You say to-may-to, I say to-mah-to
The son of The Legal Genealogist‘s niece is a little boy named Jack.
He is my brother’s first grandson, the light of all of their lives, and a total charmer whom I had the pleasure of meeting for the first time this week, just in time for his first birthday.
Which goes a long way towards explaining the dearth of blog posts lately.
But his very existence creates a question…
Is he my great nephew (or great-nephew) or my grand nephew (or grandnephew)?
Answer:
(Drum roll please…)
Yes.
Despite a rather persistent effort by genealogists to standardize the reference,1 the simple fact of the matter is that either term is just fine, thankyouverymuch.
The dictionary definition of great-nephew — at least from Merriam-Webster — is “grandnephew,” giving a first reference year for the usage of 1581.2
But that same dictionary — after defining grandnephew as “a grandson of one’s brother or sister” — gives the first reference year for that usage as circa 1639.3 Which means that great-nephew came first and grandnephew is a Johnny-come-lately.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines great-nephew as “A son of one’s nephew or niece”4 and grandnephew as “Another term for great-nephew.”5
Now there are good reasons why genealogists want to standardize the reference one way or the other — to reduce confusion and clarify relationships.6 But just as some of us say jean-ee-ology and some of us say jen-ee-ology, some of us are going to say great nephew and some of us are going to say grand nephew.
Which makes me a great aunt.
Or, as my own aunt would say, whenever any of the children of her nieces and nephews would ask if she was their great aunt, “Honey, I’m your greatest aunt.”
Cue the music: You say to-may-to, I say to-mah-to…
SOURCES
- See e.g. Amy Johnson Crow, “Great and Grand Aunts,” Ancestry blog, posted 25 Oct 2013 (http://blogs.ancestry.com/ : accessed 23 Feb 2015). ↩
- Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary (http://www.m-w.com : accessed 23 Feb 2015), “great-nephew.” ↩
- Ibid., “grandnephew.” ↩
- Oxford Dictionaries Online (http://oxforddictionaries.com/ : accessed 23 Feb 2015), “great-nephew.” ↩
- Ibid., “grandnephew.” ↩
- See generally Robert Resta, “And Bob’s Your Uncle: A Guide To Defining Great Aunts, Great-Great Grandparents, First Cousins Once-Removed, and Other Kinfolk,” The DNA Exchange, posted 16 Apr 2013 (http://thednaexchange.com/ : accessed 23 Feb 2015). ↩
It wasn’t part of a persistent effort on my part 🙂 What I was trying to say in that piece — and apparently failed at doing so — was that it really isn’t consistent and likely won’t be 🙂
But the argument was made that only one term is technically correct… And that just ain’t necessarily so!
If it’s the daughter or son of a sibling, and your sibling is the grandparent; logic says, it should be grandniece or grandnephew [spell checkers say this is a misspelling]. Is hyphenation a must or is it a matter of personal style?
Grand apparently is not hyphenated; great would be. Or not. 🙂
1. Are you and/or your aunt from the deep south because “Or, a[s] my own aunt would say, whenever any of the children of her nieces and nephews would ask if she was their great aunt, ‘Honey, I’m your greatest aunt[!]'” <— is a perfect example of such true Southern brilliance and feminine charm that, to be completely honest, I'm probably going to steal it for an essay, etc. (I've had this weird fantasy about starting a Southern Beatnik revolution since my teens… don't ask why… maybe I dream of being a more readable version of Faulkner?)
2. What did you go with? My nephew has a daughter and I simply can't decide whether to call her my "grandniece" or "greatniece" … just found out they're having another and simply cannot post photos oin the all powerful internets without picking one or the other. Great or grand???
I personally use great because that’s what I was raised with — and I was raised by my Texas-born mama who was raised by her Texas-born mama who was raised by her Alabama-born mama who was raised by… Yeah, roots deep in the deep south.
Oh my goodness! What a sweet little boy!
At least these terms make it clear who is from which generation.
The “removed” relationships can learn from that.
Now that the dictionary has added “figuratively” as a part of the definition of “literally,” I’ve given up. It is literally impossible for me to believe that a word in the dictionary would be redefined based on its use by literally a bajillion teenagers. 🙂
🙂
That is exactly how language changes and grows over the years. Once upon a time, being called “Nice” was an insult. It meant you were silly and stupid. Now it means that you are polite, respectful, etc. Because a “bajillion” people used it differently over time.
I inadvertently replied to the comment indented under yours so please see that one.
The purpose of a dictionary is to record and document how the language is used by people at all levels of society. This captures how languages grow and change. It is not intended to “freeze” the language at a given point in time.
In the Victorian era, it was unspeakably vulgar to refer to “legs”, silly as it was, one was supposed to use “limbs”. Now we use the word legs regularly because a “bajillion” teenagers of the day and adults too came to use it in every day speech and so it lost its categorization as being vulgar.
The meaning of ‘figurative’ is ‘non-literal’. The definition hasn’t changed just because a vast number of people misuse the word. It’s become commonplace for morons to drop the helping verb when using the past participle ‘seen’, but common misuse doesn’t make it correct. While I know that example doesn’t deal with a definition, it is an example of the bastardization of our language due to the laziness of far too many people today. I take no issue with some word meanings evolving over time; however, when a new definition incorporates what truly is an antonym, it is ridiculous and is nothing but a poor reflection on the people of today and their capacity to learn.
I think 2 greats should make 1 grand!…lol
I really don’t like hearing that at all. I really was hoping that you’d inadvertently misread something or had come across a site’s definition which lacked clarity in demonstrating the differences in their meanings, but I see that that isn’t the case. The dumbing-down of the English language is disturbing, isn’t it? I refuse to adopt today’s lazy English. ‘None’ and ‘neither’ forever will take a singular verb, in my book, and I’ll always follow the conjugated form of the verb “to be” with a nominative pronoun, regardless of what the rest of the English-speaking world does. My mother was a gifted English teacher and I truly value the knowledge and skills she passed on to me. I’m happy to see that I’m not alone.
Hear, hear!! Amen, Marci.
I always thought that grand-nephew, grand-aunt, etc were Americanisms but I’ve since heard the terms over here as well. I have a feeling that it all depends on where you live as to which term is used. The OED seems to have more references to greats than grands.
On this side of the Atlantic we recognise that there is an A in genealogy and we pronounce it as jean-ee-ah-logy!
I do think the grand-nephew terminology is strongert here than in the UK, Debbie, but it appears that technically both are correct on both sides of the pond.
This one made me grin. The proud Aunt Judy and why not? He is a good looking boy.
He’s adorable, Stan.
Thanks for this. I have been flipping back and forth with the usage, confusing myself and probably anyone who reads my blog. Sometimes I find it easier to use grand instead of another great just so I can relate one uncle to the appropriate direct ancestor. That is, if I am talking about my great-great-grandfather, it’s easier to think of his brother as my great-great-granduncle. But I never say granduncle. It sounds weird! So I guess I can remain confusing and confused and not be wrong either way.
And yes, your GREAT-nephew is adorable!!
I also confuse things the same way: great uncle but great granduncle.
I wasn’t sure of the difference. Thanks for your post!
Here am I. Before I was a great-uncle. Now that there is another one down the line, I am a great-grand uncle. But to no one’s surprise, I am not a monkey’s uncle over the whole debate. And also to no one’s surprise, I believe there is another one on the way.
My family used great aunt and grandnephew, but that may have been from my child mind melding usage from two families with different traditions of usage. I grew up around my father’s family, who tended to identify relationships by generations, while my mother’s family (whom I didn’t know well) did the second cousin twice removed thing, which to this day I cannot sort out. Makes much more sense to simply say “So and so is your great-grandfather’s brother’s daughter’s’s cousin through her mother’s side.” See, now I know exactly where in the family the cousin belongs, and which generation. Speaking of cousins, all my dad’s cousins and their spouses were aunt and uncle; ditto the older generation of cousins: great aunts and uncles all. If generations shift a bit, as they tend to do when families have kids with a wide range of ages, somebody might be reassigned to the generation he or she most closely matched in age. Didn’t change how relationships were figured, just where they sat at the table at our big Sunday dinners at grandma’s house.
And where you sat at that table meant the pecking order, didn’t it? (Sure did in my family!)
This little one is adorable! I too recently went through an issue of wanting to change all my blog posts that had great-aunt to grand-aunt. I had the question and I wanted to make sure I was labeling my aunt or uncle the correct way. I settled with what my mother had always state for my grandmother’s sister, she is my great aunt. Thanks for this post.
Thanks you for clearing that up. Now, let’s extend the question. What is my nephew’s grandson to me? Great Grand Nephew or 2nd great nephew? or either?
Here’s where I don’t tend to be quite as consistent as I should be, Janice. I’d say your nephew’s grandson was your second great grandnephew — and that does confuse things, doesn’t it? My genealogy program says it’s great grandnephew.
That is one adorable young man! I think he’s great….oh wait, I think he’s grand. And I’m sure you’re a great….or at least grand…..aunt. It doesn’t matter how you say it I can hear the love pouring off the page. He is one lucky little guy to be loved so dearly.
I sure hope I’m around when my nieces and nephews have kids so I can use your aunt’s line with glee. 🙂
Go for it!
I had heard it was grandnephew and grandaunt because it is the same as grandmother. First generation. Then it is great-grandmother and great-grandaunt. I’ve been called my sister Graundaunt Aunn, for the fun of it. That way everything sounds the same.
That’s certainly correct, it’s just not the only correct way to say it.
Try this one: My best and oldest friend from the Navy (we flew combat in Korea and remain very close) has a son, who has always called me “Uncle Manny” The son has three daughters, they too have always called me “Uncle Manny”. I have always referred to the girls as my nieces. Is that Ok or what?
It is lovely. These are what I call “relatives of the heart”. My older daughter adores her “Grandma Betty”, who is the woman who took care of her during the day while I worked.
Easiest way to look at grand vs great. there is no such thing as a Great Uncle/Aunt as there is no such thing as Great Father/Mother
And the grandson of you nephew is indeed your Great Grand Nephew, as he is the Great Grandson of your sibling (or sibling spouse)
You can look at it that way if you wish, but the reality of the long-term usage says, either is correct.
I wish to comment on this passage:
The dictionary definition of great-nephew — at least from Merriam-Webster — is “grandnephew,” giving a first reference year for the usage of 1581.2
But that same dictionary — after defining grandnephew as “a grandson of one’s brother or sister” — gives the first reference year for that usage as circa 1639.3 Which means that great-nephew came first and grandnephew is a Johnny-come-lately.
Comment: The dates in dictionaries are not for earliest uses but for earliest-KNOWN uses.
That is, so far as was known just before the dictionary in question was published, the earliest evidence for the first variant was dated 1581 and that for the second, about 1639.
Later research may uncover even earlier evidence for one or both of the variants, in which case one or both of the dates will change and, possibly, the variant which earlier appeared to be the older one will now turn out to seem to be the younger one.
The first of those possibilities is indeed the case:
On 28 July 2017, the website of Merriam-Webster gave 1580 as the year of earliest-known use of greatnephew and 1596 as that of grandnephew, so that even though the first variant still seems to be the older one, the gap has narrowed to only sixteen years (contrast the gap of sixty-eight years previously).
Furthermore, different researchers may arrive at different dates of earliest-known use, depending on their resources and their ingenuity. Consequently, it would be interesting to see what dates The Oxford English Dictionary gives.
For more on how the dates in dictionaries are to be correctly interpreted, see this article, the electronic version of which is available free of charge on line:
David L. Gold: An Aspect Of Lexicography Still Not Fully Professionalized: The Search For Antedatings And Postdatings, Revista Alicantina de Estudios Ingleses 18 (2005): 25-69
Because earlier evidence may change the dates, dictionaries do not speak of FIRST USE (the makers of dictionaries are not omniscient) but of FIRST KNOWN USE.
Here is the main issue I have with using “great” vs. “grand”. In genealogy we would say”great great grandmother”, or 2nd great grandmother. Whereas if we used “great great great uncle, or 3nd great uncle, that would lead to confusion as to which generation the Uncle belongs to. He would be that great great grandmother’s brother.By using “grand”,in “granduncle”. We remove that confusion. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve researched long descendancy trees and I’ve gotten confused with great great great great great nieces and great great great great grandmothers.
At that level of great or grand, I’m confused anyway. 🙂
There is confusion about great and grand uncle / great and grand aunt but the correct way is that before a person becomes a Great Grand Uncle they must first become a Grand Uncle … Here is an example …
King Henry VIII of England had a niece Frances Brandon … She in turn had a daughter Lady Jane Grey who was King Henry VIII’s Grand Niece … Some would say King Henry VIII was Lady Jane Grey’s Great Uncle but this is not possible as her Great Uncles are her Great Grandmother’s brothers who were King Edward V of England and Richard Duke of York … If King Henry VIII was Lady Jane Grey’s Great Uncle it would make King Edward V and Richard Duke of York her Great Great Uncles and this knocks out the generation relationship so it becomes incorrect.
Wikipedia correctly states that Lady Jane Grey was the GRAND NIECE of King Henry VIII and not his Great Niece.
Another example is …
The Duke of Windsor had a niece who was Queen Elizabeth II.
When Queen Elizabeth II had a son Prince Charles and so the Duke of Windsor became a Grand Uncle … He cannot be Prince Charles’s Great Uncle as that would in fact be Prince George, Duke of Kent, who is the Duke of Windsor’s Uncle. If the Duke of Windsor was the Great Uncle of Prince Charles it would make Prince George, Duke of Kent the Great Great Uncle when the Duke of Kent is in fact the Great Grand Uncle. So it would knock out the generations.
Grand Uncle / Grand Aunt … This is a person who is a sibling to your Grandparents.
Great Grand Uncle / Great Grand Aunt is a sibling to you Great Grandparents.
Great Great Grand Uncle / Great Great Grand Aunt is a sibling to you Great Great Grandparents …
And so on ….
That is the correct way … You cannot be a Great Uncle / Great Aunt to your sibling’s grandchild as you are then the Grand Uncle / Grand Aunt … The one who is a Great Grand Uncle /Great Grand Aunt to your sibling’s grandchild is actually the siblings of that child’s great grandparents.
That’s certainly the usage that genealogists are trying to standardize on. But… it’s not the historical usage, which allows for both.
On 11 January 2018 I reread the post, as well as the latest comment, and got to thinking about what I say. To my surprise I found that with respect to aunts and uncles, I don’t use “grand” at all:
aunt
great-aunt
great-great-aunt
great-great-great-aunt, and so on.
Does that strike anyone as familiar?
That’s pretty much what my family does.
I’ve wondered about this for a number of years:
I use the term “removed” ambiguously, for example, “Mary is my first cousin once removed” means that she is my first cousin’s daughter OR I am the child of Mary’s first cousin.’
Likewise, if I say, “Mary and John are first cousins once removed,” it is unclear who is of the younger generation and who is of the older one.
Does anyone else use the word “remove” in that way?
Can the relationship be expressed unambiguously?
If
In English, there is no unambiguous short form for the specific cousin relationships you describe: it could be that you’re the older generation and this is your cousin’s child, or that you’re the younger generation and this is your parent’s cousin. You’d have to say, “Mary is my first cousin once removed, the child of my cousin,” to be more precise.
I worry about you because you don’t pronounce ‘genealogy’ properly. It’s ‘jeen-ee-Alogy’ not ‘Ology’.
🙂
This comment gave me comfort. I am brand new at researching my family. I have always used “great” to identify generations of aunts and uncles. To me- it simplifies and identifies the correct generation. But I know can be more to it than that and I continue to try to understand all these relationships and how to pinpoint them verbally. I love all these discussions.
And what about the gender neutral term when you don’t know if it’s a grand-niece or grand-nephew. Grand-nibling seems to be the term … definitely an American invention.
I know of no one in America who refers to her mother’s mother as great-mother. It is grandmother. Therefore one’s grandmother’s mother is great grandmother.
For consistency the child of your niece is your grandniece. That child’s offspring would be a great-grandniece. I put no credence in first known usage in the 1500s. The later usage may be viewed as a correction, not an alternative.
Whether you personally choose to “put credence” in the usage, it is recognized and in some areas the preferred usage. You’re right that it is clearer to distinguish the generations. But it isn’t wrong to opt for something different. It’s to-may-to, to-mah-to.
Lol