Good Heavens, Why?!
Why would anyone want to be recognized as the Cuckold of the Year?
Everyone's reasons are entirely different. For some this might be a way of celebrating a lifestyle choice they enjoy. For others, it could be a cathartic acknowledgement of their lived experience.
Perhaps you've just come to a point where you're ready to "own" your experience and have decided you'd rather laugh along with everyone than feel like you're being laughed at.
Oddly enough: this concept is not new. It has been celebrated (on and off) for decades during Roccogorga Italy' annual "Festa Del Cornuto" (Festival of Cuckolds) every November. In 2002, over 5,000 men applied to be considered for the honour of "The Cuckold King"!
An article from Il Nuovo (August 16, 2002) describes the event here:
Nation's unluckiest cuckold wins contest sympathy Italy's most hard-done-by cuckold has been chosen at a contest. A 40-year-old accountant from Rome beat off 1,000 men, who told their tales of woe over two days to a panel of judges. He was crowned Cuckold King in front of a 5,000 audience at the festival in Roccagorga after they heard how his wife cheated on him every week. The story of the winner, named only as Onorato C, was checked by officials calling his wife to get her version of events. Patrizia admitted she liked to have extra-marital sex at least once a week and claimed it was what kept their marriage going. Onorato said: "I have never cheated on my wife, but I know she does. Having said that, my marriage is alright, and I'm enjoying myself quite a lot." It is the first time the contest - which started in the 1930s - has been held for 40 years, reports Il Nuovo website. It was banned in 1962 after that year's Cuckold King couldn't cope with being laughed at and pulled out a gun. He fired two shots above the audience's head before being arrested.
Everyone's reasons are entirely different. For some this might be a way of celebrating a lifestyle choice they enjoy. For others, it could be a cathartic acknowledgement of their lived experience.
Perhaps you've just come to a point where you're ready to "own" your experience and have decided you'd rather laugh along with everyone than feel like you're being laughed at.
Oddly enough: this concept is not new. It has been celebrated (on and off) for decades during Roccogorga Italy' annual "Festa Del Cornuto" (Festival of Cuckolds) every November. In 2002, over 5,000 men applied to be considered for the honour of "The Cuckold King"!
An article from Il Nuovo (August 16, 2002) describes the event here:
Nation's unluckiest cuckold wins contest sympathy Italy's most hard-done-by cuckold has been chosen at a contest. A 40-year-old accountant from Rome beat off 1,000 men, who told their tales of woe over two days to a panel of judges. He was crowned Cuckold King in front of a 5,000 audience at the festival in Roccagorga after they heard how his wife cheated on him every week. The story of the winner, named only as Onorato C, was checked by officials calling his wife to get her version of events. Patrizia admitted she liked to have extra-marital sex at least once a week and claimed it was what kept their marriage going. Onorato said: "I have never cheated on my wife, but I know she does. Having said that, my marriage is alright, and I'm enjoying myself quite a lot." It is the first time the contest - which started in the 1930s - has been held for 40 years, reports Il Nuovo website. It was banned in 1962 after that year's Cuckold King couldn't cope with being laughed at and pulled out a gun. He fired two shots above the audience's head before being arrested.
Apply to be nominated for the Palmer:
You will be given a submission package which will require a video interview which you can make yourself. On video, you will answer a series of questions which will be provided to you and you will have the opportunity to answer in your own words.
The selection committee will shortlist those candidates who qualify based on the interview. The committee will then speak with the wives of the nominees to verify their story.
The final list of up to ten approved candidates will each be given the opportunity to tell their story on the day of the event before the esteemed panel of judges makes its decision! The winner will be invited to make a victory speech and will be asked to participate in an "Ask Me Anything" question and answer for the audience.
The selection committee will shortlist those candidates who qualify based on the interview. The committee will then speak with the wives of the nominees to verify their story.
The final list of up to ten approved candidates will each be given the opportunity to tell their story on the day of the event before the esteemed panel of judges makes its decision! The winner will be invited to make a victory speech and will be asked to participate in an "Ask Me Anything" question and answer for the audience.
Lord Roger Palmer, The Earl of Castlemaine
Lord Roger Palmer was in many ways both very fortunate to born to a relatively privileged family in the United Kingdom of the 17th century, and in other ways very unfortunate: particularly as he witnessed the Catholic faith which he loved begin to recede in its' prominence in the UK.
One example of Roger's excellent luck was his betrothal to a woman known all around London for her natural beauty: Barbara DeVilliers. However, Lady DeVilliers' beauty did not go unnoticed by the other members of the court. While Barbara frequently amused herself with affairs with a number of men in the King's Court, it was when King Charles II himself took notice of Barbara that life changed for her husband Roger.
Barbara became the favourite mistress or 'mistresse en titre,' of King Charles II, coincident with his restoration to the throne in May 1660. In an entry to his diary on the 13th July 1660 Pepys describes “the King and Dukes there with Madame Palmer, a pretty woman that they have a fancy to, to make her husband a cuckold“. She claimed to have borne the King five children and had another by, it is thought, John Churchill later 1st Duke of Marlborough. It is believed that her unfortunate husband did not father a single one of Barbara's children.
Charles II created Palmer, Baron Limerick and Earl of Castlemaine in 1661, but the title was limited to his children by Barbara (as opposed, that is, to any later wife he might have) which made it clear to the whole court that the honour was for her services in the King's bedchamber rather than for his in the King's court. This made it more of a humiliation than an honour: see the diary of Samuel Pepys for 7 December 1661: "...to the Privy Seale...And among other things that passed, there was a patent for Roger Palmer (Madam Palmer's husband) to be Earle of Castlemaine and Baron of Limbricke in Ireland. But the honour is tied up to the males got on the body of his wife, the Lady Barbary - the reason whereof everybody knows." Palmer did not want a peerage on these terms but it was forced on him; and he never took his seat in the Irish House of Lords (although he did use the title). As Lady Castlemaine and later in her own right as Duchess of Cleveland, his wife's bed-hopping meant that she was the talk of the court and often of the town whilst Roger was the butt of much hilarity and the subject of cutting barbs on his inadequacy as a husband and lover from the many wits and satirists of the day. Roger had to resign himself to all this whilst the diarist John Evelyn condemned his wife as "a vulgar mannered, arrogant slut when at her best", the poet Andrew Marvell described her as "the royal harlot" whilst Samuel Pepys despite liking her appearance wrote that “I know well enough she is a whore”. In the course Roger Palmer charted from this point, two factors remain constant: his unwavering and public devotion to Roman Catholicism, in spite of heavy legal and social penalties; and his staunch support of the Stuart monarchy. There was no way out of his marital dilemma: his religion forbade divorce, and he would therefore have no legitimate children of his own. His loyalty to the throne and the Stuart succession in general and to the person of Charles II in particular forced his complaisant acquiescence to his wife’s position as the King's mistress and to his humiliating quasi-official role as the court cuckold.
One example of Roger's excellent luck was his betrothal to a woman known all around London for her natural beauty: Barbara DeVilliers. However, Lady DeVilliers' beauty did not go unnoticed by the other members of the court. While Barbara frequently amused herself with affairs with a number of men in the King's Court, it was when King Charles II himself took notice of Barbara that life changed for her husband Roger.
Barbara became the favourite mistress or 'mistresse en titre,' of King Charles II, coincident with his restoration to the throne in May 1660. In an entry to his diary on the 13th July 1660 Pepys describes “the King and Dukes there with Madame Palmer, a pretty woman that they have a fancy to, to make her husband a cuckold“. She claimed to have borne the King five children and had another by, it is thought, John Churchill later 1st Duke of Marlborough. It is believed that her unfortunate husband did not father a single one of Barbara's children.
Charles II created Palmer, Baron Limerick and Earl of Castlemaine in 1661, but the title was limited to his children by Barbara (as opposed, that is, to any later wife he might have) which made it clear to the whole court that the honour was for her services in the King's bedchamber rather than for his in the King's court. This made it more of a humiliation than an honour: see the diary of Samuel Pepys for 7 December 1661: "...to the Privy Seale...And among other things that passed, there was a patent for Roger Palmer (Madam Palmer's husband) to be Earle of Castlemaine and Baron of Limbricke in Ireland. But the honour is tied up to the males got on the body of his wife, the Lady Barbary - the reason whereof everybody knows." Palmer did not want a peerage on these terms but it was forced on him; and he never took his seat in the Irish House of Lords (although he did use the title). As Lady Castlemaine and later in her own right as Duchess of Cleveland, his wife's bed-hopping meant that she was the talk of the court and often of the town whilst Roger was the butt of much hilarity and the subject of cutting barbs on his inadequacy as a husband and lover from the many wits and satirists of the day. Roger had to resign himself to all this whilst the diarist John Evelyn condemned his wife as "a vulgar mannered, arrogant slut when at her best", the poet Andrew Marvell described her as "the royal harlot" whilst Samuel Pepys despite liking her appearance wrote that “I know well enough she is a whore”. In the course Roger Palmer charted from this point, two factors remain constant: his unwavering and public devotion to Roman Catholicism, in spite of heavy legal and social penalties; and his staunch support of the Stuart monarchy. There was no way out of his marital dilemma: his religion forbade divorce, and he would therefore have no legitimate children of his own. His loyalty to the throne and the Stuart succession in general and to the person of Charles II in particular forced his complaisant acquiescence to his wife’s position as the King's mistress and to his humiliating quasi-official role as the court cuckold.
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