and proportion of the overall population that would have members descended from the nobility – the Mixed Class. But there is no reason to assume that the commoners would die out any quicker than other groups or that the mixed group would become the largest segment of the non-nobility portion of the population.

5.      No matter where we start, there will always be a large segment of the population that will have no relationship to the nobility of a previous time period no matter what the mathematical models might suggest.

Another complexity is that, in the Western World, even just restricted to Europe, there were several populations in several regions (with very different genetic origins) that ultimately mixed through colonization, conquest or migration. These movements could change the proportions of noble versus common classes or even who was part of the nobility. As well, people moved up the ladder as well as down, with some members of the working class becoming land-owners or business magnates and eventually moving into the ruling classes through marriage or assumption of power.

In any society in which there was a ruling class (i.e. nobility) there must have been a “ruled” class (i.e. not nobility). We can more easily trace the descendants of that ruling class, because they could read and write (or employed someone who could) and kept records to demonstrate where they came from. Their families may even go back to biblical times. We cannot trace those families who toiled in the fields of the feudal lords other than through church records, if we are lucky, and those records only go back so far. And it is doubtful any of those peasants would have had estates or written wills. But they did certainly have children who went on to have children, and so on, and so on, and so on!

So – can some of us be descendants of royalty, or historical figures such as Charlemagne. Of course. Can most of us? I doubt it!

But then maybe I’m just ticked off because I haven’t found any connection to royalty yet.

Wayne Shepheard is a volunteer with the Online Parish Clerk program in England, handling four parishes in Devon, England. He has published a number of articles about various aspects of genealogy and is a past Editor of Chinook, the quarterly journal of the Alberta Family Histories Society. Wayne also provides genealogical consulting services through his business, Family History Facilitated.

Food Prohibitions During Lent

I recently came across an interesting and unexpected note in the Plympton St. Mary parish BMD register. It was penned by the vicar in 1660 and had to do with a prohibition against eating meat during lent and read:

Whereas I sertainly know that Alice Parker

the wife of Edmond Parker Esq. of Burington

in the pish of Plympton St. Marie is under such

a distemper of bodie that she is not fitt to eat any salt

flesh or fish whatsoever therefore I think it fit as

Minister of the said pish to licence hir to eat flesh

during the time of hir sickness according to the laws

and statutes of this Realme made in that Behalfe

Given under my hand – March the 4^th 1660

Simon ?

 

Note from Plympton St. Mary parish baptism register #414/1

The rules concerning what could be eaten during Lent originated with the Roman Catholic Church. And they came out of the practice of fasting by the Jews in ancient times. The types of banned foods changed over the years with considerable diversity in the practice in different parts of the world. Commonly, meat, dairy products, oil and wine were forbidden.

In Britain, the laws were retained even after the Reformation. Enforcement waxed and waned as the monarchy itself shifted from Protestant to Roman Catholic and back again. Forbidding the eating of flesh was not done altogether for religious reasons. Queen Elizabeth (1533-1603) issued a number of edicts, mostly to support English food-producing activities. She was instrumental in the establishment of meat-free Fridays, a move done to protect the fishing industry. In 1562, Wednesday was added to the days for eating only fish. Charles II (1630-1685), in 1660, issued a proclamation “for restraint of killing, dressing, and eating of flesh in lent or on fish-days appointed by the law to be observed”. James II (1633-1701), a Catholic, reinforced the rule of eating no meat in 1687. After the Glorious Revolution, which brought Protestants, William and Mary to power in England, the laws were basically ignored. They were finally repealed in 1863. And excellent article on the subject appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald of March 9, 1935 and can be read online here.

Individuals could seek relief from the laws about which foods could be consumed from the ecclesiastical authorities. This was generally done for reasons of health and with the support of a physician. That seems to be the case for Alice Parker in Plympton St. Mary. Her delicate condition obviously gave her serious problems with the consumption of certain types of foods and she was forgiven for eating any of them by the local minister. As an aside, Alice and “the Right Worshipful Edmond Parker Esquire” had seven children baptized in the parish. She was buried on April 11, 1664. The cause of her death was not listed.

Notes of this nature are not found often in old parish records, especially in BMD registers. So finding this one while browsing through, and transcribing the information was a surprise. On further investigation, it turned out to have some historical significance as well.

The image reproduced here is used with the kind permission of the rightsholder, Plymouth and West Devon Record Office, Wayne Shepheard is a volunteer with the Online Parish Clerk program in England, handling four parishes in Devon, England. He has published a number of articles about various aspects of genealogy and is a past Editor of Chinook, the quarterly journal of the Alberta Family Histories Society. Wayne also provides genealogical consulting services through his business, Family History Facilitated.

I Met a New Cousin in 2014

I don’t have a family tree on Ancestry but I use the website, and the trees there to find information. As I pointed out in my post about my experience with MyHeritage, there is lots to be gained from having your family tree on a public website, although I have just not got around to doing it myself yet.

Lots of trees have unsupported information and many are just exercises in adding names without firm or even reasonable connections with families. I complained about this in another post about looking for my great-grandfather, Asa McDaniel.

Notwithstanding the problems of online trees it is often possible to make connections with real family members. I was fortunate last year in doing just that through my Ancestry searches.

I regularly look for Shepheard families in hope of finding new information on my English roots and to meet cousins who are also looking at the same people. Many of the people I end up contacting are only indirectly related to my family, mainly having direct ancestors who may have married into the Shepheard line. That’s not a bad thing because, in looking at those other branches, they may have different sources of data and different expertise.

One such gentleman I contacted on Ancestry (I won’t use last names here as many people I will mention are still living and their privacy is important) was looking at information about the families of his wife’s ancestors, including one person that had married a Shepheard. In this case, a daughter of the 4^th great-grandfather of John’s wife was herself the 2^nd great-grandmother of the man, Leslie, who had married Margery Teresa, the daughter of my great-grandfather’s brother, John. Margery was my 1^st cousin, twice removed. OK, so that’s really very confusing. But the important part is that this researcher knew a bit more about Leslie's family and that offered another avenue into information about my direct line.

John had found that Leslie and Margery had three sons, Roger, David and Peter. I, too, had figured that out from birth records on FreeBMD. The index for this time period is very helpful as it shows the maiden name of the mother. I knew that Margery had two brothers, Alfred Harry and Wilfrid Jack, and that Wilfrid had a daughter named Pauline. I had traced the parents of these individuals, who all lived in the London region, from our common ancestors in Devon. I had a few photos of some of them that had belonged to my great-grandfather, although I was not entirely sure of who was who in the pictures because not all of the notes on them were complete.

I knew quite a bit about my 1^st cousins (twice removed) but really wanted to find their children and grandchildren, if there were any, especially any that might still be alive. But I was stymied at this point as I could not trace them past the 1911 England census and likely marriages and deaths for them, again found on FreeBMD. John and I thought there was a reasonable chance that children of Alfred Harry, Wilfrid Jack and Margery Teresa could still be alive as they were all born in the 1930s.

Both John and I had tried to contact one of the Ancestry tree-owners in 2013, who we believed was related to Leslie and Margery but neither of us got a response. After comparing notes we both thought this individual might be Margery's son, David.

John had found who he thought were David and his wife on a UK electoral register list for 2002-2013 (also on Ancestry), living in Kent. All of the names for the family shown on the list appeared to match information we had found from other sources so we thought this lead was worth pursuing. I decided to write to the Kent address and see. The only thing I could lose would be the cost of postage if this was not the right family.

The letter went off in August 2014. I included information about who I was and how I thought we were related. I put my full postal address and my email address in the letter to make any response easier. In September I received an email from David’s wife, Marian. She confirmed that David was indeed Margery’s son, my 2^nd cousin, once removed. David had passed away around 2009 which explains why we had not been able to make any contact with the Ancestry tree-owner, even though the tree was still visible online. His two brothers had died some time earlier so there were now fewer direct-line cousins that I could meet.

Pauline, however, is still around. She married in 1959 and is living in Derbyshire. Marian contacted her by telephone and asked if she would mind hearing from me. Pauline was very surprised to hear from a Canadian cousin and very open to corresponding. She is not “connected” so I sent another letter off to her right away. Shortly afterward, I also had an email from the widow (Liz) of one of David’s brothers, Peter. Peter had passed away as well, in 2000. Marian has also called Liz to let her know of my interest. Marian and Liz were able to provide me with quite a bit of information on both their families and on Pauline. All of a sudden I had the names and addresses of several more family members and an opportunity to learn more about the branch that had moved from Devon to London around 1900.

After a number of years of searching for and wondering about them, I could now correspond directly with cousins who share the same ancestry as me. I sent Pauline copies of the photos that had come down to me from my great-grandfather. As it happened the names I had on some of them were wrong and she was able to set me straight. One of them is shown below, taken at the 1928 wedding of Margery and Leslie. The family called her Midge which I was delighted to hear because I had another photo in the collection with only the name Midge written on the back. Thanks to Pauline I now had that one identified.

 

1928 wedding photo for Leslie and Margery Teresa. Margery’s brother, Wiflrid, second from left, was the best man. Her parents are immediately to the right of her, both wearing glasses.

My great-grandfather stayed in touch with his family back in England after he emigrated to Canada in1913. He had photos of many of them taken right up into the mid-1930s. Thanks to a family tree posted on Ancestry and some sleuthing of mine and of John’s I was able to track down my cousins and begin to catch up on our own family histories. It was especially delightful to finally meet, at least by letter, the little girl in the photo below that I had wondered about for so long.

 

Photo of my cousins taken about 1935: Alfred Harry and Wilfrid Jack; Wilfrid’s wife, Florence; 

and little Pauline

Wayne Shepheard is a volunteer with the Online Parish Clerk program in England, handling four parishes in Devon, England. He has published a number of articles about various aspects of genealogy and is a past Editor of Chinook, the quarterly journal of the Alberta Family Histories Society. Wayne also provides genealogical consulting services through his business, Family History Facilitated.