Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know
Lady Caroline Lamb & Lord Byron (from two separate paintings) Life for the rich and fashionable in London during the Regency period (1788 to 1830), was extravagant and decadent. Marriage was mostly seen as a business arrangement, with fidelity being very low on the priority list for both sexes. The idea was that a woman's duty was to provide her husband with at least one male heir. That objective having been achieved, the happy wife was free to amuse herself with as many lovers as she sought fit to. Lady Caroline Lamb was a typical example of the time. She was brought up in an environment in which all the adults were having affairs and many of her playmates were their illegitimate children. In her early teens she was married off to William Lamb, an ambitious politician and son of Lady Melbourne, ex mistress of the Prince of Wales. Two out of five of Lady Melbourne's children were rumoured to have been fathered by her lovers. Not long after her marriage Caroline embarked on