In Russian, there are many words borrowed from French, for example "adultery". But does everyone know its meaning? But the expression "set the horns" is clear to everyone. It is used in everyday speech, and in literature, and in countless jokes on the topic of marital fidelity.
Where did the mentioned expression, which became a phraseological turn, come from in the Russian language? This is not known for certain, but explanatory dictionaries note at least four possible answers to this question. Let's start in order, namely with Ancient Greece.
Revenge of the Goddess
A long time ago, when the gods of Olympus often descended to the land of Hellas, Actaeon happened to hunt with friends on a hot day near the Gargafia valley. While friends settled down to rest in the shade of a large tree, Actaeon noticed a grotto on a mountainside. He became curious to find out what was inside.
It's a pity he didn't see how shortly before that a beautiful huntress, the daughter of Latona and Zeus, Artemis, entered the grotto. Only the nymphs undressed the goddess, preparing her for bathing, when Actaeon entered the grotto. No mortal before him had seen the naked beauty of Artemis. For such insolence, the offended goddess turned Actaeon into a deer, leaving only his mindhuman.
Not recognizing the owner, the dogs chased the deer with branched horns, overtook and violently tore his body apart. Actaeon's friends came to the rescue and heard a groan escape from the deer's chest, in which the sound of a human voice was heard. They never found out who the deer really was and why Artemis decided to horn him. Actaeon himself later became a symbol of a deceived husband.
Royal reward
Andronicus, the last emperor of Byzantium from the Komnenos dynasty, ruled in Constantinople for only two years - from 1183 to 1185, however, he managed to cuckold more than one of his courtiers. They say that as compensation for the insult, deceived husbands received hunting grounds, and deer antlers nailed to the gates of the estate served as a sign confirming the right to own them.
Later, the French kings, also not known for their chastity, adopted the Byzantine method of reparation for an insult. The dishonored nobles were allowed to hunt in the royal forests, and their estates were decorated with deer antlers. This is where the word "cuckold" comes from. And if at first they were called the courtier, whose wife agreed to cuckold her husband with His Majesty, then later they began to call them all the deceived husbands. Well, and from France this expression came to Russia.
Other versions
The ancient Germans had a custom according to which a woman put a helmet with horns on the head of her husband going to war. Thus, she became on somefree time. In the XV century, all in the same Germany, an imperial decree was issued, ordering those soldiers who were in the army with their wives to wear horns.
However, there are earlier references to horns associated with adultery. So, Ovid, in one of his works, laments about the horns that appeared on his head, after he belatedly found out about the betrayal of his beloved. In European poetry of the 13th century, there are often places where it is said that a horn grows on the forehead of a deceived husband.
As you can see, there are many versions, but they all come down to one answer to the question of what it means to set the horns: it means cheating on a husband or cheating on a wife, and also offending someone's dignity by seducing his bride or spouse.
In Literature
Literary works and memoirs testify that the expressions "cuckold" and "cuckold" have been used for a long time and everywhere. In addition to the works of ancient Roman and medieval literature mentioned above, we also find them in Shakespeare, for example, in The Merry Wives of Windsor.
On the pages of the works of Pushkin, Chekhov, Krylov, Dostoevsky, Lermontov and in the memoirs of Catherine II, there are also repeated references to horns and cuckolds when it comes to adultery, that is, betrayal of a husband or wife.
