[sinclairfan]

100% actual history, documented in actual surviving Goya paintings (one of which is of a reclining nude woman):

During the 1788-1808 reign of King Charles IV, three of the most powerful women in Spain were carrying on simultaneous, torrid love affairs with 2 of most powerful men in the country.

The men:
> Manuel Godoy, Enlightenment Prime Minister of Spain
> Francisco Goya, possibly the greatest painter in the country's history

The women:
> Queen Maria Luisa (Charles IV's wife, who confoned her affair with Godoy to keep him in government service).  Maria Luisa was born in 1751, and is not to be confused with Napoleon's second wife, also named Maria Luisa of Parma, who was actually a Hapsburg princess, but was born in 1791 and became Napoleon's 2nd wife in 1810.  (The confusion between the 2 Maria Luisa's is the main reason this pentagon isn't better known.)
> Maria Pimental, Duchess of Osuna (the nude model for a famous Goya painting)
> Maria Cayetana de Silva , Duchess of Alba

The 3 women knew of each other and were bitter rivals.  Alba's premature death was believed, at the time, to have been by poisoning.

[rocknrick22]

Very interesting history thank you for sharing.  You refer to paintings...found any links to them?  You suggest that because they were having simultaneous affairs that means their was a rivalry.  Any documentation to substantiate that?  I ask because you are so informed on the history perhaps there is more to this story and I would like to know all about it if there is.  Don't doubt your veracity and this information lends itself to great story lines.  Art imitating life and vice versa.

[sinclairfan]

The Goya painting of the Duchess of Alba is at

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Maja_desnuda

Incredibly, Goya is the painter, while it was commissioned by Godoy.  So, the pentagon had stereotypical f-m-f-m-f jealousy dynamics, with the 2 men "totally cool with" each other, and the three women at each others' throats.

There have been published scholarly attempts (a British historian in 1912, a University of Alabama historian in 1987) to determine the cause of the Duchess of Alba's premature death, both inconclusive. 

But since Queen Maria Luisa is suspected have having poisoned her own daughter-in-law in 1806, she will always remain under a cloud of suspicion in the Duchess of Alba's premature demise.

[rocknrick22]

Thanks for taking the time to provide the info and the link.

[Seve2U]

So, this week was the 60th anniversary of the death of Marilyn Monroe.  And for wild conspiracy theories, or much more likely ridiculous fetish fiction, what if Jacqueline Kennedy had had enough of Marilyn Monroe hitting on her husband ("Happy Birthday Mr. President") and decided to put her sexual competitor to permanent rest?  The Secret Service tells Marilyn to expect a visit from the President to her LA home.  But when the motorcade arrives, it is Jacqueline who shows up to confront the sexy blonde homewrecker.  The women argue and then fight.  Jackie uses a special ribbon, given to her by the CIA to strangle Marilyn without leaving any marks on her skin (created for use by the Mossad).  After Jackie dispatches Marilyn, the Secret Service cleaner moves in, leaving Marilyn naked on the bed, her blood full of anti-depressant medication (injected inside her ear canal), scatters her anti-depressant pills all over the bedroom, cleans up all signs of a struggle, places the telephone receiver in Marilyn's hand, and clears the scene.  Meanwhile, the powers that be are letting the LA police not to dig too deeply on the cause of this death.  Take what you see at face value and make this a closed case.  The report comes out and Marilyn is declared to have committed suicide.  But those who know the hearts of men and women suspect otherwise.  If this were true, it certainly would have "changed history."

[sinclairfan]

.....and.....what if the Mob knew who Marilyn's real killer was, and their actual Dallas target was Jackie [the perfect crime--everyone would have assumed her death was from a failed assassination], but the Mob botched the Jackie hit and got JFK instead by accident?

[sinclairfan]

'The Troubled Trinity' by Douglas Hilt [1987] relates a funny story of Queen Maria Luisa and Godoy walking behind King Charles IV and having a lover's quarrel (perhaps over Godoy continuing to see the Duchesses Alba and Ossuna), and Maria Luisa slapping Godoy in the face.  The startled King turned around and asked what the noise was, and the jealous Queen said, "Nothing; Minister Godoy has dropped a book."