History Main / CuckoldHorns

[[folder: Real Life]]

While in English-speaking countries this has been a practically ForgottenTrope for over a century, it still thrives in European and Latin American countries where the word for cuckold literally means "horned", the Italian word "cornuto" being perhaps the most widely recognized example.

-> ''Victor Hugo relates that in the Channel Islands Satan himself--tempted more than elsewhere by the beauty of the women, doubtless--sometimes plays at incubus, greatly to the inconvenience and alarm of the good dames who wish to be loyal to their marriage vows, generally speaking. A certain lady applied to the parish priest to learn how they might, in the dark, distinguish the hardy intruder from their husbands. The holy man said they must feel his brow for horns; but Hugo is ungallant enough to hint a doubt of the efficacy of the test.''

[[folder: Anime & Manga]]

[[folder: Arts]]

[[folder: Comic Books]]

* In a ''[[ComicBook/RatMan1989 Rat-Man]]'' scene set in [[FireAndBrimstoneHell Hell]] one devil with a particularly impressive set of horns asks a colleague "I wonder what our wives do to pass the time while we're at work".

%%[[folder: Fan Works]]

[[folder: Films -- Live-Action]]

[[folder: Jokes]]

-->"My dear. I gave birth to a boy. However, I had lactation problems, so the baby was nursed by an Ethiopian. You won't believe it, but the baby turned black."
::The husband is amazed. He writes to his mum about that. Soon after, he receives a reply[=:=]
-->"Dear son. When you were born, I, likewise, had lactation problems, and you were nursed by a cow, but it wasn't until now that you grew horns."

[[folder: Literature]]

* In ''Literature/RallyRoundTheFlagBoys'', Harry Bannerman, who feels guilty about his affair with his boss's wife, imagines twelve-foot horns protruding from his boss's forehead at one moment when his boss angrily strikes up a conversation with him on a subject that turns out to be completely irrelevant. But since Harry is a married man himself, he shortly thereafter contemplates the ethics of "put[ting] horns on your wife."
* Creator/DanSimmons's short story "My Private Memoirs of the Hoffer Stigmata Pandemic," in which a pandemic makes people's sins externally manifest in the form of various facial deformations, has a variant; fleshy blood-horns represent adultery, but they appear on the adulterer, not the cuckold.
* Mentioned in ''Literature/LettersToHisSon''; from letter CLXXXVI: "A prudent cuckold (and there are many such at Paris) pockets his horns when he cannot gore with them; and will not add to the triumph of his maker by only butting with them ineffectually."

[[folder: Live Action TV]]

* ''Series/GameOfThrones'': Robert Baratheon wears a CrownOfHorns and has an unfaithful wife. The effect is dialed down, though, as he's not exactly a paragon of fidelity himself, being far more unfaithful and publicly so than she is. It even gets HarsherInHindsight when you realize his betrothed and LostLenore, Lyanna Stark, is revealed to have never loved him ''either'', choosing his ArchEnemy Rhaegar over him. In the books, in ''Literature/AGameOfThrones'', Ned Stark remembers a conversation he had with Lyanna, with the latter complaining that Robert cheated on her during her engagement and fathered a bastard in the Vale, Mya Stone. Ned insisted that Robert would change after marriage, but Lyanna replied that "Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man's nature."

[[folder: Music]]

[[folder: Theatre]]

* Used in a few Creator/TennesseeWilliams plays:
** In ''Theatre/TheRoseTattoo'', after two gossips disclose to Serafina that her late husband had an affair with another women, she angrily and repeatedly denies it, saying that her husband would not have put "the nanny-goat's horns" on her head. There is also an actual goat that is troubling her. (Oddly enough, "corna" and "cornuta" are not among the many GratuitousItalian words used in the play.)
** In ''Camino Real'', Casanova has become a LadykillerInLove, having fallen for Marguerite from ''La Dame aux Camelias'' and is crowned "King of the Cuckolds" during the festival with a CrownOfHorns. He weeps and shouts "Cornudo!" over and over.

* In ''Theatre/LaBoheme'', when Marcello confronts Musetta about her flirting with other men, he proclaims that he won't allow horns to grow under his hat – even though he and Musetta aren't married, as she irritably points out to him.

[[folder: Video Games]]
* People experiencing the nightmares ''{{VideoGame/Catherine}}'' are turned into sheep, and as such have horns. One gets into the nightmares with relationship troubles, which most often include cheating and having cheating significant others, although not every sheep is there for cheating (Justin Bailey is having nightmares because his guilt issues are making him stall on engagement).

[[folder: Western Animation]]

* [[ValuesDissonance Brazilians don't take cuck jokes as lightly as Americans or Europeans]], and it has lead to problems with auto sales in the country.

* When VW launched the sunroof option for the Beetle in Brazil, it sold well initially until a joke spread that it was to make room for the driver's horns. Sales tanked, the option was withdrawn, and some owners even demanded the sunroof be filled in. Some years later, the Brazilian Ford Maverick's emblems had to be modified to remove the horned cow head of the US model.

%%[[folder: Fanfic]]

[[folder: Film]]

** In the episode "Eternal Moonshine of the Simpsons Mind", Homer, infallibally predicting that once his memory is wiped he will be in a MistakenForCheating situation, uses the phrase "No doubt I'll misconstrue that as him placing a cuckold's horns upon my brow."

* Oberon had these in the ''ComicBook/TheSandman'' story which riffed on ''Theatre/AMidsummerNightsDream'', because his wife Titania was cheating on him.

* A white woman gave birth to a black boy while her husband was away. She writes him:

** The phrase "give him horns" is used a lot. When Lancel Lannister is given an ArrangedMarriage with [[ReallyGetsAround "Gatehouse"]] Ami, it's joked that he needs an armorer to make him a horned helm.

[[folder: Fanfic]]
* [[Fanfic/AdoptionNightmare Brina]] gives these to ''Skulker'' of all characters... It's a miracle she isn't dead yet...
[[/folder]]

-> ''Victor Hugo relates that in the Channel Islands Satan himself — tempted more than elsewhere by the beauty of the women, doubtless — sometimes plays at incubus, greatly to the inconvenience and alarm of the good dames who wish to be loyal to their marriage vows, generally speaking. A certain lady applied to the parish priest to learn how they might, in the dark, distinguish the hardy intruder from their husbands. The holy man said they must feel his brow for horns; but Hugo is ungallant enough to hint a doubt of the efficacy of the test.''

* A woman gave birth to a black boy while her husband was away. She writes him:

** The phrase "give him horns" is used a lot. When Lancel Lannister is given an ArrangedMarriage with '[[ReallyGetsAround Gatehouse]]' Ami, it's joked that he needs an armorer to make him a horned helm.

* ''Series/GameOfThrones'': Robert Baratheon wears a CrownOfHorns and has an unfaithful wife, though the effect is dialed down as he's not exactly a paragon of fidelity himself in that he's far more unfaithful and publicly so than she is, and at least one of his bastard children survive whereas none of hers do. It even gets HarsherInHindsight when you realize his very betrothed, Lyanna Stark, is revealed to have never loved him, choosing his ArchEnemy Rhaegar over him. In the books, in ''Literature/AGameOfThrones'', Ned Stark remembers a conversation he had with Lyanna, with the latter complaining that Robert cheated on her during her engagement and fathered a bastard in the Vale, Mya Stone. Ned insisted that Robert would change after marriage, but Lyanna replied that "Love is sweet, dearest Ned, but it cannot change a man's nature."

* The classic song from Los Embajadores Vallenatos, ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_ZTW0SruDA El Santo Cachon]]'' (which literally translates to "The Saint Horned")
* The other classic is "[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DloxuSM5SJI El Venao]]" (lit. "The deer").

[[folder:Anime & Manga]]

[[folder:Comic Books]]

[[folder:Fanfic]]

[[folder:Film]]

* Referenced several times throughout ''Film/TheBakersWife'', both by the baker and the villagers. The latter prank the former by presenting him with a present which turns out to be gag gift consisting of a pair of horns.
* One adaptation of Offenbach's "La Belle Héléne" (a parody of [[UsefulNotes/TheTrojanWar Helen's seduction and kidnapping by Paris]]) has Menelaus present the crown of laurels to Paris as a symbol of victory. When Menelaus wears them, it's unfortunately tilted so it looks remarkably like cuckold's horns.

[[folder:Jokes]]

[[folder:Literature]]

* Creator/DanSimmons' short story "My Private Memoirs of the Hoffer Stigmata Pandemic," in which a pandemic makes people's sins externally manifest in the form of various facial deformations, has a variant; fleshy blood-horns represent adultery, but they appear on the adulterer, not the cuckold.

[[folder:Live Action TV]]

[[folder:Music]]

[[folder:Theatre]]

* In his operas, Creator/WolfgangAmadeusMozart tended to make a musical pun on this trope by writing music for brass horns whenever cuckoldry was the subject at hand. Examples include Figaro's aria "Aprite un po' quegli occhi" in ''Theatre/TheMarriageOfFigaro'' when Susanna is {{Mistaken For Cheating}}, and Masetto's aria "Ho capito" in ''Theatre/DonGiovanni'' when Zerlina is about to cheat on him.

[[folder:Video Games]]

[[folder:Western Animation]]

[[folder:Real Life]]
* When VW launched the sunroof option for the Beetle in Brazil it sold well initially until a joke spread that it was to make room for the driver's horns. Sales tanked, the option was withdrawn and some owners even demanded the sunroof be filled in. Some years later, the Brazilian Ford Maverick's emblems had to be modified to remove the horned cow head of the US model.
* French marquess [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Henri_de_Pardaillan_de_Gondrin Louis Henri de Pardaillan de Gondrin]] "decorated" his coach with huge horns and antlers, furious that his wife had become Louis XIV's mistress. He also demanded that both flaps of the church door are to be opened for him, because his horns won't fit otherwise.

* Brazilian singer Falcão, who constantly sings about how being a cuckold, named a ConceptAlbum all about being cheated on as ''[[https://img.discogs.com/ctRT2laFSRsgUZshCwHCpseteUg=/fit-in/300x300/filters:strip_icc():format(jpeg):mode_rgb():quality(40)/discogs-images/R-12317727-1532813616-6559.jpeg.jpg 500 Years of Horns]]'' (it was released one year before the country's discovery turned 500).

* In a ''ComicBook/RatMan'' scene set in [[FireAndBrimstoneHell Hell]] one devil with a particularly impressive set of horns asks a colleague "I wonder what our wives do to pass the time while we're at work".

Symbolic horns are used as a visual shorthand to indicate a man whose wife cheats on him. This may involve allusions to horned animals such as bulls and stags. The symbolism is more rarely applied to women whose partners are unfaithful.

See also HornedHumanoid, WardingGestures, {{Cuckold}}. Contrast CrownOfHorns.

* All the sheep in ''{{VideoGame/Catherine}}'' have ram horns. Subverted in that not ''EVERYONE'' experiencing the nightmares is actually cheating on someone else.

Symbolic horns are used as a visual shorthand to indicate a man [[YourCheatingHeart whose wife cheats on him]]. This may involve allusions to horned animals such as bulls and stags. The symbolism is more rarely applied to women whose partners are unfaithful.

* In ''Comicbook/ArthurKingOfTimeAndSpace'', when it looks like Sir Ector's son Kay is the lost heir, King Lot says to Ector "Of all the honors Uther gave you, I never suspected the horns!"

A prank in various European and Latin American countries is to surreptitiously hold two fingers behind an unwitting victim's head, giving them cuckold horns. The American variation is the BunnyEarsPicturePrank, which is done with different fingers and doesn't have any negative connotation besides looking funny. Incidentally, do ''not'' show the "hook 'em horns" symbol to people from those countries, because that gesture means "Your wife's sleeping around" to them.

* In ''Literature/RallyRoundTheFlagBoys'', Harry Bannerman, who feels guilty about his affair with his boss's wife, imagines twelve-foot horns protruding from his boss's forehead at one moment when his boss angrily strikes up a conversation with him on a subject that turns out to be completely irrelevant. But since Harry is also a married man, he shortly thereafter finds himself pondering the ethics of "put[ting] horns on your wife."