How to Find Your Exact Relationship to Any Cousin

I've recently identified hundreds of my cousins from Santa Paolina, Avellino, Italy. I found them in the town's thousands of 1809–1945 vital records. Now I want to find some living cousins.

To find descendants of the town, I turned to my Ancestry DNA matches. I like the different options they have for filtering your matches. A handful of last names from Santa Paolina are closely tied to me. I can filter my DNA matches to show only those with a specific last name in their family tree—even if it's a private tree.

Finding a Likely Cousin

I picked one of my family names from the town at random: Ricciardelli. Then I filtered my DNA match list to show only those with Ricciardelli in their family tree. I chose a DNA match who's in the 4th–6th cousin range for me.

I should tell you that my closest relative from this town is my 2nd great grandmother. I would not expect to find any very close DNA cousins—other than the cousins I grew up with.

I took a look at this 4th–6th cousin's family tree and found only one Ricciardelli. But there were quite a few positive things about her:

• This Ricciardelli woman was born in 1879, which is well in range of the available vital records.
• My DNA match knows the woman's exact birth date, making her easy to positively identify.
• My match listed the woman's hometown as Alvelena, Italy. That doesn't exist, but I'll bet this was how her family heard "Avellino" get passed down through the years.
• The woman died in the U.S., which means I can find immigration and census records for her family.

By pure coincidence, a family I worked on last week belongs to today's DNA match.

Following a Path to My DNA Match

My recent deep dive into Santa Paolina records taught me a lot. I know which names are common and how to spell them. It was obvious my match had Americanized the woman's first name. And she misspelled her middle name a bit. So I went right after this Ricciardelli woman, using her correct name.

I launched a search program on my PC called Everything. I typed in Maria Diamante Ricciardelli. There were two of them, both born to the same parents. The 1877 baby was actually Diamante Maria, while the 1879 baby was Maria Diamante. Surprisingly, there is no death record for the first baby. Were they purposely trying to mess with future genealogists?

I checked to see if Maria Diamante Ricciardelli's parents were in my family tree. They were! Her father Emanuele is my 1st cousin 5 times removed. His father Samuele is my 4th great uncle, and his father (also Emanuele) is my 5th great grandfather. I can take Maria Diamante back 4 generations to my 6th great grandfather, Saverio Ricciardelli, born about 1741.

Figuring Out Our True Relationship

Maria Diamante Ricciardelli is my 2nd cousin 4 times removed. I saw that when I put her name into Family Tree Maker. She appears to be the great grandmother of my DNA match. So, what does that make us to one another?

Trying to figure this out was worse than trying to split a bill seven ways at a restaurant. Without a calculator. I needed a chart to make it clear how I'm related to a descendant of a person with a known relationship to me. I've published a relationship calculator before. It has its purpose, but it wasn't exactly what I needed now. It doesn't tell me how I'm related to the great grandchild of my 2nd cousin 4 times removed.

I made a new chart you can download called Cousin Connection. I've highlighted all the "full cousin" relationships in green (1st cousin, 2nd cousin, 3rd cousin, etc.). NOTE: If you are unable to download the file, please let me know. I can add it to a different location.

Use this chart to take the guesswork out of distant cousin relationships.

How to Use the Chart

Maria Diamante Ricciardelli is a descendant of my 5th great grandparents. So I'll start at Column G, the 5th Great Grandparent column. She is 3 generations below my 5th great grandparents, so I'll go down the column 3 cells. This cell (G4) places Maria as the great grandchild (look to the left at Column A) of my 5th great grandparents. It says she is my 2nd cousin 4 times removed. So far, so good.

To see how my DNA match is my cousin, I'll move down Column G 3 more cells. That's how many generations below Maria she is (child, grandchild, great grandchild). That puts us at cell G7. That tells me she is my 5th cousin once removed.

Based on our amount of shared DNA, Ancestry DNA said we were in the 4th–6th cousin range. Now I can see exactly what to call our relationship, and it does fall in that range. We are 5th cousins once removed.

After I add Maria's birth record to my family tree and follow up with U.S. documents and facts, I'll write to this DNA match.

Telling her our exact relationship is much better than saying, "Your great grandmother's grandparents are my 5th great grandparents." Don't you agree?

I hope this chart will be a useful tool for calculating your relationships to cousins, too.

Why My Family Tree is Exploding in Size

This will anger some genealogists, but here goes. I added 500 people to my family tree in a couple of days. It was fun and easy. Here's how it works.

Examining the Documents

I made the entire collection of an Italian town's vital records searchable on my computer. I had already downloaded the town's documents to my computer. I put them in 386 folders—one for each year's birth records, marriage records, and death records, from 1809 to 1945.

Then I viewed every single document image to see who it belonged to. Each file comes with a name like 007859450_00687.jpg. This number helps me recreate the exact URL where anyone can find it for themselves. I use that URL in the source citation. So I kept the numbers, but I added the name of the person(s) in the document.

Why settle for only my 2nd great grandparents' 1871 marriage record when TONS of cousins are waiting for me in this collection?

A lot of people in the town have the same name. So it's extremely helpful to include the name of the person's father in the file name. In Italian, di means of, and it's how they state the name of a person's father. "Vitantonio Egidio di Pasquale" means that Pasquale is the father of Vitantonio Egidio. It's also a handy shorthand for my file names:

• 007859450_00688 Angelarosa Lombardo di Felice and Pasquale Musto di Carmine.jpg
• 007859450_00689 Maria Spinelli di Francesco and Saverio Spinelli di Vincenzo.jpg
• 007859450_00690 Angelo Raffaele Carpenito di Saverio and Paolina deGuglielmo di Antonio.jpg

Finding What's Missing

With all the files renamed, I can search for anyone. I use a free Windows program called Everything. Let's say I want to find all the children born to a particular man. I simply type his last name "di" his first name in quotes—"deGuglielmo di Antonio"—into Everything.

The cousins pile up fast when all their names are at your fingertips.

Santa Paolina, Avellino, Italy, is the hometown of my 2nd great grandmother and her paternal ancestors. Its population may have peaked at 2,487 in 1951. I want to identify as many Santa Paolina cousins as possible. This can help me connect to distant cousins around the world.

I've already found all my direct Santa Paolina ancestors. Now I'm going sideways. One generation at a time, I'm finding all the siblings of my direct ancestors. Who did they marry? Who were their spouses' ancestors? Who were their children, and who did their children marry? All the answers are in my renamed files.

Just the Facts

The only way I could add 500 cousins so quickly is by taking off the training wheels for a while. Normally I add vital records images to my family tree as I find them, along with a source citation. Right now, for this town, I'm adding only the names and facts and moving on.

There's no risk for me in skipping these important documents and sources. They're only a couple of clicks away. The vital records are easily searchable on my computer. I can find them again whenever I want. If a distant cousin finds my tree on Ancestry.com, I'll add the documents and sources for our mutual benefit.

I would not, and do not, do things this way with census records, ship manifests, or any record I find on Ancestry.com. I gather the document and create a source citation immediately. But the Italian vital records on my computer (and backed up in triplicate) are very easy to put my hands on again.

But right now, I'm owning my Santa Paolina heritage 100%. My grand aunt used to say the family was from Avellino. But she didn't know which town, or which ancestors. I'm so happy I discovered the answers. I'm running with it!

It's amazing to see how this process is working. I choose, let's say, a 3rd great uncle. I find out who he married and add her birth date and her parents' names. Then I find her parents' marriage so I can learn their parents' names. And I can look for their death records and learn their parents' names.

Coming back to that 3rd great uncle, I search for all the children he and his wife had. I search for his death, and his wife's. I search for the marriages and deaths of his children. I follow the children's children as far as the records will take me.

You can see how easy it would be to quickly add 500 people this way.

From what I've seen, the best way to connect to many DNA matches is to have their grandparents in your family tree. I will keep going, harvesting facts from Santa Paolina, and my other ancestral towns. And if anyone finds a hook into my tree? Well, they're going to be in for quite a shock.

And speaking of vital records:

• Following the Documents from Marriage to Marriage
• How to 'Attack' Your Ancestor's Small Town Vital Records
• How I Tracked Down My 4th Great Grandmother's Parents

How to Find the Stragglers in Your Family Tree

I'm living in my 16th home, so I know a thing or two about moving. To lighten the load before you pack, you sort your stuff into three categories: keep, sell, or throw away.

We can use a similar rule on our family trees. I generated a list of unrelated people in my family tree. I fit each person into one of three categories: research, keep, or delete.

This started when a Family Tree Maker user asked how to find the loose (unrelated) people in her family tree. One person answered "Family Tree Analyzer" without an explanation. I launched my copy of the program and answered with these instructions:

Family Tree Analyzer is a free program that can analyze your tree in many ways. Export a GEDCOM from your tree and open it with Family Tree Analyzer. Once it's open, click the Main Lists tab and view the Individuals tab (the first tab). Scroll to the right to find the Relation column and click to sort by it. The "Unknowns" are your loose people.

I did this and exported my full list of people to a spreadsheet. Then I sorted and deleted everyone who did have a relationship to me.

Take a fresh look at the unrelated people in your family tree.

Now I had a spreadsheet of all the unrelated people in my family tree. I set out to categorize them as research, keep, or delete. I added a new column to my spreadsheet with the heading "Reason." As I worked my way down the list of alphabetized names, I added the reason they're in my tree.

For example, I had dozens of disconnected people with the last name Asahina. They're in my tree because of an undocumented connection to my husband's Ohama family. In the "Reason" column, I gave each of these people "Asahina" as the reason they're in my tree.

Other people are in my tree because my family says they are cousins, but the documents don't exist. I gave them a last name as a "Reason." They are either Saviano (my great grandmother's maiden name) or Sarracino (my great grandfather's name).

Now that everyone in the list had a particular reason to be there, I sorted the spreadsheet by the reasons.

• Some people were from my grandfather's hometown. I worked with vital records to figure out their connection. I had lots of success and deleted them from the spreadsheet.
• A couple of families were in the published 1742 census for my grandfather's town. I did some research, but I couldn't find a bridge between the civil records and 1742. I decided to keep these 12 people anyway.
• There were a few families of three: two parents and a baby. I searched for more of their children. Unfortunately, all the children died young. Without a marriage to build on, I could not connect this small family to anyone else. I deleted them from my family tree and the spreadsheet.
• When it came to the Asahina family, my own notes for two different people gave me the connection I was seeking. The story is, an Ohama family gave one of their babies to a childless cousin. As shocking as that sounds, it's a Japanese tradition. My own father-in-law was nearly given away! In the Ohama family, I'd entered a baby named _____ Asahina with a note saying, "this is the baby they gave away." In the Asahina family, I had attached a note to a woman named Masa Asahina. "A distant cousin says Masa is the Ohama baby given to the Asahina family." Hurray! I merged _____ Asahina with Masa Asahina, connecting the entire family. I removed them from my spreadsheet of unrelated people.
• I tried again to connect a Saviano clan to myself. The family says they are cousins, and I have no doubt of that. But their hometown didn't keep civil records before 1861. Their church records are lacking, too. I added some new documents and facts, but they are still loose in my tree. I will keep them there.

My family tree still has 161 unrelated people I've chosen to keep. Twelve are from the 1742 census of Grandpa's town. The rest are from the town without documentation. I'm OK with that. They all have a now-documented reason for being in my family tree. I'll be on the lookout to see if any distant cousins know more about them than I do. So far, they don't.

In the end, I researched everyone in the list to some extent, deleted a bunch, and kept 161 people. And that's how you sort out and lighten the load before you move on to more research.

If you use Family Tree Maker, use these settings to find the unrelated people in your family tree.

Someone else had a different answer to the "how to find loose people" question. They recommended Family Tree Maker's Kinship Report. With 29,000+ people in my tree, the report takes about 30 minutes to run, and it's 979 pages long. I can export to a spreadsheet by clicking Share, Export to CSV. Then, in Excel, I can filter the results to show only the "Unrelated" Relationship.

I recommend you go with Family Tree Analyzer for quick, useful, effective results. Then get moving and sort out your people.

Sorting Out a Hot Mess in Your Family Tree

It all started with Angela. When I landed on her in my 29,000-person family tree, I noticed I had her death date, but not her parents' names. She died in April 1809—about a month after my part of Italy began keeping birth, marriage, and death records.

I pulled up her death record. I found her parents' names and added them to my family tree. Then I saw a bigger problem with her father, Pasquale. His facts were a hot mess.

I found two versions of Pasquale's 1799 death record:

• in his son Angelo's 1815 marriage documents
• in his grandson Pasquale's 1853 marriage documents

In both versions of the death record, Pasquale is the son of Tommaso Cocca and Angela Gentile. That's fantastic because Tommaso and Angela are in the town's 1742 census. (The census is captured in a book called "Colle Sannita nel 1742" by my friend, Dr. Fabio Paolucci.) In both death records Pasquale's wife is Costanza Iamarino. I knew two of Pasquale and Costanza's children: Angela (born in 1776 per her death record) and Angelo (born in 1795).

But here's the problem. In my family tree, I had also identified Mariangela Iamarino as Pasquale's wife. That couple had two children in 1771 and 1773.

A note in my family tree made me wonder if he really had married both Mariangela and Costanza. Here's my note:

"Pasquale's death record (from his granddaughter Carmina Cocca's 1837 marriage documents) says he died on 2 Jul 1795, was the son of Giambattista Cocca and Pietronilla Vignogna, and was married to Mariangela Iamarino. I believe I've combined 2 men."

Finding More Facts to Sort Out the Mess

Now that I've stumbled upon this Pasquale mess again, it's time to set things straight.

The first thing to do is look at the 1795 death record in Carmina Cocca's marriage documents. In all, I found three versions of Pasquale's 1795 death record, but only one included his age at death.

Two different death records, with two different wives, made it clear I'd merged two men.

The available facts make it clear I accidentally merged two Pasquale Cocca's into one. So how do I separate them while maintaining each man's facts?

If I could duplicate Pasquale in Family Tree Maker, I could remove the wrong facts, spouses, and kids from each man. Since there is no duplication option, I'll make a note of each fact that belongs to the Pasquale who died in 1795:

• He married Mariangela Iamarino
• They had 3 children: Giambattista, Donata, and Maria Maddalena
• I now know he died in 1795 and his parents were Giambattista Cocca and Pietronilla Vignogna

Separating the Families Carefully

To avoid losing sight of Mariangela and her children, I'll follow these steps:

1. Select each of the children and detach them from Pasquale, but not from Mariangela Iamarino.
2. Select Mariangela and detach her from Pasquale.
3. Create a new Pasquale Cocca as Mariangela's husband and father of her children.
4. Add this new Pasquale's death date and his parents' names.

With all the facts and steps in front of me, I can fix this mess without missing anything. I'll remove that very important note and bookmark from the other Pasquale Cocca, too.

Now I've given Mariangela and her children their very own Pasquale Cocca. When I added his parents, I found that they, too, are in the 1742 census. I used the census to add Pasquale's paternal grandfather and his two older siblings. Since Pasquale is not listed in the 1742 census, I know he was not born in 1740, as his death record says. I'll give him a birth date of Abt. 1743.

Don't Assume You'll Remember These Things

I'm so grateful I left myself a note about Pasquale.

The Bookmarks feature of Family Tree Maker is an important way to keep your notes visible.

When I add a note in Family Tree Maker, I give the person a bookmark. Seeing that bookmark in the list of all people lets me see there's something about this person I need to know. Once I solve a problem, I remove the note and the person's bookmark.

If there's a hot mess in your family tree, gather as many facts as you can. Pay attention to the discrepancies. Take careful notes so you can undo your errors and set things straight.

Use What You Know to Break Down a Brick Wall

When you've been swimming in old Italian vital records for as long as I have, you learn a lot of little tidbits. Using those tidbits, I broke through a brick wall last week.

I finally got past one of my 5th great grandfathers. Once I found exactly the right record, I shot straight up his paternal line to my 8th great grandparents!

It was one heck of a process, and I'm so glad I stuck with it.

Since you may not know all the tidbits I've learned along the way, I thought it'd be helpful for me to list them for you. These facts are true of Italian vital records and some church records. Some of these facts should apply to other countries' vital records as well.

1. Italian women keep their father's last name for life. There is no "maiden name" and "married name." There's one name. If they boarded a ship to emigrate, they used their one-and-only last name.
2. Birth records may include the name of the baby's grandfathers and if they're alive or dead. If it says di and a name, the grandfather is alive. If it says fu and a name, the grandfather is dead.
   
3. Death records name the deceased's parents and spouse, and whether they are alive or dead. But, if a person died in another town, the people there may not know the names all the deceased's parents and spouse. And if a man died quite early, his death record may say that he is married, but not give his wife's name.
4. An Italian marriage requires the consent of the bride and groom's parents. If a parent is dead, a grandfather may consent. If everyone's dead, there needs to be proof. So, the marriage records can include:
   • Bride and groom's birth or baptism record, possibly with their parents' ages at the time. Note: The earlier in someone's life their age is stated, the more reliable it is.
   • Bride and groom's mother's death record, if she's dead at the time of the marriage
   • Bride and groom's father's death record, if he's dead at the time of the marriage
   • Bride and groom's grandfather's death record, if parent and grandfather are both dead
   • Bride and groom's previous spouse's death record. Note: There was no divorce in Italy until 1970, but widows usually remarried quickly.

Last week I noticed that my Grandma Lucy's line had a dead end at my 5th great grandfather, Antonio Zeolla. I've done tons of work to make every vital record from Antonio's town searchable. So why didn't I know when he died or who his parents were?

Building out all of Antonio's children and grandchildren was the key to finding his ancestors.

I did know Antonio was still alive in 1817. I learned that from his wife's death record.

• If the deceased's spouse is dead, the document says they were the vedovo di or vedova di, followed by their late spouse's name. Vedovo/a di means widow of.
• If the deceased's spouse is alive, the document says they were the marito di or moglie di, followed by their spouse's name. Marito di means husband of. Moglie di means wife of.

I searched for an Antonio Zeolla who was the widow of Andreana Piacquadio (my 5th great grandmother). There was no widow of Andreana. Had Antonio remarried? In 1817 when Andreana died, the couple had 2 very young children. Antonio should have remarried.

But I couldn't search for the marriage of an Antonio Zeolla. That's a common name in the town of Colle Sannita, and I wouldn't know if I'd found the right man. If he remarried at the right time, the documents would include Andreana's death record. I searched for that. But he didn't remarry at the right time.

I knew what I had to do.

I had to find all of Antonio and Andreana's children and their marriage records. But Antonio was still alive when his children married.

Antonio's grandchildren's marriage records would include his death if they married:

• after their parent had died, and
• after Antonio had died.

I began identifying his grandchildren and searching for their marriages.

At last I found what I needed. In 1850, Andreana Zeolla got married. She was the daughter of Antonio's eldest son. Luckily for me, When she married, both her father and grandfather were dead. After hours of searching, I found Antonio's death record from 1848. I learned his parents (my 6th great grandparents) were Marco Zeolla and Donata Tedesco.

It took his granddaughter's marriage to positively identify Antonio's death date and second wife. Then I found even more.

The 1848 death record says Antonio was the widow of a different woman. It's clear from the context that this is the Antonio I was looking for. His second wife is the reason I couldn't find him.

Now I knew he had remarried Lucia Piacquadio, so I found his 1819 marriage documents. Those documents held an even bigger treasure for me.

When Antonio remarried, both his father and grandfather were dead. Hurray, right? I learned that:

• my 6th great grandfather Marco Zeolla died in 1791
• he was the son of Antonio Zeolla and Angela Iacobaccio, my 7th great grandparents
• my 7th great grandfather Antonio Zeolla died in 1764
• he was the son of Marco Zeolla and Fioribella diRuccia, my 8th great grandparents!!

While this method doesn't always lead to this much success, you mustn't overlook it. When you can't find the document you need, work around it. A family member—one you haven't found yet—may be the key to help you break down that brick wall.

Your DNA Matches Hold Hidden Clues

"How can DNA help me build my family tree?" I see this question online all the time. People who haven't taken a DNA test are wondering if it's worth the price.

I can see their point, can't you? If they care about only their own ancestry, they may not care about finding their 5th cousin 3 times removed.

Here's why DNA matches are important to any genealogy researcher: The facts you discover in their trees can fill in the blanks in your tree.

For example, I was looking at a DNA match in the 4th–6th cousin range. He has Irish Ancestry on his father's side, and Italian ancestry on his mother's side. His Italian grandparents, with familiar last names, were all I needed to begin my search.

His info was a little vague. But I found his grandmother's birth record in the vital records from my Grandpa's hometown. I love it when the Italian birth records include a note about who this baby grew up to marry. But this person, Liberantonia deMatteis, had no such note.

Your DNA test buys you access to an endless amount of clues for your family tree.

Searching for his grandfather, I found 2 possibilities in the Italian records. Without that marriage notation, I couldn't be sure which was the right person.

I turned to Ancestry.com, hoping to find the couple's immigration record for more clues. Instead, I found a more detailed family tree owned by a relative of my DNA match (same Irish last name). Her family tree confirmed that I had found the right grandmother for my DNA match. And it pointed out a crucial error in the first tree. His name wasn't Pasquale, it was Innocenzo. With that clue, I found the birth record for my DNA match's grandfather.

I already know more about my DNA match's Italian ancestry than he does.

Without this DNA match to Innocenzo and Liberantonia, I would have passed them by. Knowing there's a connection, I must climb each of their trees to find our relationship.

I've put in the work to make finding ancestors easy as can be.

It took me about 3 hours to find a true relationship to my DNA match, but it was fun. His grandmother is my 5th cousin twice removed, so my DNA match is my 7th cousin.

His grandmother's mother was the key to our multi-faceted relationship. I climbed her father's side of the family 5 generations to reach my 6th great grandparents Saverio and Angela. But I also climbed her mother's side of the family 5 generations to reach my double 6th great grandparents Giuseppe and Maria.

Does that make us triple 7th cousins? We do have a 4th–6th cousin DNA relationship.

Not all DNA test-takers are actively building their family trees. That's why they don't answer us when we write to them. Rather than write to this DNA match, I will update my public family tree with his relatives.

Some day, if he's interested, he'll stumble upon my tree and be amazed at all the generations I've found for him. In the meantime, this helps me in my quest to connect everyone with roots in my ancestral hometowns.

If you're one of the DNA skeptics, know that your matches can give you helpful clues, whether they know it or not.