So True? So False? Is Johnny Depp Really Related to the Royal Family?!

Rumor has it Depp shares a bloodline with HRH Queen Elizabeth. Could it be true?

By Gina Serpe May 16, 2011 3:27 PMTags
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Stranger tides things have happened.

Like Kate Middleton being related to George Washington. And Ellen DeGeneres.

So why shouldn't America's own box office king Johnny Depp have his own connection to British royalty, tenuous as the link may seem?

A new report is claiming that the perpetual Sexiest Man Alive shares a bloodline with Sexiest Monarch Alive (what, it would kill you to throw the old girl a compliment?) Queen Elizabeth II.

Hey, it could be true, right? Britannia rules the waves, Depp, um, plays a pirate. But is the hunky heartthrob really related to Britain's queen? Hang on to your knighthoods, because this rumor is…

So true!

Genealogist to the stars (really—he's the top guy on the BBC's Who Do You Think You Are?) Nick Barratt lays claim to having discovered the connection after he took it upon himself to do a little digging.

What he found? That Depp shares a great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great-grandfather with HRH. That's 19 greats for those keeping track at home.

Hardly seems mentioning, really. Especially when you take into account that that less than boast-worthy link makes Johnny and Lizzie 20th cousins.

But a connection is a connection all the same—even if it's a few centuries old. And not exactly a sure thing.

"You have to go back more than 500 years to reach the point where his ancestors become royal," Barratt told the Daily Mirror.

Once you do, you learn that Depp is a descendant of Sir William Gasciogne and Margaret Percy, the latter of whom was the daughter of the 3rd Earl of Northumberland, a direct descendant of King Edward III. (As if we needed to tell you that.)

However—and here's where the tenuous bit really kicks in—the link depends on a marriage that took place in the 1600s that appears to have been unrecorded. Unlucky.

But if it's good enough for Barratt, it's good enough for us. All hail King Johnny. Line for his ladies-in-waiting starts here.