Princess Eugenie to marry Jack Brooksbank today – her third cousin once removed
The couple, who tie the knot in the second-most anticipated royal wedding of the year after Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s, share a common ancestor
Princess Eugenie will marry London socialite Jack Brooksbank today in the second most anticipated royal wedding of the year.
The announcement of their engagement in January prompted an observation almost as old as the British royal family itself: that the soon-to-be-married couple are blood relatives.
Eugenie and Brooksbank are distant cousins – third cousins once removed, to be precise. This chart explains what’s going on:
The couple share a common ancestor in the 19th-century aristocrat Thomas William Coke, the 2nd Earl of Leicester.
We found the connection via thepeerage.com, an online database of European aristocracy sourced from a variety of historical texts. Coke’s entry is here, and you can click through each descendant to Brooksbank and Eugenie.
Coke is Eugenie’s great-great-great-great grandfather, on the side of her mother Sarah, Duchess of York (widely known as “Fergie”).
Coke is also Brooksbank’s great-great grandfather, via his second marriage.
Since this marriage came when Coke was older, and also because of later marriages further down the line, there are fewer generations on the Brooksbank’s side of the family.