Страница 6 из 9
Of the many Sicilian expatriates and ex-convicts
he met during this period, one introduced him to
a seventeen-year-old girl named
Lorenza Seraphina Feliciani
(ca. 8 April 1751 - 1794),
known as Serafina,
whom he married 1768.
The couple moved in with
Lorenza's parents and her brother
in the vicolo delle Cripte,
adjacent to the strada dei Pellegrini.
Balsamo's coarse language and the way he incited Lorenza to display her body contrasted deeply with her parents' deep-rooted religious beliefs. After a heated discussion, the young couple left.
At this point Balsamo befriended
Agliata,
a forger and swindler,
who proposed to teach Balsamo
how to forge letters, diplomas and myriad other official documents.
In return, though, Agliata sought sexual intercourse with Balsamo's young wife, a request to which Balsamo acquiesced.
The couple
traveled together to
London,
Лондон
where Balsamo, now styling himself with one of several pseudonyms and self-conferred titles before settling on
"Count Alessandro di Cagliostro",
allegedly met
the Comte de Saint-Germain.
Cagliostro traveled throughout Europe,
especially to Courland, Russia, Poland, Germany, and later France.
(Курланд (сейчас в Латвии), Россия, Польша, Германия, Франция)
His fame grew to the point that
he was even recommended as a physician to
Benjamin Franklin
during a stay in Paris.
On April 12, 1776
"Joseph Cagliostro"
was admitted as
a Freemason
of the Esperance Lodge No. 289 in Gerrard Street, Soho, London.
(Масон Английской Ложи в Лондоне)
In December 1777
Cagliostro and Serafina
left London (Лондон)
for the mainland,
after which
they travelled through various German states,
visiting lodges of
the Rite of Strict Observance
looking for converts to Cagliostro's
"Egyptian Freemasonry".
In February 1779
Cagliostro traveled to
Mitau,
Митай,
where
he met
the poetess
Elisa von der Recke.
In September 1780,
after failing
in Saint Petersburg
to win the patronage of Russian Tsaritsa Catherine the Great,
(Пытался завладеть патронажем и покровительством Екатерины Великой в Российской Империи, в Сант-Петебурге, но эта затея провалилась, и Калиостро уехали во Францию).
the Cagliostros
made their way to
Strasbourg,
at that time in France.
In October 1784,
the Cagliostros
travelled to
Lyon.
On December 24, 1784 they founded
the co-Masonic mother lodge
La Sagesse Triomphante
of his rite of Egyptian Freemasonry at Lyon.
In January 1785,
Cagliostro and his wife
went to
Paris
in response to the entreaties of
Cardinal Rohan.
Affair of the diamond necklace
Satire on Cagliostro at a Masonic meeting in London in 1786, by James Gillray
Cagliostro was prosecuted in
the Affair of the Diamond Necklace
which involved
Marie Antoinette and Prince Louis de Rohan,
and was held
in the Bastille
for nine months
but finally acquitted,
when no evidence could be found co
to the affair.
Nonetheless,
he was banished
from France
by order of Louis XVI,
and departed for England.
There he was accused by French expatriate
Theveneau de Morande
of being Giuseppe Balsamo,
which he denied
in his published Open Letter
to the English People,
forcing a retraction
and apology from Morande.
Betrayal, imprisonment, and death
Cagliostro
left England
to visit Rome,
where he
met two people
who proved to be
spies of the Inquisition.
Some accounts hold that
his wife was the one
who initially betrayed him to
the Inquisition.
On 27 December 1789,
he was arrested and imprisoned in
the Castel Sant'Angelo.
Soon afterwards
he was sentenced to death
on the charge of being a Freemason.
The Pope
changed his sentence,
however,
to life imprisonment
in the Castel Sant'Angelo.
After attempting to escape
he was relocated to
the Fortress of San Leo
where he died not long after.
Legacy
Portuguese author Camilo Castelo Branco credits to Balsamo the creation of the Egyptian Rite of the Freemasons and intensive work in the diffusion of Freemasonry, by opening lodges all over Europe and by introducing the acceptance of women into the community.
Cagliostro was an extraordinary forger.
Giacomo Casanova,
in his autobiography,
narrated an encounter
in which
Cagliostro was able
to forge a letter by Casanova,
despite being unable to understand it.