A good number of people in Britain and beyond have had the honour of being stripped of their knighthoods and awards by the honours forfeiture committee since 1995.
Last year a former Manchester headteacher, Jean Else, became the first woman to have her damehood annulled.
The forfeiture committee was established to guard the system of knighthoods, peerages and other awards.
The committee’s recommendations are submitted to the Queen through the prime minister. Any decisions on forfeiture are formally published in the London Gazette.
It is composed of senior civil servants. Meeting at least once a year, the committee examines individual cases brought to its attention and reviews general policy about how the system should operate.
The Commonwealth award is removed by a different forfeiture committee.
Robert Mugabe, knighted in 1994, to cheers of African liberation and Mandela worshipping, had the honour withdrawn in 2008 following the international furore over violent, disputed elections. Bob had become slightly too black for his boots.
The Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu, honoured by the British government in an attempt to improve relations within Europe during the cold war had his knighthood revoked just in time. He fell from grace the day before his execution by a revolutionary firing squad.
Anthony Blunt, the keeper of the Queen’s pictures, was knighted for his services to art only to have his status revoked in 1979 shortly after the prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, had exposed his double life as a Soviet spy in parliament.
Another victim of the hasty re-writing of history is the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.
Mussolini had been the first Italian to receive the honour. He was given the Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath in 1923 from King George V, no less.
Il Duce lost his knighthood when Italy joined Nazi Germany in 1940 in declaring war on the UK.
The case of Roger Casement remains one of the most controversial forfeitures. A distinguished diplomat and human rights campaigner, he was eventually hanged for treason. He had attempted to deliver weapons to Irish republicans before the Easter Rising in 1916.