love child

plural love children · alternative love-child · alternative lovechild

1. euphemisticA child born as a result of a romantic liaison between parents not married to one another; an illegitimate child.

   Love child, never meant to be / Love child, born in poverty

   1968, “Love Child”, performed by The Supremes

   2 more examples

   Two thousand a-year without debt or drawback — except for the little love-child, indeed; aye, I had forgot her; but she may be 'prenticed out at a small cost, and then what does it signify?

   1811, Jane Austen, chapter 30, in Sense and Sensibility

   Nobody ever came to see her, nobody spoke of her, nobody cared about her. Mr Brass had said once, that he believed she was a ‘love-child’ (which means anything but a child of love).

   1841, Charles Dickens, chapter 36, in The Old Curiosity Shop

   Synonyms: bastard, bantling, bastard, bastardling, bastid, batchelor's son, by-blow, degenerate

2. Something that includes influences of multiple predecessors.

   The grunge genre was the love child of punk and metal.