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{{examples}}
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* This trope is referenced in ''[[Ranma ½]]''. One of the things [[Jerk with a Heart of Gold|Ranma]] does to try and get Ukyo [[Please Dump Me|to dump him]] is to tell her he's going to go spend the night with his mistress. Made funnier when he enters Akane's room and tries to convince her to go along with it. [[Tsundere|She]] really doesn't take it well.
* ''[[Rosario + Vampire]]'' makes use of it overtly; in the case of those seeking Tsukune's love only one has expressed real interest in marriage, with the others either outright saying they want to be something else to him, or simply showing no great interest either way. However more subtly {{spoiler|when we finally discover the full picture of the Shuzen family, we learn that not only was [[Disappeared Dad|Issa]] casually polygamous, but it is implied that among his partners, Moka's mother [[Lady of War|Akasha]] [[Names to Run Away From Really Fast|Bloodriver]] is Issa Shuzen's mistress rather then his wife. This despite also being a Shinso vampire and one of the Three Dark Lords, who control/watch over Japan.}}
 
== [[Film]] ==
* Lola's father has one in ''[[Run Lola Run]]''.
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== [[Literature]] ==
* Tom's relationship with Myrtle in ''[[The Great Gatsby]]''.
* In Katherine Kerr's ''Devvery'' series, Rhodry takes Jill as a mistress—he would have liked to marry her, but could not for political reasons. It's acknowledged that this is common among the nobility due to the proliferation of political marriages; and in many cases the jilted spouse doesn't particularly mind as long as you are tactful and discreet.
* One interpretation of the poem "The Rival" by [[Sylvia Plath]] (in ''[[Ariel]]'') is that the subject is an [[Expy]] of the mistress of Plath's husband.
* ''[[Discworld/Making Money|Making Money]]'' The bank's previous owner was the mistress of the former chairman, mentioning that as his mistress, she had the wife's approval because it got him out of her hair for a while. She was also good with numbers, which is why she remained in charge of the bank after his death. Before she passed on, she noted that standards have dropped and that now "the ability to spin upside down on a pole is considered sufficient".
* The position is [[Deconstructed]] in ''[[Dune]]'' wherein Paul Atreides considers the woman who is technically his mistress as his true wife, and never consummates his official (and political) marriage with his actual wife.
* Petra Cotes in ''[[One Hundred Years of Solitude]]'', doubling as one of the three [[Hooker with a Heart of Gold|hookers with hearts of gold]].
* In ''[[Guilty Wives]]'', Winnie is revealed to have been the mistress of {{spoiler|the President of France}} for some time before the action of the novel begins.
 
== [[Live-Action TV]] ==
* Spoofed in ''[[Designing Women]]'', when they get a mistress to stop seeing a married man, but the wife was angry, because she knew about the affair and was having her own.
* In the first time in ''[[Quantum Leap]]'' where Sam leapt into a woman, he was there to save "his" roommate from committing suicide over an relationship with her boss - she thought her boss would leave his wife for her, but the wife made it clear to her that she tolerated his "indiscretions" but they would never break up (and she was a former mistress of the boss herself, having broken up his previous marriage).
* An extremely rare [[Gender Flip]] version appears on ''[[The Office]]'', during the plotline where Michael thinks his girlfriend Donna is cheating on him but it turns out that the "other man" is her husband: "''I'M'' the mistress?"
* ''[[Kaamelott]]'': Arthur has up to four mistresses at any given time, going from one to the other as his needs warrant. [[Hilarity Ensues]] when a rumor spreads of his rebuking the queen, and each girl tries to convince him to marry her.
* ''[[Midsomer Murders]]'' loves this trope along with general adultery.
* ''[[The Sopranos]]'': Almost every made guy has a "gumar" on top of their wives who they won't divorce for their Catholic beliefs. For the main character, it becomes a major plot device when one of his mistresses actually contacts his home pushing his wife to call it quits, albeit temporarily.
** "Comare." Literally "godmother" in Sicilian dialect, but slang for mistress.
* ''[[Desperate Housewives]]'' wouldn't really be ''Desperate Housewives'' if it didn't have at least one mistress per season.
* In the ''[[Firefly]]'' episode "Shindig," Atherton Wing wanted Inara for one of these. Mal [[Fumbling the Gauntlet|objected]], leading to a [[Duel to the Death|sword duel over her honor]].
 
== [[Manga]] ==
* This trope is referenced in ''[[Ranma ½]]''. One of the things [[Jerk with a Heart of Gold|Ranma]] does to try and get Ukyo [[Please Dump Me|to dump him]] is to tell her he's going to go spend the night with his mistress. Made funnier when he enters Akane's room and tries to convince her to go along with it. [[Tsundere|She]] really doesn't take it well.
* ''[[Rosario + Vampire]]'' makes use of it overtly; in the case of those seeking Tsukune's love only one has expressed real interest in marriage, with the others either outright saying they want to be something else to him, or simply showing no great interest either way. However more subtly {{spoiler|when we finally discover the full picture of the Shuzen family, we learn that not only was [[Disappeared Dad|Issa]] casually polygamous, but it is implied that among his partners, Moka's mother [[Lady of War|Akasha]] [[Names to Run Away From Really Fast|Bloodriver]] is Issa Shuzen's mistress rather then his wife. This despite also being a Shinso vampire and one of the Three Dark Lords, who control/watch over Japan.}}
 
== [[Theatre]] ==
* ''[[Cyrano De Bergerac]]'': [[Villains|De Guiche]] wants to bully heroine Roxane into this. She will have none of it.
 
== [[Video Games]] ==
* King's Mistress is one of the endings in some of the ''[[Princess Maker]]'' games.
** Not only that, the second game as a possible ending with the girl as the lover of a local landlord as well. Said landlord [[Chekhov's Gun|can potentially show up earlier]] and makiemake the girl his lover if she has high Charisma with low Morals—it's not reccomendedrecommended to just let her be, though, as her stats and overall rep will go lower.
** In said second game the King of the Land also has a royal concubine, and your daughter can speak to her. She seems to be a pretty but deadly bored woman rather disenchanted with the life of the court, but unwilling to leave it due to the benefits it still gives her.
* ''[[Fire Emblem Elibe|Fire Emblem Blazing Sword]]'': King Desmond of Bern has a son (Zephiel) by the queen (Helenne), and a daughter (Guinevere) by his [[No Name Given|unnamed]] mistress. His illegitimate family lives in the palace, while his official one lives in an old out-of-the way manor. It's explained in the prequel ''Sword of Seals'' that {{spoiler|said mistress was actually the King's old girlfriend, whom the King couldn't marry due to being forced in an [[Arranged Marriage]] with the Queen..}} Needless to say, [[Big Screwed-Up Family|it does NOT''not'']] [[It Got Worse|end well.]]
* In ''[[Dragon Age]]'', {{spoiler|if you make Alistair king and cannot/will not make yourself queen and are in a romance, and provided you "hardened" him earlier, you may become his mistress. Not just a mistress, though, you may be his adviser, as well.}}
* In ''[[Tales of Symphonia]]'', Zelo's father had a mistress, who was the mother of Zelo's half-sister Seles. Despite him being the Chosen, it's implied that it was something everyone knew, as Zelos and Seles not only knew about each other, but they got on rather well. The mistress wasn't happy with the arrangement though, knowing that Zelos would be [[The Chosen One]] instead of their daughter. [[Tear Jerker|Let's just say]] [[It Got Worse]] and [[Dark and Troubled Past|leave it at that.]]
 
== [[Real Life]] ==
* There are a LOT''lot'' of historical examples, because European aristocratic marriages were almost always purely political—it was generally accepted that the husband and ([[Double Standard|though less tolerated]]) wife would take lovers to provide the emotional fulfillment they would not be getting from their marriage. It was usually considered bad form to be public about it, but not always—in some countries such as France The Mistress was even something of a semi-official position. (Among other things, this made it easier to keep tabs on any illegitimate children that might one day contest for the throne...)
* The picture is of Madame de Pompadour, one of the mistresses of [[L'État, c'est moi|Louis XV]], who was featured in ''[[Le Chevalier d'Eon]]''. She also appeared in the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' episode "The Girl In The Fireplace".
** The Doctor even mentions that she and the queen were good friends.
{{quote|'''The Doctor''': "France! It's another planet!"}}
** Queen Marie wasn't happy with her husbands affairs at all, since she was a devout Catholic. She merely preferred the well-behaved and properly deferential Pompadour over her downright arrogant predecessors. Marie Therese, on the other hand, was openly dissappointeddisappointed when her husband exchanged Louise de la Valliere for de Montespan.
** Madame DuBarry was another mistress late in his life, who was an [[Historical Villain Upgrade|initial antagonist]] in ''[[Rose of Versailles]]''.
* Looking through the history of any European country, the amount of mistresses the royalty and nobility kept on hand is staggering. Special mention to [[wikipedia:Louis XIV of France|Louis XIV of France]], who was still sleeping around at 70, and [[wikipedia:Augustus II|Augustus II of Poland]], who ended up with ''350 '' children, of which ''one'' was legitimate.
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* [[The House of Stuart|King Charles II of England, Scotland, and Ireland]] was known as "the Merry Monarch" for his free-living lifestyle, and is famous for having twelve acknowledged illegitimate children by seven mistresses—with no less than five of the children being by Barbara Palmer, Countess of Castlemaine—and no children at all by his legitimate wife, Catherine of Braganza. Many of Charles' bastards have prominent descendants, with one of them (Diana Spencer) marrying the Prince of Wales (making Princess Di), and thus probably finally getting one of Charles' descendants in line for the throne.
* [[The House of Hanover|William IV of the United Kingdom]] was also famous for a large number of illegitimate children (as, frankly, were many of the sons of George III, much to their devout and [[Happily Married]] father's disgust—at least when he was lucid enough to be disgusted). He had only two daughters by his wife, Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen, but he had ten by his mistress, the actress Dorothea Jordan. Both of his legitimate daughters died, leaving the throne to his niece [[Queen Victoria|Victoria]]. And of course, William's surviving children had important descendants, the most famous of whom is current [[The Men of Downing Street|Prime Minister]] [[David Cameron]].
* [[Marion Davies]], longtime girlfriend of publishing magnate [[William Randolph Hearst]]. Hearst remained married to his wife Millicent until his death, despite having been carrying on with Davies for the last 34thirty-four years of his life.
 
{{reflist}}
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