Editing Alessandro Cagliostro (section)

===Travels===
[[File:Seraphinia Feliciani.jpg|thumb|Lorenza Seraphina Feliciani, his wife]]
[[File:Germania, 1882 1020213 (4359093810).jpg|thumb|19th-century illustration of a Cagliostro performance in [[Dresden]]]]
In early 1768 Balsamo left for Rome, where he managed to land himself a job as a secretary to Cardinal Orsini.<ref>The cardinal in question would have been Domenico Orsini d'Aragona (1719–1789), nephew of [[Pope Benedict XIII]]. [http://www.fiu.edu/~mirandas/bios1743.htm#Orsini Miranda, "Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church"].</ref> The job proved boring to Balsamo and he soon started leading a double life, selling magical "Egyptian" amulets and engravings pasted on boards and painted over to look like paintings.<ref name=iain>[[Iain McCalman]]: ''The Seven Ordeals of Count Cagliostro'', 2004: Flamingo (Australia) and Random House (UK); published in the US as ''The Last Alchemist'' by HarperCollins.</ref> Of the many Sicilian expatriates and ex-convicts he met during this period, one introduced him to a fourteen-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.<ref name=iain/> 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, Agliata sought sexual intercourse with Balsamo's young wife, a request to which Balsamo acquiesced.<ref>{{cite web
 |url=http://www.wilsonsalmanac.com/count_cagliostro.html
 |title=Count Cogliostro – Alchemist who could turn people into gold
 |access-date=22 September 2008
 |last=Wilson
 |first=Pip
 |publisher=Wilson's Almanac
 |url-status = dead
 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080908044135/http://www.wilsonsalmanac.com/count_cagliostro.html
 |archive-date=8 September 2008
}}</ref>

The couple traveled together to London, 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 [[Duchy of Courland and Semigallia|Courland]], Russia, Poland, Germany, and later France. His fame grew to the point that he was even recommended as a physician to [[Benjamin Franklin]] during a stay in Paris.

On 12 April 1777, "Joseph Cagliostro" was admitted as a Freemason of the Espérance Lodge No. 289 in Gerrard Street, Soho, London.<ref>See Reinhard Markner: Cagliostro's Initiation: His 1777 Grand Lodge Certificate Rediscovered, in ''The Square,'' Sept. 2019, p. 23. [https://www.academia.edu/40295293/Cagliostro_s_Initiation_His_1777_Grand_Lodge_Certificate_Rediscovered].</ref> In December 1777 Cagliostro and Serafina left London 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 "[[Rite of Memphis-Misraim|Egyptian Freemasonry]]". In February 1779 Cagliostro traveled to [[Jelgava|Mitau]], (nowadays [[Latvia]]), where he met the poet [[Elisa von der Recke]]. In September 1780, after failing in [[Saint Petersburg]] to win the patronage of Russian [[Tsaritsa]] [[Catherine the Great]], the Cagliostros made their way to [[Strasbourg]], at that time in France. In October 1784, the Cagliostros travelled to [[Lyon]]. On 24 December 1784 they founded the [[Co-Freemasonry|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 de Rohan|Cardinal Rohan]]. {{citation needed|date=November 2016}}