Royal bastard
A royal bastard is a child of a reigning monarch born out of wedlock. The king might have a child with a mistress, or the legitimacy of a marriage might be questioned for reasons concerning succession.
Notable royal bastards include Robert, Earl of Gloucester, son of Henry I of England, Henry FitzRoy, son of Henry VIII of England, and the Duke of Monmouth, son of Charles II. The Anglo-Norman surname Fitzroy means son of a king and was used by various illegitimate royal offspring, and by others who claimed to be such. In medieval England a bastard's coat of arms was marked with a bend or baton sinister.[1]
Notable fictional examples include Mordred, the villainous illegitimate son of King Arthur. Some fictional portrayals of royal bastards are less negative, such as the character of Philip the Bastard in Shakespeare's King John.
Ancient Rome[edit]
Unlike medieval royalty, the Romans were more concerned with continuity of family name than with bloodline.[2] If a man recognized a child as his, this was accepted by law, and the issue of who the biological father was did not arise.[2] Children not recognized could be exposed or brought up as a slave. For example, Emperor Claudius initially accepted a girl as his daughter, but later rejected her and had her exposed.[2] Emperors often adopted their successors. There are no recorded examples of aristocrats in classical times accusing other aristocrats of being illegitimate, as was common in later periods.[2]
Caesarion was possibly the illegitimate son of Julius Caesar by Cleopatra, which would also make him Caesar's only known child besides Julia.
Monaco[edit]
Prince Albert II of Monaco has two illegitimate children, Jazmin Grace Grimaldi and Alexandre Grimaldi-Coste.
Portugal[edit]
King Peter I of Portugal had an illegitimate son, John, who became Grand Master of the Order of Avis, and following the childless death of his legitimate half-brother, King Ferdinand I of Portugal and the ensuing 1383–1385 Portuguese interregnum, he succeeded as King John I, founding the House of Avis that would rule Portugal for the next two centuries. John I had an illegitimate son, Afonso, who was named Duke of Braganza by his half-brother, the regent Peter, Duke of Coimbra. He thus founded the House of Braganza that in 1640 would successfully claim the Portuguese crown on the basis of this descent, and rule into the 20th century.
King Carlos I of Portugal allegedly had an illegitimate daughter who became one of the most famous and controversial royal bastards in the history of European royalty: Maria Pia of Saxe-Coburg and Braganza.[28][29][30][31]
Russia[edit]
Empress Catherine the Great (reigned 1762 to 1796) had an illegitimate child in 1762, Alexei Grigorievich Bobrinksy, who was born a few months before she took the throne. Catherine officially acknowledged him in a letter sent in 1781. Later, his half-brother Emperor Paul made him a count of the Russian Empire and promoted him to general-major. He married Baroness Anna Dorothea von Ungern-Sternberg and had issue that continues to this day.
Spain[edit]
In 783, Mauregatus of Asturias, the illegitimate son of King Alfonso I of Asturias allegedly born to a Moorish serf, took the throne upon the death of his brother-in-law Silo of Asturias, reigning for about 5 years.
The will of Sancho III of Pamplona, who died in 1035, lands in the County of Aragon were left to his illegitimate son Ramiro, who would grow these holdings into the Kingdom of Aragon, and whose son Sancho Ramírez, became King of Pamplona. Ramiro's illegitimate son, also named Sancho Ramírez, was made Count of Ribagorza. King García Sánchez III of Pamplona, had an illegitimate son Sancho Garcés, and when King Alfonso the Battler died in 1134, grandsons of royal bastards Sancho Ramírez of Ribagorza and Sancho Garcés of Uncastillo were among the candidates for succession, with the latter being successful, becoming King García Ramírez of Navarre.
Alfonso VI, King of León and Castile, had a complex family born to multiple wives and mistresses, but only one son, Sancho, born to a fugitive Muslim mistress, Zaida of Seville. Sancho was named his father's heir in 1107, but was killed following a battle the next year. Alfonso's legitimate daughter Queen Urraca of León succeeded, but her rule in Portugal was challenged by her illegitimate half-sister, Theresa, Countess of Portugal, whose ambitions for independence were realized by her son, Afonso I of Portugal. Urraca herself, as queen regnant, would have two recognized illegitimate children by nobleman Pedro González de Lara, her main supporter against her former husband Alfonso the Battler.
In the 14th century, the English-allied King Peter of Castile would be overthrown by an alienated nobility in favor of his illegitimate half-brother, Henry of Trastámara, who thus became king as Henry II of Castile and was ancestor of the later royal family.
In the 16th century John of Austria (Spanish: Juan de Austria) was an illegitimate son of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. In his last will of 1558, the Emperor officially recognized Juan as his son and put him to the service of his legitimate successor Philip II. He devoted his life to the service of his half-brother, King Philip II of Spain, and is best known for his role as the admiral of the Holy Alliance fleet at the Battle of Lepanto.
In 2003, Leandro Ruiz Moragas, an illegitimate son of King Alfonso XIII's, gained the right to call himself a prince.[32]