WHEN researching your family history you might hope to find a couple of interesting people in your family tree.

It has proved so for one man living in Okehampton who has found he has a direct link to Charlemagne, the medieval emperor who ruled much of Western Europe from 768 to 814.

Tony Dion, originally from America, has been researching his family genealogy for a number of years.

His father, an insurance underwriter for Aetna Life Insurance in Hartford, Connecticut, put together a genealogical history of the Dion family before his death in 1976. It was this work that sparked Tony's interest in finding out more about his family history.

He said: 'Because of my father's work with the Aetna, his penmanship was something to be admired.

'As I was growing up I really liked the work that he had done. However, this was before the days of computers and the intense amount of work to make copies for all his children and others who wanted it must have taken loads of time.'

Tony worked in the US Army for nine years and then worked for Electronic Data Systems (EDS) for 28 years.

During his time with EDS he became computer literate and following his retirement in 1997, he got a genealogy software program.

He laboriously entered the data his father had accumulated on over 800 relatives and ancestors.

Since then, Tony has expanded on his father's tireless work and there are now 3,280 individuals in the family genealogy, which dates back 42 generations to Charlemagne's grandparents in 676.

The link between Tony and the King of the Franks, Charlemagne, became apparent after he remembered his father's first cousin Tom Dion, who had also done work on the family genealogy.

Tony said: 'I tried to contact him but his daughter told me that he had died recently.

'She then asked me if I knew that her father was a member of the Charlemagne Society. I did not know this and asked her what the membership meant.

'To be a member of the Charlemagne Society you have to have proven lineage to Charlemagne, which Tom had!

'I then asked her if she had any of the paperwork associated with his membership.

'She mailed to me twelve genealogy charts showing the people and relationships from her father to Charlemagne's father.

'As I have a direct relationship with Tom Dion, because of his work I now have a direct relationship with Charlemagne.'

He is not the only family member of note – during his research Tony has also found he has a relationship to Hugh Capet, King of France, who is his 32nd great grandfather and to Henry I, King of England, his 28th great grandfather.

As the Emperor Charlemagne, 743 to 814 AD, had three wives and at least 18 children, he has many descendants across the globe today.