Who would have thunk it?

A couple of centuries ago, it was the in thing for a highly placed woman (in the nobility) to have an acknowledged public lover/male attendant/gigilo who paid her attention her husband presumably...did not. It's a fascinating piece of history that you rarely hear about. Mistresses, sure. Kept male lovers of highly ranked women? Not so much. A male mistress was called a cicisbeo. And the husbands? They had to put up and shut-up about it.