Stefano Zannowich
He was born in Paštrovići,[2] the fourth child of Antun Zanović, a wealthy merchant and shoemaker, and his wife Franka (née Marković).
The large number of siblings allowed them to constantly change identities, falsely impersonating one another, often creating confusion by allegedly appearing in two places at the same time.
They were imprisoned in Siberia until 1788 when they were pardoned by Catherine the Great due to Zorich's intervention and Stjepan's fame in Western Europe, where he always glorified the Russian empress.
His youngest brother Miroslav also adopted the title of count and became involved in politics as a staunch opponent of Venetian aspirations towards Dalmatia.
During this voyage, he visited many parts of France, including Marseille, Aix-en-Provence, Lyon, and eventually Paris, where he moved in social circles around Encyclopédistes, thus meeting d'Alembert, Marmontel, and Rousseau.
Obviously seeking to profit from the power vacuum after the death of Stephen the Little, the actual impostor of Peter III, he later assumed his identity and presented himself across Europe as the man who caused such political intrigue.
While in Vienna, he tried to gain support from local Orthodox deacons for his plan to seize power in Montenegro, and it is at this point that he began his quest to prove his noble heritage (he had claimed descent from Skanderbeg[6]).
Johann Christian von Mannlich recounts how well he was received in Zweibrücken in 1778, only to be arrested and denied a residence permit after an incriminating letter against him arrived from Berlin.
Spending some time under various false identities in Alsace and Lorraine, he arrived in Rome, where he started an affair with the Duchess of Kingston despite their age difference.
During his stay in Belgium, clearly unwilling to abandon his political ambitions involving Montenegro, he devised a plan to place the country under the protection of Joseph II, whose intervention saved him from prison in Vienna in 1778.
Living off various hoaxes and frauds, he collected 5,764 Dutch guilders from a bank in Amsterdam on 11 August 1784, using a false promissory note from the Duchess of Kingston.
He regularly visited Augsburg, Regensburg, and Munich, establishing contacts with wealthy merchants and persuading them to enter the Dutch market where he had considerable influence.
[8] He had pen pals such as Gluck, Pietro Metastasio, Voltaire, Jean le Rond d'Alembert, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Catherine the Great, and Frederick William II of Prussia, to whom he dedicated a book of French verses translated from Italian, "L'Alcoran des Princes Destinés au Trone".
Giacomo Casanova mentions Stefano Zannovich, who "paid a visit to Vienna under the alias of Prince Castriotto d'Albanie.
With the latest research and study, Zannowich's work now belongs to the genre of an epistolary novel, a form especially popular in the Age of Enlightenment.
[21] Serbian historian Michael M. Petrovich traced the Zenović or Zenovich family from the Paštrović clan emigrating during or after the Napoleonic Wars to North America, first settling in Louisiana and later in California.
