Family trees

Family tree examples

Real, literary and made-up families, each drawn from a story written in plain English. Click into any tree to explore it, step through its timeline or test yourself with the quiz.

Books and plays

For readers who've lost track of who's who.

  • Wuthering Heights family tree

    An interactive Wuthering Heights family tree. See how the Earnshaws, the Lintons and Heathcliff are related, which Catherine is which, and when everyone was born, married and died.

  • Macbeth family tree

    An interactive Macbeth family tree: Duncan and Macbeth as cousins, Malcolm and Donalbain, Banquo and Fleance, the Macduffs and the Siwards, and how the play compares with the real kings of Scotland.

  • Romeo and Juliet family tree

    An interactive Romeo and Juliet family tree: the Montagues and the Capulets, how Tybalt and Benvolio fit in, why Mercutio is on neither side, and who dies.

History and royalty

Dynasties, marriages and who inherited what.

  • Wars of the Roses family tree

    An interactive Wars of the Roses family tree: Edward III's sons, the Lancastrian and Yorkist kings, the Nevilles, the Princes in the Tower and how Henry Tudor joined the two roses.

  • Tudor family tree

    Henry VIII, his six wives and their children, from Henry VII to Elizabeth I.

Famous families

Real families who kept turning up in the history books.

  • Darwin–Wedgwood family tree

    An interactive Darwin–Wedgwood family tree: Erasmus Darwin, Josiah Wedgwood the potter, Charles and Emma Darwin and their children, and the cousins who kept marrying each other.

  • Brontë family tree

    An interactive Brontë family tree: Patrick and Maria, Aunt Branwell, and all six children, from Maria and Elizabeth to Charlotte, Branwell, Emily and Anne, with the dates and places of their short lives.

  • Mitford family tree

    An interactive Mitford family tree: Farve and Muv, Nancy, Pamela, Tom, Diana, Unity, Jessica and Deborah, the men they married and the next generation, from the Guinnesses and Mosleys to the Dukes of Devonshire.

Everyday families

Step-parents, half-siblings, second marriages and adoption, and how to show them on a tree.

  • Blended family tree

    An example blended family tree with divorces, second marriages, a stepdaughter and half-siblings, and the plain sentences that draw it, so you can make one for your own family.

  • Family tree with adoption

    An example family tree with an adopted son and his birth mother, a foster daughter and an aunt married to her wife, and the plain sentences that draw it.

Invented worlds

Made-up families to borrow ideas from, if you're writing your own.

  • The House of Ashvale

    An invented fantasy dynasty, with a king's unacknowledged son, twins and a witch aunt.

  • The Five Houses

    Five made-up fantasy families on one chart, three of them joined by marriage.

Make your own family tree Read the guides