[NEMDF]

That is funny, related “by intercourse!”.

At least in our situation, we are all old enough to be somewhat understanding of transgressions, accepting of reality, etc.

But, for example, the new half-sibling has two children, who would now likely find out that their adored grandfather wasn’t really related to them, and their adored grandmother may have cheated on him, which might be hard for these young adults to take in.

[Verginius Rufus]

I ran across an article about a village in Europe where some of my ancestors lived. The author had studied church records from 1870 to 1880 and found that 7% of the babies were born out of wedlock and that more than 40% of the first-born children to married couples had been conceived before the wedding ceremony. This was in a rather large village of 4,000 people or so.

If you go back ten generations you have 1024 ancestors in that generation (but some could be duplicates if some of your ancestors married cousins). Eleven generations back you have 2048 ancestors, etc. So it seems virtually certain that everyone has some ancestors who were born out of wedlock...if not in the most recent 11 generations certainly in an earlier one.

Many people are proud of noble or royal ancestry--which pretty much guarantees having illegitimate ancestors (such as William the Bastard, later known as William the Conqueror, or Charles Martel).

I personally don't know of any illegitimate ancestors but I'm sure it is just because I haven't been able to go back far enough tracing my ancestors. I did find one great-great-great-grandmother who was born 5 months after her parents got married. Born very premature, no doubt.