Famous Woman Who Had an Affair

RainyDayNinja

Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 24, 2008
Messages
362
Reaction score
56
Location
Oregon
Can anyone give me ideas for famous women in history whose lives were ruined by an affair? The time period and place don't really matter
 

Cella

Cella
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Aug 22, 2009
Messages
26,851
Reaction score
13,880
Bathsheba? Did I spell that right?
 

Ken

Banned
Kind Benefactor
Joined
Dec 28, 2007
Messages
11,478
Reaction score
6,198
Location
AW. A very nice place!
... maybe a former Queen of England? Kinda recall one being sent to the block for infidelity.
 

maggi90w1

CAVE!
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jul 17, 2008
Messages
841
Reaction score
65
Location
Germany
Anne Boleyn? Does that count?

edit: And Katherine Howard. She definitely counts.
 
Joined
Aug 7, 2005
Messages
47,985
Reaction score
13,245
There was never any evidence of Anne Boleyn having an affair with anyone.

Katherine Howard, on the other hand, was sent to the block.
 

Cyia

Rewriting My Destiny
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Nov 15, 2008
Messages
18,615
Reaction score
4,029
Location
Brillig in the slithy toves...
Nope. Annie got a bad rap. (She was actually executed for treason, IIRC, and even that was a suspect charge.)
 
Joined
Aug 7, 2005
Messages
47,985
Reaction score
13,245
Nope. Annie got a bad rap. (She was actually executed for treason, IIRC, and even that was a suspect charge.)
Wasn't it adultery as well?

Or I could be thinking of the pre-contract with Percy...even though Henry divorced her before she was executed.

Which presents the question - why divorce her if they were never truly married? Covering his bases I should think.

But anyway...I reckon Anne was a virgin up until the time she married Henry (yes, yes, I know...you're thinking how could she keep him interested for seven years? Simple. By saying no). After? She was faithful to him.

The times and dates she was supposed to be banging all these other men were falsified - and proven to be falsified.
 

Cyia

Rewriting My Destiny
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Nov 15, 2008
Messages
18,615
Reaction score
4,029
Location
Brillig in the slithy toves...
I was thinking he got jealous and tacked the adultery charge on to say that she'd been sharing secrets in bed or stealing secrets from her "lover" in bed. He couldn't charge her with one without charging her with the other, so he used both. Treason just so happened to be something he could kill her for, which "solved" his problems.
 

RainyDayNinja

Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 24, 2008
Messages
362
Reaction score
56
Location
Oregon
Well, I'm writing a time travel story anyway, so I don't mind invoking a little historical revisionism.
 

Giant Baby

Oh, the humanity.
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Aug 29, 2007
Messages
988
Reaction score
271
Location
First-person omnicient
Please study Anne Boleyn before deciding whether you want to use her. She's a fascinating character in history, IMO. For me, if a writer chose to go back in time and depict her as a character who's actually committed the crimes Henry VIII had her charged with -- charges researchers have since cast grave doubts about the validity of -- I'd want some serious historical theory/evidence to back it up. Otherwise, as a woman, I'd throw the book against the wall and write a scathing letter to the author and his/her publisher.

For a woman to have been brought up on unfounded charges and executed for them back in the sixteenth century is a crying shame, of course, but it was what it was. Historians to have since posited that there is no evidence to support Henry VIII's charges of adultry (or other delightful crimes she was charged with). For a writer in the twenty-first century to go back in time and re-accuse her for the sake of a story is not cool. To women. Today.

Please be careful about going revisionist in this manner, unless you're going to let Anne Boleyn go all ninja on your ass, kill off half your characters (including Cromwell and Hank-8), and run off with the hero of your story with her bad-assed tot, Lizzy-1, in tow. Because then we'd be talking.

Have you considered the woman Jesus saved from stoning for the crime of adultry in the Gospel of John? She wasn't killed, but it's hard to imagine a universe where *that* wasn't a life-changing experience.
 
Last edited:

JemmaP

Super Member
Registered
Joined
Aug 4, 2010
Messages
71
Reaction score
18
Location
Seattle
I'd just like to chime in with the request that anone who writes a time travel where Anne Boleyn goes ninja and takes out Crommy and Henry VIII, please marry me and let me be your beta.

That's all. :p
 

maggi90w1

CAVE!
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Jul 17, 2008
Messages
841
Reaction score
65
Location
Germany
When I said Anne Boleyn I did mean her liaison with Henry. After all the whole thing started out with an affair. Altough I'm not sure if they had sex before they were married. If that matters. I would still count it as an affair.
 
Joined
Aug 7, 2005
Messages
47,985
Reaction score
13,245
Katherine Howard would be a far better bet.

(As for Anne having an affair with Henry? The king says he wants you, you go along with it. Especially when your family are all in on it too).
 

Kathie Freeman

That Crazy Cat Lady
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Mar 17, 2005
Messages
394
Reaction score
83
Location
Fallbrook, CA
Website
catbook.biz
Emma Hamilton, with Horatio Nelson.

I found her life impressive to say the least, and would think it's certainly worth a read. :)

Lady Hamilton had numerous affairs including artist George Romney. I rember seeing 3 prtraits of her by 3 different artists at the Huntington Art Museum, but I don't recall who the others were. She died in poverty, in Naples, I believe.
 

katiemac

Five by Five
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Feb 11, 2005
Messages
11,521
Reaction score
1,661
Location
Yesterday
I was thinking he got jealous and tacked the adultery charge on to say that she'd been sharing secrets in bed or stealing secrets from her "lover" in bed. He couldn't charge her with one without charging her with the other, so he used both. Treason just so happened to be something he could kill her for, which "solved" his problems.
I think Henry considered adultery against the king treason in of itself. But yes, her charges included high treason, adultery and incest.

I like waylander's suggestion: Guinevere.
 

DeleyanLee

Writing Anarchist
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Sep 6, 2007
Messages
31,660
Reaction score
11,407
Location
lost among the words
The problem I have with Guinevere is that the whole Lancelot thing was added on by French poets to make the stories appeal to their patrons. That wasn't in the original stories at all. Guinevere was pretty much a non-entity. French poets knew that sex sold, after all.

There's some belief that Lucrezia Borgia had lovers, I believe one was her brother-in-law. There's also tons of rumors about Eleanor of Aquataine (though I don't buy into those) having an affair with her uncle while on Crusade with her husband.

Queen Charlotte of England (married to George IV) was tried for adultry before the House of Lords (IIRC). I believe she got off, but it was a HUGE scandal in the day. She's the closest thing I can think of as "ruined" by the scandal, as opposed to put to death.
 

mscelina

Teh doommobile, drivin' rite by you
Requiescat In Pace
Registered
Joined
Jan 18, 2007
Messages
20,006
Reaction score
5,352
Location
Going shopping with Soccer Mom and Bubastes for fu
Anne Boleyn's life was ruined by her husband's affair--his overwhelming desire to marry Jane Seymour and get a son. Most pre-eminent Tudor historians after the Victorian era agree that all the charges against her were unfounded--cooked up between Henry's goal of switching out wives, anti-Boleyn sentiment, Cromwell's growing anomosity to Boleyn power, Jane Rochford's jealousy and hatred of her husband, and a political atmosphere torn between the Reformist views of the Queen and her supporters and the more conservative appeal of the Seymours and their power base. Anne was a shrew, not an unfaithful wife.

It occurs to me, however, that you're missing an obvious candidate--Helen of Troy.
 

waylander

Who's going for a beer?
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Oct 24, 2005
Messages
8,276
Reaction score
1,566
Age
65
Location
London, UK
The problem I have with Guinevere is that the whole Lancelot thing was added on by French poets to make the stories appeal to their patrons. That wasn't in the original stories at all. Guinevere was pretty much a non-entity. French poets knew that sex sold, after all.
True, but that is the best known version of the story and I took it that the OP wanted an example that a lot of people would be familiar with
 

DeleyanLee

Writing Anarchist
Kind Benefactor
Super Member
Registered
Joined
Sep 6, 2007
Messages
31,660
Reaction score
11,407
Location
lost among the words
It occurs to me, however, that you're missing an obvious candidate--Helen of Troy.

I second Helen of Troy. I'm ashamed of myself that I forgot her.

True, but that is the best known version of the story and I took it that the OP wanted an example that a lot of people would be familiar with

Just pointing out that "common knowledge" isn't right in that regard either, as it isn't about Anne Boleyn.

One of the best and easiest slams against a woman you don't like is to brand her a whore or an adultress. It sells well and tends to stick into history books because it's great scandal. I'd wager that at least 90% of all historical women so labeled were just making somone really uncomfortable with how powerful or positioned they were. Anytime I read about a powerful woman labeled as sexually indiscriminate, I doubt it. It's just too easy and too obvious, especially when it's all hindsight.

For this, though, it totally depends on what the OP wants to do with it and whether they want to be historically accurate or go with "common knowledge".