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Barking up the wrong tree

May 5, 2011 10:56

By

Simon Rocker,

Simon Rocker

1 min read

Despite web rumour, Kate Middleton is unlikely to be of Jewish stock.

What's stirred it is that her mother Carole was born Goldsmith: and further up the matrilineal line lies great-great-grandma Elizabeth Myers.

But Myers and Goldsmith can be English surnames. The family tree reaches back to 18th-century carpenter John Goldsmith, whose labourer son and grandson were both named John. John was hardly a common Jewish name and Ashkenazi Jews did not name sons after fathers. Myers derives from "marsh" or "son of mayor" and Elizabeth was born in a Durham parish not noted for Jewish settlement.

But here's one kosher thought from Rabbi Alan Plancey, a guest at the royal wedding: "I wished our brides dressed as modestly."