Career
She entered the harem of Sultan Mehmed World War II In autumn 1458, Mehmed II sent a messenger to Helena"s father, Demetrios Palaiologos, the Despot of the Morea and pretender to the Byzantine throne with orders to hand over the sixteen-year-old Helena, famed for her beauty, for inclusion in the Imperial Harem. In spring 1460, Mehmed invaded Morea. Demetrios agreed to leave his capital of Mistra and surrender it to the Turks on 29 May.
The sultan arrived with the vanguard of his army the next day, and Demetrios was summoned to appear before him.
Mehmed left no doubt that Demetrios was to consider himself a hostage and that Greek rule in both Mistra and Morea was over, and once again demanded Helena, who was then in Monemvasia with her mother, be handed over to him. According to the historian Sandra Origone, Helena was taken to the Sultan Mehmed II"s harem.
However, according to the Ottomanist Franz Babinger, Helena may never have entered the sultan"s harem, for Mehmed feared she might poison him. Demetrios died in 1470 in a monastery in Edirne.
Helena"s mother Theodora Asanina also soon died.
Helena herself died of bubonic plague just before her father. An unknown rhetorician who composed a lament in her honour could not find tears enough to bemoan her passing.
