User:Ichthyovenator/Fernando Palaiologos (XX)

Fernando Palaiologos (Italian: Fernando Paleologo, Φερνάνδος Παλαιολόγος; ) was a 15th- and 16th-century Italian-Greek nobleman and possibly a son of Andreas Palaiologos, nephew of the last Byzantine emperor Constantine XI Palaiologos.

Biography
Fernando is first attested on 17 July 1499, when he was sent by Ludovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan, on a diplomatic or espionage mission to the Ottoman Empire. Sforza's own writings record record the Duke sending "Don Fernando, son of the Despot of the Morea, nephew of the lord Constantine [Arianiti, governor of Montferrat], to the Turk with five horses".

As he is described as the "son of the Despot of the Morea", and the sole claimant to that title in 1499 was Andreas Palaiologos, it is possible that Fernando was his son. After Andreas died in 1502, Fernando formally claimed the title for himself, but he does not appear to have made much of an impact on history. This might be either due to an unwillingness to play a prominent role or perhaps due to the possibility that he might have been illegitimate, which would have hampered him.

The Constantine Arianiti referenced by Sforza, genealogically unconnected to Andreas, also claimed the title of Despot of the Morea a few months after Andreas's death.

One of Andreas's successors as claimant to the position of Despot of the Morea raised problems of protocol when he in 1518 invited Pope Leo X to become the godparent of his son Giovanni Martino Leonardo and also invited ten cardinals to the baptism, held in the church San Marco in Rome. Although American historian Kenneth Setton believes that it is possible that the despot in question was Constantine Arianiti, Arianiti resided in Fano at the time and had only one historically verified son, Arianitto (or Arianit).