Kate Middleton does have some royalty in her after all--new research shows that she shares an ancestor with Queen Elizabeth’s mother.
Kate and Prince William are going to see the famous Blakiston-Bowes Cabinet when the tour the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. Turns out the centuries-old piece, which has the Blakiston and Bowes family crests on its doors, proves the link between Kate and Elizabeth.
The cabinet was created around 1700 to celebrate the wedding between the two biggest families in County Durham - the Blakistons and the Bowes-Lyons.
Sir William Blakiston, of Gibside Hall, near Gateshead, is the common ancestor that the Duchess and the Queen Mother share, art historian Michael Reed says. Elizabeth, Sir William’s great granddaughter, married into the Bowes-Lyon family.
“It makes sense that Kate wore the Queen Mother’s tiara when she married Prince William--both women share a great deal, Durham ancestry, the vast Gibside Estate and the same famous cabinet,” Reed said in a statement.
Reed also explained that his research shows the Blakiston Baronets and the Baronets of Conyers of Hordern, Kate’s ancestors, were the wealthiest landowners in Northern England.
They married into the Bowes-Lyon family so the families could share each others’ vast coal estates.
