Board Thread:What If?/@comment-5674726-20140630220202/@comment-5674726-20140723212200

It is made clear on the show that Morgana has a claim to the throne as Uther's daughter, albeit after Arthur so the option of claiming her as his heir would be open to Uther. Having Ygraine wear padding for at least several months prior to Vivienne's due date and passing baby Morgana off as hers would be an option, if Uther was especially reluctant to admit to his affair but, all things considered, I can't see him giving up his chance to claim his only heir by blood. Given his feelings about nobles vs. commoners, it is very likely that he'd rather leave his throne to Morgana, whose mother is a noble, than to father a sprog by a random servant girl and raise it as his heir.

Choosing an heir from a noble family is much more problematic than claiming his biological child by a woman other than his wife as it would require him to select one family for the honour of one of their own becoming the future King of Camelot, which is not going to go down well with the other families, who would be bound to resent that their son wasn't chosen. Making one noble family happy while making lots of noble families angry wouldn't be a clever move, and Uther was an intelligent man.