Cleofa Malatesta

Cleofa Malatesta
Bornfl. 1420
Died1433
SpouseTheodore II Palaiologos
IssueHelena Palaiologina
HouseMalatesta
FatherMalatesta IV Malatesta
MotherElisabetta da Varano

Cleofa Malatesta da Pesaro (also Cleofe, Cleopa or Cleopha) (fl. 1420 – died 1433) was an Italian noblewoman and the wife of Theodore II Palaiologos, Despot of the Morea, brother of Constantine XI, the last Byzantine emperor. She was a daughter of Malatesta dei Sonetti, Count of Pesaro, and Elisabetta da Varano.[1] She married Theodore Palaiologos in Mystras on January 21, 1421,[2][3] or sometime in 1422[4] in an arranged marriage that was part of an initiative of her uncle, Pope Martin V, to join Western (Roman Catholic) with Orthodox nobility, who in this way hoped to gain political alliances against the Ottoman Turks.

  1. ^ Prosopographisches Lexikon der Palaiologenzeit, vol. IX, n 21395.
  2. ^ Leofranc Holford-Strevens, "Du Fay the Poet? Problems in the Texts of His Motets", Early Music History, Vol. 16, (1997), p. 102.
  3. ^ Heinrich Besseler, "Neue Dokumente zum Leben und Schaffen Dufays", Archiv für Musikwissenschaft, 9. Jahrg., H. 3./4. (1952), p. 161.
  4. ^ Silvia Ronchey, "Orthodoxy on Sale: The last Byzantine and the lost Crusade", in Proceedings of the 21st International Congress of Byzantine Studies, London, 21–26 August 2006, p. 323.