Considering animals to be a part of human moral frameworks has a long history and can be traced in many parts of the world from ancient times. By contrast, the concept of moral rights for animals in a narrower Western philosophical sense, or of legal rights for animals, is predominantly a development of recent times. What follows is mainly the history of animal protection in the Western world. There is a rich history of animal protection in the ancient texts, lives, and stories of Eastern, African, and Indigenous peoples.