A new genealogical study has uncovered a remarkable historical link connecting three vastly different icons: Manchester United legend Eric Cantona , Pope Leo XIV, and Nobel Prize-winning author Albert Camus.
Despite their different paths , football, faith, and philosophy, all three men share a common ancestral line rooted in Southern France.
The connection
The discovery comes from a study by French genealogists using the platform Geneanet, which traced the lineage of Pope Leo XIV (born Robert Francis Prevost in Chicago) back several centuries to France and Italy. His paternal grandfather emigrated from Italy to the U.S., but deeper digging revealed extended family ties reaching across French provinces.
As it turns out, Pope Leo XIV and Eric Cantona are distant cousins, linked between the 12th and 15th generations through Bertrand Negrel and Louise Jean, who married in 1566 in Roquevaire, a town near Marseille.
That same Negrel-Jean line also appears in the family tree of Albert Camus, the French-Algerian philosopher and author of The Stranger and The Myth of Sisyphus. Camus is connected from the 14th to the 16th generation through another Roquevaire-based couple, Jean Negrel and Jeanne Bouis, married in 1501.
This means Cantona, Camus, and Pope Leo XIV all descend from the same extended Provençal family line, with Roquevaire serving as their ancestral hub.
A provençal thread through time
Roquevaire, in the Bouches-du-Rhône department of southern France, sits just a short distance from Marseille, Cantona's birthplace. While Camus was born in French Algeria and Pope Leo in the United States, their genealogical roots trace back to the same centuries-old French lineage.
The study paints an intriguing picture of how a small village in Provence gave rise to a football legend, a literary titan, and now, the leader of the Catholic Church.
While the three men never crossed paths in life, their shared ancestry speaks to the strange poetry of history, one family line producing greatness in sport, thought, and spirituality.
Some notable cousins
Apart from a cousinship via Louisiana, most come from the NEGREL family, in the south of France, over several generations.
Despite their different paths , football, faith, and philosophy, all three men share a common ancestral line rooted in Southern France.
The connection
The discovery comes from a study by French genealogists using the platform Geneanet, which traced the lineage of Pope Leo XIV (born Robert Francis Prevost in Chicago) back several centuries to France and Italy. His paternal grandfather emigrated from Italy to the U.S., but deeper digging revealed extended family ties reaching across French provinces.
As it turns out, Pope Leo XIV and Eric Cantona are distant cousins, linked between the 12th and 15th generations through Bertrand Negrel and Louise Jean, who married in 1566 in Roquevaire, a town near Marseille.
That same Negrel-Jean line also appears in the family tree of Albert Camus, the French-Algerian philosopher and author of The Stranger and The Myth of Sisyphus. Camus is connected from the 14th to the 16th generation through another Roquevaire-based couple, Jean Negrel and Jeanne Bouis, married in 1501.
This means Cantona, Camus, and Pope Leo XIV all descend from the same extended Provençal family line, with Roquevaire serving as their ancestral hub.
A provençal thread through time
Roquevaire, in the Bouches-du-Rhône department of southern France, sits just a short distance from Marseille, Cantona's birthplace. While Camus was born in French Algeria and Pope Leo in the United States, their genealogical roots trace back to the same centuries-old French lineage.
The study paints an intriguing picture of how a small village in Provence gave rise to a football legend, a literary titan, and now, the leader of the Catholic Church.
While the three men never crossed paths in life, their shared ancestry speaks to the strange poetry of history, one family line producing greatness in sport, thought, and spirituality.
Some notable cousins
Apart from a cousinship via Louisiana, most come from the NEGREL family, in the south of France, over several generations.
- Jean DE LATTRE DE TASSIGNY (1889-1952), general officer during the Second World War, Marshal of France, from the 8th to the 7th generation, via the couple François LEMELLE dit Bellegarde and Marie Louise MARIETTE, married in 1728 in New Orleans
- Edmond ROSTAND (1868-1918), French playwright, from the 12th to the 11th generation, via the couple Bertrand NEGREL / Louis JEAN, married in 1566 in Roquevaire (13)
- Eric CANTONA (1966), footballer, from the 12th to the 15th generation, via the couple Bertrand NEGREL / Louis JEAN, married in 1566 in Roquevaire (13)
- Jacques MEDECIN (1928-1998), mayor of Nice, in the 12th generation, via the couple Jean-François DANIEL and Nicole FORNARI, married in 1586 in Menton (06)
- Nadine TRINTIGNANT (1934), director, screenwriter, writer, in the 13th generation via the couple Antoine NEGREL and Catherine MAURIN, married in 1550 in Aubagne (13),
- Caroline CELLIER (1945-2020), actress, from the 14th to the 17th generation, via the couple Jean NEGREL and Jeanne BOUIS, married in 1501 in Roquevaire (13)
- Jean-Claude GAUDIN (1939-2024), mayor of Marseille, from the 15th to the 16th generation, via the couple Jean NEGREL and Guillelme BLANC, married around 1470 probably in Roquevaire (13).
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