Constantine XI Palaiologos
1405 – 1453 · Generation XL · Emperor (r. 1449–1453) · Palaiologos
Constantine (AD 1405 – 1453). Emperor (r. 1449–1453). Last Byzantine emperor; died at the fall of Constantinople. A soldier above all, he was twice trusted as regent by his brother John VIII and from 1428 ruled the Morea as despot, where with his brothers he stretched imperial rule over nearly the whole Peloponnese for the first time since the Fourth Crusade and restored the old Hexamilion wall guarding the peninsula. He upheld the church union of Florence in hope of Catholic aid, against fierce opposition led by Mark of Ephesus; twice widowed, he never found a third wife despite his confidant George Sphrantzes’s matchmaking. When Mehmed II invested the city with an army his defenders could not match at one in ten, he refused to abandon his capital and, by most accounts, fell fighting in a last stand. Greek folklore made him the “Marble Emperor,” sleeping beneath the Golden Gate until God should wake him.
One of 20 people of Palaiologos (1190–1503) in this archive. The last and longest-lived house — it retook the city in 1261 and lost it in 1453.
Line of descent: Manuel Komnenos → John Komnenos → Alexios I Komnenos → Theodora Komnene → Andronikos Angelos Doukas → Alexios III Angelos → Irene Angelina → Theodora Palaiologina → Michael VIII Palaiologos → Andronikos II Palaiologos → Michael IX Palaiologos → Andronikos III Palaiologos → John V Palaiologos → Manuel II Palaiologos → Constantine XI Palaiologos.
Parents
- Manuel II Palaiologos (1350 – 1425)
- Helena (1372 – 1450)
Siblings
- John VIII Palaiologos (1392 – 1448)
- Thomas Palaiologos (1409 – 1465)