Andreas Palaiologos
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Andreas Palaiologos (or Palaeologus) (1453 - 1502[1]) de jure Byzantine emperor and Despot of Morea from 1465 until death in 1502.
He was the nephew of Constantine XI Palaiologos, the last Byzantine Emperor of Constantinople. After Constantine was defeated and killed by the forces of Mehmed II on May 29, 1453, Andreas continued to live in Morea, which was ruled independently by Andreas' father Thomas Palaiologos, the younger brother of Constantine, until 1460. At this time he escaped to the Italian peninsula following an Ottoman invasion. Before entering Italy, Thomas and all his children made the conversion to the Roman Catholic religion. When his father died in 1465, Andreas stayed in Italy under the protection of the Papal States. He lived in Rome, styling himself Imperator Constantinopolitanus ("Emperor of Constantinople"), where he married a Roman prostitute.[2]
During his lifetime, Andreas is believed to have wasted enormous sums of money given to him by the Pope. However, modern historians now believe that the money received from the Pope was only enough for a meager standard of living.
Looking for money and a better life, Andreas tried to sell the rights to the Byzantine crown, which had fallen to him de jure[citation needed] since the death of his father Thomas. Charles VIII of France originally agreed to purchase the rights of succession from Andreas in 1494. However Charles predeceased him on April 7, 1498.
Andreas' younger brother Manuel Palaiologos arranged a deal with the Ottoman Sultan Bayazid II, exchanging his rights to the Byzantine throne for a comfortable pension.
Andreas died a pauper in 1502, having sold his titles to Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella of Castile.[3] While most scholars believe Andreas left no descendants of his own, Donald M. Nicol's The Immortal Emperor recognises a Constantine Palaiologos who served in the Papal Guard and a Maria who married Russian noble Mihail Vasilivich as possible offspring of Andreas.
[edit] References
- ^ Libro d'Oro di Melita
- ^ Norwich, John Julius, Byzantium - The Decline and Fall, p.446
- ^ Norwich, John Julius, Byzantium - The Decline and Fall, p.446
- Jonathan Harris, Greek Émigrés in the West, 1400-1520, Camberley: Porphyrogenitus, 1995. ISBN 1 871328 11 X
- Jonathan Harris 'A worthless prince? Andreas Palaeologus in Rome, 1465-1502', Orientalia Christiana Periodica 61 (1995), 537-54
- Donald M. Nicol, The Immortal Emperor, Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 115-22. ISBN 0 521 41456 3.
- Steven Runciman, The Fall of Constantinople 1453, Cambridge University Press, 1965, pp. 183-4. ISBN 0 521 09573 5
- also see F. Rodriguez, Origine, cronologia esuccesione degli Imperatori Paleologo, "Riv. di Araldica e Geneologia" I, 1933.
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Andreas Palaiologos
Palaiologos dynasty
Born: 1453 Died: 1503 |
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| Titles in pretence | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Thomas Palaiologos |
— TITULAR — Despot of Morea 1465-1503 |
Succeeded by Ferdinand II of Aragon |
| — TITULAR — Byzantine Emperor 1465-1503 Reason for succession failure: The Fall of Constantinople led to the Ottoman conquest of the Byzantine Empire |
Succeeded by Isabella I of Castille and Ferdinand II of Aragon |
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