This article offers a longitudinal analysis of the legal status of children born outside lawful marriage, charting their treatment from antiquity through the present day. It begins by exam-ining ancient and Roman legal regimes, in which household affiliation and exceptional grants of legitimacy mitigated—but did not eliminate—the stigma of sui iuris descent. It then turns to the Middle Ages, where Christian morality and feudal custom imposed strict inheritance and civic restrictions on “illegitimate” offspring, albeit with localized legitimation practices such as the Mantelkinder ritual and papal rescripta. The study next surveys the early mod-ern and Napoleonic reforms that introduced codified paternity presumptions, voluntary ac-knowledgment, and legitimation by subsequent marriage or sovereign grace, culminating in Joseph II’s revolutionary decrees of formal parity. Finally, it assesses contemporary Euro-pean and supranational frameworks—particularly the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, the ECHR, and Brussels II bis and Succession Regulations—which have abolished formal dis-tinctions based on birth status yet confront residual administrative and cultural barriers. By situating each epoch within its broader social and legal milieu, the article illuminates how historical doctrines continue to shape modern efforts to secure full equality for all children under the law.