Романовы (Romanov dynasty / Triều Romanov / 羅曼諾夫皇朝)

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Babich-Design

The courteous 18th century was an era of brilliant dancing parties,

fanciful carnivals, jesters and fireworks.

The quadrille, a dance during which

partners change constantly was the most fashionable.

The huge Empire lived

under its own inertia while its rulers replaced each other on the throne,

like during the dance. It was an epoch of palace resolutions in Russia.

THE HOUSE OF ROMANOV. Episode Four

The year 1727. Peter the Great has been already dead for two years.

The Empire that he created still lived as before.

However, first alarm signals sounded.

There were two million less of taxes gathered.

Unfinished ships stood in shipyards.

There were shortages of food

and equipment in the army.

In state administrative establishments

corruption and bribery flourished.

There was no one to see to that.

The Higher Secret Council ruled the state.

It consisted of a handful of nobles who only cared about their own interests.

A 12-year old teenager occupied the throne.

Chapter One. Peter II Alexeyevitch

Peter II was the son of Prince Alexey Petrovitch and the German Princess

Sophia-Charlotte Brunswick-Wolfenbuttel, a grandson of Peter I.

He lost his mother at the age of 10 days and his father when he was three.

His sister Natalia, who was one year his senior, was his only close relative.

He had a title of the Great Duke and wasn’t considered as an heir to the throne

while the Emperor had sons Peter Petrovitch and Pavel Petrovitch.

When they died, the Great Duke Peter Alexeyevitch remained the only male

of the Romanov’s dynasty line.

Peter was born and grew up in an atmosphere of total dislike.

"His parents didn’t love each other; his grandfather didn’t love his father, "

his father didn’t love him.

Negligent nannies used to give wine to the baby to keep him from crying.

Later teachers were assigned to him.

"However, they turned out to be bad too.

The boy could barely talk Russian; "

he spoke some German and some Latin.

That was all his knowledge.

Nevertheless, by seven he was well-acquainted with the life style

and entertainments of the “golden youth”.

Young Peter was interested neither in the army, nor in the fleet,

nor in the sciences – in nothing except for entertainments.

It didn’t worry people who surrounded him.

On the contrary, it was convenient for them.

They wanted to make a “pocket Tsar” out of Peter.

The question was in whose pocket the Tsar would end up.

By the moment Peter II ascended the throne it was His Serene Highness

Alexander Danilovitch Menshikov who happened to be the closest to him.

He was a close friend and associate of Peter the Great and his widow Ekaterina

and the most influential person in the Empire at that time.

Menshikov talked dying Ekaterina who owed her power to him into signing

a testament according to which the Great Duke Peter Alexeyevitch

was to become the heir.

There was a condition – on coming of age,

Peter was to marry Menshikov’s daughter.

Then there would be no limits to the powers of Alexander Danilovitch.

Of course, nobody asked for the opinion of the underage groom.

Soon after his coronation a 12-year old Peter was officially engaged

with a 16-year old Maria Menshikova.

The Emperor’s bride got a title

of Her Imperial Highness and a year allowance of 34 thousand rubles.

Peter II didn’t express any love to his bride.

He called her “a stone statue” and “a porcelain doll” in his letters.

Right after the engagement Menshikov settled the young Tsar in his palace

on the Vasilieyvskiy island to protect him from unnecessary influence.

He assigned a teacher – Baron Andrei Ivanovitch Ostermann,

the Vice-Chancellor (i.e. Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs).

However, the Emperor’s lessons didn’t last for long.

Menshikov suddenly fell seriously ill.

While he was not looking after Peter,

he soon got close with a young rake Ivan Dolgorukov and abandoned his studies.

Menshikov had been sick for six weeks.

During that time, the Emperor fell under the influence

of the Dolgorukov’s family.

At instigation of his new friends

soon joined by his favorite teacher Ostermann Peter moved

from Menshikov’s palace to Petergof and cancelled his engagement

with Maria Manshikova.

Later a specially established investigation commission

accused Menshikov of embezzling, deprived him of all posts, titles, awards,

estates and property and sent together with his family into the exile

to the town of Berezov near Tobolsk.

Princes Dolgorukovs and cunning Ostermanntook control over the huge country.

Sovereign Peter Alexeyevitch was doing

what he liked best of all - hunting.

As opposed to his great-grandfather Alexei Mikhaylovitch

who loved falconry passionately, Peter hunted without any system.

It was not important for him how and what to pursue.

The main thing was to ride somewhere with loud shouts

in a company of hunters, friends and dogs,

and later celebrate hunting successes in a field marquee.

It would have been natural for his age but for constant drinking sprees.

Nobody cared about his health except for his sister Natalia.

She was the only person who truly loved the boy-Emperor

and was trying to break him out of the habit of drinking.

However, Natalia suffered from tuberculosis and soon she died.

With nobody to stop him, he drank equally with his guards.

Any women were always at his service.

The young Emperor was physically beyond his years and looked older.

Besides Peter II fell in love with his aunt Elizabeth, Peter’s I daughter.

However, nobody would allow Peter to marry Elizabeth.

First of all, the church categorically prohibited marriages

with such close relatives. Secondly, Prince Ivan Dolgorukov had already chosen

a bride for him – his sister Ekaterina.

To avoid the Emperor’s protests

he presented the boy with proofs that his beloved auntie Elisabeth

was in love with an officer from the Preobrazhenskiy Regiment.

Being a hot-headed teenager, the young Emperor felt betrayed.

He made a point of turning his attention to Princess Ekaterina Dolgorukova.

He accepted the rules of the other people’s game again.

While the court was absorbed by love affairs, the huge country lived

under its own inertia, almost without any control.

"The finances were in chaos; the army started to disintegrate, "

Russia’s international stance was plunging.

This is an extract from reports of the European ambassadors and spies

at the Russian court: “It makes no sense to conclude any allied agreements now”.

“The Tsar only thinks about entertainments and hunting, and the officials –

about how to destroy each other”.

“Everybody is living so carelessly,

that it is unclear how such a huge state can hold its own without any support”.

The huge administrative apparatus was working under its own inertia too.

There was no central government.

Even the Higher Secret Council in fact didn’t function.

The Higher Secret Council was established by Ekaterina I

to help her rule the Empire, or to rule it instead of her, to be more exact.

Officially, it was considered an advisory body by the monarch

but in fact it solved all the most important state issues.

Six nobles comprised the Higher Council in Peter’s II time:

Count Gavrila Golovkin, two Princes Golotsins – Dmitry and Mikhaylo,

two Princes Dolgorukovs – Vasiliy Vladimirovitch and Vasiliy Lukitch,

and Baron Andrei Ostermann.

A 14-year Peter had no idea about the dire state of affairs in his country.

Princes Dolgorukovs – the elder Alexei Grigoryevitch

and the younger Ivan Alexeyevitch – did everything they could

to keep him from thinking about it.

They had a clear aim:

to fully control the Emperor and use him to lead the country back

to the times before Peter’s innovations.

Peter had already agreed to stop the building of the fleet (why waste the money?),

transfer the capital from Petersburg to Moscow

(there are great places for hunting around Moscow!).

Only a few steps remained.

On November 19, 1728 Princess Ekaterina Dolgorukova was announced

the Emperor’s fiance. In just 11 days, the solemn engagement took place.

The dressmakers only just had time to sew the dress.

On entering the palace, the fiance’s luxury carriage caught on the low gates.

In the gapers’ and the guards’ presence a gilded decoration

of an imperial crown fell down from its roof into the dirt.

During six weeks before the wedding, the Princes organized constant entertainments

not to let the Emperor come to his senses.

On January 6, 13 days before the wedding

Peter went to the consecration of water ceremony at the Moscow River.

He went there standing at the footboard

of his fiance’s carriage like a loyal knight.

He spent four hours in the cold in a light jacket.

The next day the Emperor had fever.

First, it was considered to be a cold. However, it turned out

that the situation was much more serious: it was smallpox.

Natural or black smallpox (Variola vera) was a real scourge of Europe in the 18th century.

As opposed to cholera and plague,

it didn’t start as an epidemic, but existed all the time.

There was even a saying: “Only a few may avoid love and smallpox”.

The main purpose of the decorative make-up that was widely used

not only by women but by men too was masking of smallpox scars.

Every year over 80 mln people of Europe

caught smallpox, and every sixth patient died.

The life style of the teenager Emperor ruined his health completely.

Together with a serious cold and weakened immunity,

smallpox was progressing quickly.

In just one week, it became clear

that there was no hope for his recovery.

The Dolgorukovs were in despair: their plans were collapsing.

While the Emperor was dying in the Lefortov Palace

already decorated for his wedding, his friends the Dolgorukovs

were holding frantic meetings nearby thinking of a way to keep to the power.

They decided to make the Emperor sign a testament according to which

the throne would go to the Tsarina-fiance, the Great Duchess Ekaterina Dolgorukova.

If they had succeeded with that fraud,

the ruling dynasty of Russia would have changed.

The Dolgorukovs would replace the Romanovs.

However, the Emperor didn’t have time to sign the testament.

On January 18, on the eve of his wedding, he suddenly came to his senses,

said: “Get the sledges ready. I want to go to my sister”.

Then the agony started.

Peter II died at night of January 19.

The Higher Secret Council, the eight nobles who were solving

all the most important state issues turned down the Dolgorukovs’ fraud with indignation.

The Romanovs were the lawful kin on the Russian throne.

If their male line interrupted, they should turn to the female line.

The line of the succession to the throne consisted of two daughters of Peter I –

Anna Petrovna and Elizabeth Petrovna, as well as three daughters of Ivan V,

Peter’s brother and joint ruler who died young: Ekaterina Ioannovna,

Anna Ioannovna and Praskovya Ioannovna.

Anna Petrovna married the Duke of Holstein, gave birth to a boy

Karl-Peter-Ulrich in 1728 and died in a few days after giving birth.

Ekaterina Ioannovna was married to the Duke of Mecklenburg,

had a 12-year old daughter Elizabeth-Catherina-Kristina.