What is Jure Sanguinis?
Italian Citizenship by Blood, Explained

What does Jure Sanguinis mean?

Jure Sanguinis is Latin for "by right of blood." It is the legal principle under which Italy extends citizenship to the descendants of Italian citizens who emigrated abroad — without requiring those descendants to have been born in Italy or to have lived there.

In practice, if your parent or grandparent was Italian — and never legally severed their Italian citizenship — you may have inherited that citizenship at birth, whether you knew it or not. Jure Sanguinis is the mechanism for formally recognizing that inherited status.

Italy is not alone in this principle, but its implementation is one of the more meaningful in the world. Italy does not require language tests, residency, or cultural integration to apply. The entire process is based on documented lineage and legal continuity of citizenship.

The 2025 generational limit — what changed under Law 74/2025

Before March 28, 2025, Italian citizenship by descent could theoretically be claimed through any direct Italian ancestor, regardless of how many generations back. A great-great-grandparent was sufficient, provided the lineage met the legal requirements.

Law 74/2025 (Decree-Law No. 36/2025) changed that. The new law introduced a hard two-generation limit: to be eligible for a new Jure Sanguinis application, you must have at least one of the following:

• A parent born in Italy, or
• A grandparent born in Italy, or
• A parent who lived in Italy for at least two years before your birth

Great-grandparent claims are no longer accepted for new applications filed after the law's effective date. Applications submitted or consulate appointments formally confirmed before March 27, 2025 at 11:59 PM Rome time remain grandfathered under the old rules.

Who is eligible for Italian citizenship by descent?

Under the current rules, you are likely eligible if all of the following are true:

• You have an Italian-born parent or grandparent who was born in Italy and lived past March 17, 1861 (the founding of unified Italy)
• No one in your direct lineage between you and your Italian ancestor renounced Italian citizenship before their child was born
• Your Italian ancestor did not naturalize as a citizen of another country before their child turned 21 — unless that naturalization occurred after August 15, 1992, when Italy formally permitted dual citizenship
• If claiming through a female ancestor whose child was born before 1948, the case must go through Italian court (a "1948 case") rather than a consulate

The single most important question is: was your Italian-born ancestor still legally an Italian citizen at the time their child was born? If yes, Italian citizenship was transmitted to that child, and the chain continues down to you.

The three routes to apply for Jure Sanguinis

Once you've established eligibility, there are three main routes to obtain your Italian citizenship:

1. Consulate application

The most common route for North American applicants. You submit your complete case file — birth, marriage, death, and naturalization records for every person in your lineage — to the Italian consulate in your jurisdiction. Consulate processing currently takes 3–5 years due to high application volumes. However, it does not require you to travel to or live in Italy.

2. Municipality application (relocation to Italy)

If you are willing to relocate to Italy, you can apply directly at the local comune (municipality) where you establish residency. This route is significantly faster — often completed within 6–12 months — but requires you to be physically present in Italy throughout the process. This was the route our Head of Customer Services, Spencer Badanai, used when he obtained his own Italian passport.

3. Court route — ATQ and 1948 cases

The court route is used in two situations. First, the ATQ (Against the Queue) route — formally called a "Denial of Justice" filing — allows applicants who cannot obtain a consulate appointment within a reasonable timeframe to file directly in Italian court through a licensed Italian attorney. Second, the 1948 case route is required when citizenship was transmitted through a female ancestor whose child was born before January 1, 1948. Both types of court cases are typically resolved in 1–3 years.

What breaks the citizenship chain?

The Jure Sanguinis principle only works if citizenship passed continuously from your Italian ancestor down through each generation to you. The chain can be broken by:

• Naturalization before a child's birth — if your ancestor became a U.S. citizen before their child was born, Italian citizenship generally was not transmitted to that child
• Naturalization while a child was under 21 (before 1992) — if naturalization occurred while the child was a minor, the child may have been included in the naturalization and thus lost Italian citizenship
• Voluntary renunciation — if an ancestor formally renounced Italian citizenship, the chain ends there

Naturalization after 1992 generally does not break the chain, as Italy formally permitted dual citizenship from that year forward.

The 1948 case — citizenship through female ancestors

Under Italian law prior to 1948, women automatically lost their Italian citizenship upon marrying a foreign national. This meant that if your lineage passed through a woman who married a non-Italian before 1948, the citizenship chain appeared broken. Italian courts have consistently ruled that this gender-based discrimination cannot be used to deny citizenship today.

A 1948 case is a court petition filed by an Italian attorney seeking judicial recognition of citizenship through that female ancestor. These cases have strong precedent and are regularly won in Italian courts. They cannot be handled at a consulate. Under Law 74/2025, the same generational limit applies: the female ancestor in your 1948 case must be a grandparent, not a great-grandparent.

What documents will you need?

Every Jure Sanguinis case requires a complete documentary record of your lineage — from your Italian ancestor down to you. At minimum, this includes birth, marriage, and death certificates for every person in the chain, plus naturalization records (or official certificates confirming no record of naturalization) for your Italian ancestor.

All non-Italian documents must be apostilled, certified, and translated into Italian. Requirements vary by consulate and by court, and specific cases may require additional records. See our complete documents checklist for a detailed breakdown.

Why does Italian citizenship matter?

Italian citizenship is EU citizenship. As an Italian citizen, you gain the right to live, work, and study anywhere in all 27 EU member states, visa-free travel to over 180 countries, access to Italian healthcare and public services, the ability to own property and operate a business in Italy, and the right to pass Italian citizenship on to your own children.

Compared to golden passport programs — which require minimum investments of €150,000–€2,000,000 — Jure Sanguinis remains one of the most accessible routes to EU citizenship available, particularly for families with Italian heritage.