MOSCOW, June 2, Pavel Surkov. Exactly 280 years ago, Giuseppe Giovanni Battista Balsamo was born in Palermo, a man who called himself Count Cagliostro and went down in history as one of the brightest and incredibly successful adventurers. He was noted in the Russian Empire. About the legend of the XVIII century — in the material. 
An ignoramus and a bully: how the story of Count Cagliostro began
As a child, he was restless and a hooligan — much more than studying, he was interested in various tricks and tricks. His father, a cloth merchant, thought that nothing good would come of his son, he would end his life either in prison or on the chopping block. And in general he was right.
For re-education, Giuseppe was sent to a Benedictine monastery to study. There he got acquainted with many ancient books. He was especially attracted by his works on chemistry and medicine. And, breaking free, he decided to become a wandering alchemist and healer.
When his aunt died, who bore the sonorous name of Cagliostro, he took this name for himself, adding the title of count.
He married the sweetest young lady Lorenza Feliciani, and for many years she became his assistant in endless adventures. 
Tours in Europe: empty promises of a second youth
The couple actively traveled around the Old World, in one city or another, Cagliostro traded in the «secret of the philosopher's stone» and numerous «elixirs of youth». Not all drugs helped, but the placebo effect worked: some Italian matrons really believed that they gained a second youth from the count's potions. He also assured that he had learned the secret of eternal life and had been walking the earth for a thousand years. 
Cagliostro borrowed a few tricks from him: for example, he taught servants answer questions about his own age like this: «Over the three hundred years that I have served the count, he has not changed much» or «I entered his service, it seems, in the year of the assassination of Julius Caesar.» Many believed.
The glory of Cagliostro grew, he was already accepted by European monarchs. The turn has come to Russia. 
Ekaterina's Embrace: The Adventures of Cagliostro in Russia
Mother Empress Catherine honored the count with an audience, and the all-powerful Prince Potemkin was especially interested in him. Cagliostro offered him a deal. His Serene Highness will bring all his gold to the overseas guest, and he will perform a magical rite over him, after which the weight of the precious metal will increase three times. For this, the count asked for a third of the profit. Potemkin agreed.
On the appointed day, Potemkin's gold was delivered and weighed. Cagliostro somehow bewitched him and locked him in a vault for two weeks. When the gold was weighed again — lo and behold! — it has become exactly three times more! What exactly Cagliostro did remained a mystery (perhaps he bribed the guards in the vault), but Potemkin gave the Count the reward.
Caught Cagliostro on a rather cruel trick: he allegedly resurrected a baby — the newborn son of Prince Gagarin. It turned out that there was a substitution, and the foreigner had to hastily leave Russia.
Catherine II was so outraged that she wrote the comedy The Deceiver, which was then staged at the Hermitage Theatre. photo» data-crop-ratio=»1.32133676092545″ data-crop-width=»600″ data-crop-height=»793″ data-source-sid=»» class=»m-vertical lazyload» lazy=»1″ />
Betrayal of the wife and death: how the great mystifier ended his life
When Cagliostro returned to France, the revolution was already raging there. The count was accused of having links with the Freemasons — such accusations were very common in those years. The main witness at the trial was Cagliostro's wife: Lorenza got scared and told everything about her husband's scams.
However, this did not help her: she was sent to a monastery, where she soon died.
And Cagliostro himself was sentenced to public burning. But Pope Pius VI pardoned the count, replacing the execution with life imprisonment. There was even a ceremony of repentance: barefoot and in one shirt, with a candle in his hands, the criminal begged God for forgiveness — and in front of him at the stake his «magic» books were burned.
Then he was sent to a cell — a real stone bag with a hole in the ceiling. There he spent four years. They say that one of the jailers helped him to die — he passed the poison.