page_title: Pretenders to the Byzantine throne
section_title: Marziano Lavarello
hierarchical_section_title: Pretenders to the Byzantine throne / Notable modern pretenders / Marziano Lavarello
caption_attribution_description: English: Marziano Lavarello, self-proclaimed Byzantine Emperor, in 1964
context_page_description: The Byzantine Empire, the medieval continuation of the ancient Roman Empire, ceased to exist with the Fall of Constantinople in 1453, ending its line of emperors stretching from Augustus in 27 BC to the final emperor Constantine XI Palaiologos in 1453. After the Fall of Constantinople, both the Ottoman Empire and Moscow, proclaimed themselves as Byzantium's successors as the "Third Rome".
  Unlike many kingdoms and empires, the Byzantine Empire technically wasn't a hereditary monarchy; there were no formal succession laws in place to specify who was to succeed as emperor. As such, there cannot be a legitimate pretender to the Byzantine throne as the possibility of a true "rightful emperor" died with the empire and its institutions in 1453. Despite this, there were claimants to the title in the immediate aftermath of Constantinople's fall, the most prominent being Constantine XI's nephew Andreas Palaiologos, who claimed the title from 1483 to his death in 1502.
context_section_description: Marziano Lavarello (17 March 1921 – 7 October 1992), sometimes going by the name Marziano Lavarello Lascaris Paleologo (claiming descent from the Byzantine Laskaris and Palaiologos families) or Marziano Lavarello Obrenovic (claiming descent from the Serbian Obrenović dynasty), was an Italian man from a wealthy Genoese family of shipowners who proclaimed himself as "His Imperial Majesty, Marziano II" (the 5th-century Emperor Marcian being "Marziano I"). Lavarello annually celebrated the anniversary of his "coronation" as emperor (a ceremony which took place in a Methodist church in Rome). Marziano's real ancestors, the Lavarello family, were a distinguished Genoese family and could trace their descent (albeit not an imperial one) back to the 14th century. Marziano, possibly on account of his mother having an affair with a high-ranking member of the Roman Church, grew up in the Vatican instead of in Genoa and repeatedly looked for prestigious lines of descent, beyond his own Lavarello line. In 1973 he published a genealogy which made him out to be a descendant of the Greek god Zeus.
  The legal system of Italy in the 1950s and 1960s provided ample ground for imposters and claimants such as Lavarello, and many such as himself managed to secure limited legal recognition. Lavarello's titles, and his role as Grand Master of the Constantinian Order of Saint George, were recognized by a court in Rome on 10 September 1948, wherein he was referred to as "Imperiale il principe Don Marziano II Lascaris Comneno Flavio Angelo Lavarello Ventimiglia di Turgoville". One version of Lavarello's claimed full title was "Titular Emperor of Constantinople, Despot of Nicaea and Bithynia, Grand Duke, Sebastokrator and Byzantine Patrician, Emperor of Trebizond, Sovereign of Cephalonia and Asia Minor, Porphyrogenitus, Imperial and Royal Prince Lascaris-Doukas, Grand Head of the House of Lascaris, the Ninth Dynasty of the Holy Roman Empire of the East". Lavarello minted coins of himself with the inscription "Marcianus II Serviae Rex Romanorum Imperator Dei Sacratus Gratia". 
  In 1952 there was a famous legal battle between two self-proclaimed emperors, with Lavarello's right to "rule" being challenged by a comedian and actor from Naples known as Totò. Totò claimed the title "His Imperial Highness Antonio Porphyrogenite of the Constantinian Descent of Phocis, Achaia, Flavio, Duke Comneno de Curtis, Imperial Prince of Byzantium, Prince of Cilicia, of Macedonia, Darbiana, Thessaly, Moldavia, Ponto, Illyria, Peloponnesus, Duke of Cyprus and Epirus, etc., etc.". Both would-be emperors held court and distributed supposed Byzantine titles to their friends and supporters.
  Marziano spent the last years of his life living in a small apartment in Rome, having spent most of his inherited money on his "royal" lifestyle and ceremonies. He never married and died childless. Lavarello's funeral was at the Church of St. Nicholas in Rome, a Russian Orthodox Church, which still houses one of Lavarello's manufactured "imperial crowns". Lavarello's claim is perpetuated to this day by Arcadia Luigi Maria Picco, born in 1958 in Iglesias, Sardinia, who alleges that Lavarello willed his "titles" to him in the absence of heirs of his own. Picco thus claims the title of "Roman Byzantine Emperor" and claims to be the head of the house of "Lavarello Obrenović Angelo Flavio".
caption: Marziano Lavarello, the self-proclaimed Emperor "Marziano II", enthroned with a crown in 1964.
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