page_title: Theodore Paleologus
section_title: In the service of the Earl of Lincoln
hierarchical_section_title: Theodore Paleologus / Biography / In the service of the Earl of Lincoln
caption_attribution_description: Tattershall Castle is one of a complex of buildings built by Ralph, Lord Cromwell, in the late 15th century and which also included Tattershall College, the collegiate church and the Almshouse.
context_page_description: Theodore Paleologus was a 16th and 17th-century Italian nobleman, soldier and assassin. According to the genealogy presented on Theodore's tombstone, he was a direct male-line descendant of the Palaiologos dynasty, which had ruled the Byzantine Empire from 1259 to its fall in 1453. Though most of the figures in the genealogy can be verified to have been real historical figures, the veracity of his imperial descent is uncertain.
  Born in Pesaro around 1560, Theodore was forced into exile after being convicted for the attempted murder of man called Leone Ramusciatti. He lived in exile for many years and went on to become a proficient soldier and hired assassin. In 1597, Theodore arrived in London, hired by the authorities of the Republic of Lucca to kill a man named Alessandro Antelminelli. After failing to track down Antelminelli, Theodore stayed in England, possibly for the rest of his life.
  In 1600, Theodore was hired by Henry Clinton, the Earl of Lincoln, ostensibly as "Master of the Horse" but in reality probably as a henchman and assassin. At the time, Clinton was perhaps the most hated nobleman in the entire country.
context_section_description: After failing to track down Antelminelli, Theodore chose to stay in England. To earn money, he entered into the service of Henry Clinton, the Earl of Lincoln, in 1599. Theodore would spend many years living at Clinton's castle, Tattershall Castle in Lincolnshire. The castle had once been denounced by King Henry VIII as "one of the most brutal and beastly [castles] of the whole realm" and the town it overlooked, also called Tattershall, was scarcely more than a village at this point in time, having suffered a drastic depopulation in the late 16th century. Henry Clinton was almost sixty years old and one of the most brutal, feared and hated feudal lords in Britain. Clinton is frequently described as waging war on his neighbors and is often credited with rioting, abduction, arson, sabotage, extortion and perjury. At one point, Clinton even expanded his castle walls into the nearby churchyard.
  Clinton officially hired Theodore as his Master of the Horse, but he clearly had intended uses for Theodore beyond the Italian's skills with horses, and presumably knew of Theodore's previous work. It is thus likely that Clinton's real intended use for Theodore was as a soldier and assassin. Theodore himself probably entered Clinton's service due to his advancing age, hoping to find a safer and more stable profession than his many years as a hired killer. Clinton was often at London due to his frequent entanglements with the law, during which Theodore, as Master of the Horse, would likely have accompanied and escorted him.
  While staying at Tattershall, Theodore met his future wife, Mary Balls. Mary had been born in Hadleigh, Suffolk c. 1575 (she is known to have been 24 years old in 1599) and had no known friends or family outside that town, making her sudden appearance at Tattershall in 1599 somewhat puzzling. The only certain previous link between her family and Tattershall is her father, William Balls, being recorded as a witness to a legal document in Tattershall in 1585. William might thus have been known at the Tattershall household in some capacity.
  Mary conceived Theodore's first child c. September 1599, and she married him in Cottingham, East Yorkshire on 1 May 1600, at which point she was several months pregnant. It is possible that the reason for the wedding being so late, only six weeks before the birth of their child, was Theodore accompanying Clinton on one of his law-related trips to London. The ceremony took place in the Church of St. Mary in Cottingham, where the marriage register records the marriage of Thedorus Palelogu and Maria Balle. The couple might have chosen to marry at Cottingham, nearly seventy miles away from Tattershall, due to Cottingham being under the rule of the Duke of Suffolk, Clinton's feudal superior. Because of the relation between the duke and the earl, the priest in Cottingham might have avoided asking awkward questions in regards to Mary's pregnancy. Their first child, named Theodore, was baptised on 12 June but died an infant on 1 September.
  During their time in Lincolnshire, Theodore and Mary had further children. Baptismal records at Tattershall confirms the baptisms of three of their five, possibly six, later children. On 18 August 1606, their daughter Dorothy (identified in the records as "Dorathie, daughter of Theodore Palalogo") was baptised, followed by Theodore Junior ("Theodore Palalogo, son of Theodore Palalogo") on 30 April 1609 and John Theodore ("John Theodore, son of Paleologo Theodore) on 11 July 1611. There is also a partially legible entry for "Elizabeth, daughter of Theo ..." from August 1614, likely another child of Theodore. Since no further records are known of this Elizabeth, she is likely to have died in infancy.
  On 14 May 1600, Francis Norreys, the son of Clinton's wife Elizabeth Morrison by a previous marriage, wrote to the Secretary of State, Robert Cecil, in the hope that he would intervene in Clinton's affairs, since Clinton had recently ordered that Elizabeth be confined to Tatershall Castle. The letter references an "Italian murderer", likely Theodore. With Clinto
caption: Tattershall Castle, the seat of the Earl of Lincoln and Theodore's home for many years in the service of the feared and hated Earl Henry Clinton
exif: {}