My g grandmother's uncle George, who was my g grandmother's father's brother, had a son George Jr., who then was my g grandmother's cousin. George Jr. married a woman, Jane who then became my g grandmother's cousin by marriage. Jane was the g aunt of Debbie. How are Debbie and I related - we share ggg grandparents so does that mean we are 4th cousins even though my line is direct and her's is through a great aunt?

Hello Zoroaster993, that is complicated and I have been doing genealogy for years. So I found you a chart, which I find makes it easier to find out relationships between people.

Hope it helps you.

http://genealogy.about.com/library/nrelationshipch art.htm

Thank you much and I appreciate your getting back to me so soon. I have seen the chart before and I think my question revolves around defining the relationship between Debbie and my ggg grandparents. Is she their ggg grand niece? If not, what is she? If I know that, I can use the chart to figure this out. Can you help.

First cousins share the same grandparent. Second cousins share the same great-grandparent. Third cousins share the same great-great-grandparent and finally, fourth cousins share the same great-great-great-grandparent. It is a generational thing.

Many find that it gets confusing when you try to figure out first-cousin once removed or third cousin twice removed for example. The "removed" thing is just to show how your cousin's child is related to you. If your first cousin has a child, then that child would be your first cousin once removed. If that child also has a kid then that baby would be your first cousin twice removed.

Basically the cousin thing is based on each generational step as shown above. So if you have a child, then that child would be Debbie's fourth cousin once removed. And if Debbie also had a child then that child would be your child's fifth cousin. If you have trouble with that, just read it again. It's not as complicated as it seems.

Civil relationships of persons are generally counted up to 4th civil degree relation, by blood or by affinity and all relationships beyond that degree are considered distant relatives. This is because there is no more point of consideration counting all relationships that are already too remote or distant that might trace back to the offspring of Adam and Eve, whatever. The main purpose of counting relationships is in connection with succession entitlements of inheritance in cases of intestate deaths, where the decedent dies without a will and it is the law that will pinpoint who is entitled in the line of succession.