2019. In 1775, the empress decreed a Statute for the Administration of the Provinces of the Russian Empire. [111] Orthodox Russians disliked the inclusion of Judaism, mainly for economic reasons. On the morning of 5 November 1796 . Nobles in each district elected a Marshal of the Nobility, who spoke on their behalf to the monarch on issues of concern to them, mainly economic ones. The Manifesto of 1763 begins with Catherine's title: We, Catherine the second, by the Grace of God, Empress and Autocrat of all the Russians at Moscow, Kiev, Vladimir, Novgorod, Tsarina of Kasan, Tsarina of Astrachan, Tsarina of Siberia, Lady of Pleskow and Grand Duchess of Smolensko, Duchess of Estonia and Livland, Carelial, Tver, Yugoria, Permia, Viatka and Bulgaria and others; Lady and Grand Duchess of Novgorod in the Netherland of Chernigov, Resan, Rostov, Yaroslav, Beloosrial, Udoria, Obdoria, Condinia, and Ruler of the entire North region and Lady of the Yurish, of the Cartalinian and Grusinian tsars and the Cabardinian land, of the Cherkessian and Gorsian princes and the lady of the manor and sovereign of many others. In these cases, it was necessary to replace this "fake" empress with the "true" empress, whoever she may be. A shrewd statesman, Panin dedicated much effort and millions of roubles to setting up a "Northern Accord" between Russia, Prussia, Poland and Sweden, to counter the power of the BourbonHabsburg League. Converted Jews could gain permission to enter the merchant class and farm as free peasants under Russian rule. On the night of 8 July (OS: 27 June 1762),[22] Catherine was given the news that one of her co-conspirators had been arrested by her estranged husband and that all they had been planning must take place at once. Paper notes were issued upon payment of similar sums in copper money, which were also refunded upon the presentation of those notes. Many Orthodox peasants felt threatened by the sudden change, and burned mosques as a sign of their displeasure. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. Her genius seemed to rest on her forehead, which was both high and wide. These differences led both parties to seek intimacy elsewhere, a fact that raised questions, both at the time and in the centuries since, about the paternity of their son, the future Paul I. Catherine herself suggested in her memoirs that Paul was the child of her first lover, Sergei Saltykov. So why then has the legacy of Russia's longest-ruling woman been stained with these rumours for over two centuries? A description of the empress's funeral is written in Madame Vige Le Brun's memoirs. Catherine The Great's Infamous Death Vigilius Eriksen/Grand Peterhof Palace Equestrian portrait of Catherine the Great in uniform of the Preobrazhensky Regiment, one of the oldest Imperial Russian guard units, circa 1762. On 28 June 1791, Catherine granted Daikokuya an audience at Tsarskoye Selo. Catherine did turn Russia into a global great power not only a European one but with quite a different reputation from what she initially had planned as an honest policy. Russian poets wrote about his virtues, the court praised him, foreign ambassadors fought for his favour, and his family moved into the palace. Catherine created the Orenburg Muslim Spiritual Assembly to help regulate Muslim-populated regions as well as regulate the instruction and ideals of mullahs. [23][24] On 17 July 1762eight days after the coup that amazed the outside world[25] and just six months after his accession to the thronePeter III died at Ropsha, possibly at the hands of Alexei Orlov (younger brother to Grigory Orlov, then a court favourite and a participant in the coup). In 1786, she assimilated the Islamic schools into the Russian public school system under government regulation. She levied additional taxes on the followers of Judaism; if a family converted to the Orthodox faith, that additional tax was lifted. Catherine and her new husband had a rocky marriage from the start. Legends abound about Catherine the Greatthe good kind and the bad kind. Catherine decided it promoted the dangerous poison of the French Revolution. As many of the democratic principles frightened her more moderate and experienced advisors, she refrained from immediately putting them into practice. For all her show of sensuality, Catherine was actually rather prudish, says Jaques. Further compounding these unpopular decisions were his attempted repudiation of his wife in favor of his mistress and his seizure of church lands under the guise of secularization. Whilst this one is also just an absurd rumour, it lies ever so slightly nearer the truth. A great dreamer, he was avid for territories to conquer and provinces to populate; an experienced diplomat with a knowledge of Russia that Catherine had not yet acquired and as audacious as Catherine was methodical, Potemkin was treated as an equal by the empress up to the time of his death in 1791. The most widely known story of Catherine the Great involves her death at age 67 in 1796. Russian economic development was well below the standards in western Europe. Because the Moscow Foundling Home was not established as a state-funded institution, it represented an opportunity to experiment with new educational theories. Along the way, she became a very passionate, knowledgeable proponent of painting, sculpture, books, architecture, opera, theater and literature. (Lord Byron's Don Juan, around the age of twenty-two, becomes her lover after the siege of Ismail (1790), in a fiction written only about twenty-five years after Catherine's death in 1796. It was unthinkable they could rule a nation, especially one successfully. Whereas the premium cable series traced the trajectory of Catherines rule from 1764 to her death, The Great centers on her 1762 coup and the sequence of events leading up to it. Paul ascended to the throne and was known as Emperor Paul I. Catherine's will was discovered in . When it became apparent that his plan could not succeed, Panin fell out of favour and Catherine had him replaced with Ivan Osterman (in office 17811797). The Russian troops set out from Kizlyar in April 1796 and stormed the key fortress of Derbent on 10 May. Poniatowski accepted the throne, and thereby put himself under Catherine's control. Death date: 0 January, 1975, Wednesday This memorial website was created in memory of Catherine Person, 49, born on October 2, 1925 and passed away on January 0, 1975. She transformed the clergy from a group that wielded great power over the Russian government and its people to a segregated community forced to depend on the state for compensation. She had the book burned and the author exiled to Siberia. For example, serfs could apply to be freed if they were under illegal ownership, and non-nobles were not allowed to own serfs. 1772-04-06 Catherine the Great Empress of Russia, ends tax on men with beards, enacted by Tsar . Catherineflanked by Orlov and her growing cadre of supportersarrived at the Winter Palace to make her official debut as Catherine II, sole ruler of Russia. This enormous collection ultimately formed the basis of the Hermitage Museum. While this was considered a controversial method at the time, she succeeded. Sergei Saltykov was used to make Peter jealous, and relations with Saltykov were platonic. He also placed great emphasis on the "proper and effectual education of the female sex"; two years prior, Catherine had commissioned Ivan Betskoy to draw up the General Programme for the Education of Young People of Both Sexes. Yet by the end of Catherine's reign, an estimated 62,000 pupils were being educated in some 549 state institutions. Catherine the Great died in 1796 at the age of 67 and was buried at the Peter and Paul Cathedral in Saint Petersburg. She was the second wife of Peter the Great. [94] The girls who attended the Smolny Institute, Smolyanki, were often accused of being ignorant of anything that went on in the world outside the walls of the Smolny buildings, within which they acquired a proficiency in French, music, and dancing, along with a complete awe of the monarch. Journal of Modern Russian History and Historiography, USA. 12. pp. [77] She especially liked the work of German comic writers such as Moritz August von Thmmel and Christoph Friedrich Nicolai. Several bank branches were afterwards established in other towns, called government towns. Catherine did initiate some changes to serfdom. The official cause of death was advertised as hemorrhoidal colican absurd diagnosis that soon became a popular euphemism for assassination, according to Montefiore. They often became trusted advisors who she then promoted into positions of authority. )This practice was not unusual by the court standards of the day . This reversal aroused the frustration and enmity of the powerful Zubovs and other officers who took part in the campaign: many of them would be among the conspirators who arranged Paul's murder five years later.[39]. Closer to home, her success, coupled with how she came to power, led to jealously and fear among her male objectors in the Russian court. A portrait of Catherine the Great by Fedor Rokotov, 1763. In 1769, a last major CrimeanNogai slave raid, which ravaged the Russian held territories in Ukraine, saw the capture of up to 20,000 slaves. Under her long reign, inspired by the ideas of the Enlightenment, Russia experienced a renaissance of culture and sciences, which led to the founding of many new cities, universities, and theatres; along with large-scale immigration from the rest of Europe and the recognition of Russia as one of the great powers of Europe. The death of Catherine shocks him, and as the intentions of Heathcliff never mean to hurt that much her to cause her dead. In 1783, storms drove a Japanese sea captain, Daikokuya Kday, ashore in the Aleutian Islands, at that time Russian territory. Perhaps the most readily recognizable anecdote related to Catherine centers on a horse. Before her death she recognized Peter II, the grandson of Peter I and Eudoxia, as her successor. Catherine never even mentioned her daughter's death in her memoirs. He died at the age of 52 in 1791. Prussia (through the agency of Prince Henry), Russia (under Catherine), and Austria (under Maria Theresa) began preparing the ground for the partitions of Poland. [7] For the smaller German princely families, an advantageous marriage was one of the best means of advancing their interests, and the young Sophie was groomed throughout her childhood to be the wife of some powerful ruler in order to improve the position of the reigning house of Anhalt. This was another attempt to organise and passively control the outer fringes of her country. Historically, when the serfs faced problems they could not solve on their own (such as abusive masters), they often appealed to the autocrat, and continued doing so during Catherine's reign, but she signed legislation prohibiting it. Terms of Use [133] The court physician diagnosed a stroke[133][134] and despite attempts to revive her, she fell into a coma. To put it bluntly, Catherine was a usurper. Catherine's eldest sonand heirmay have been illegitimate. If Catherine the Great had one overarching goal as empress, it was, in her words, to "drag Russia out of its medieval stupor and into the modern world". She succeeded her husband as empress regnant, following the precedent established when Catherine I succeeded her husband Peter the Great in 1725. [1] The Manifesto on Freedom of the Nobility, issued during the short reign of Peter III and confirmed by Catherine, freed Russian nobles from compulsory military or state service. Her rise to power was supported by her mother Joanna's wealthy relatives, who were both nobles and royal relations. They introduced numerous innovations regarding wheat production and flour milling, tobacco culture, sheep raising, and small-scale manufacturing. Assisted by highly successful generals such as Alexander Suvorov and Pyotr Rumyantsev, and admirals such as Samuel Greig and Fyodor Ushakov, she governed at a time when the Russian Empire was expanding rapidly by conquest and diplomacy. She fell into a coma and died the next day whilst lying in her bed. In 1767, Catherine decreed that after seven years in one rank, civil servants automatically would be promoted regardless of office or merit. Cookie Settings, Photo illustration by Meilan Solly / Photos via Hulu and Getty Images, Photo by Fine Art Images / Heritage Images / Getty Images, Ad Meskens via Wikimedia Commons under CC BY-SA 4.0, Godot13 via Wikimedia Commons under CC BY-SA 3.0. She made use of the social theory ideas of German cameralism and French physiocracy, as well as Russian precedents and experiments such as foundling homes. Despite his objections, on 28 June 1744, the Russian Orthodox Church received Princess Sophie as a member with the new name Catherine (Yekaterina or Ekaterina) and the (artificial) patronymic (Alekseyevna, daughter of Aleksey), so that she was in all respects the namesake of Catherine I, the mother of Elizabeth and the grandmother of Peter III. [88] Through him, she collected information from Russia and other countries about educational institutions. But the actual story of the monarchs death is far simpler: On November 16, 1796, the 67-year-old empress suffered a stroke and fell into a coma. Finally, it was the Annals by Tacitus that caused what she called a "revolution" in her teenage mind as Tacitus was the first intellectual she read who understood power politics as they are, not as they should be. She disliked his pale complexion and his fondness for alcohol at such a young age. Some claimed Catherine failed to supply enough money to support her educational program. In addition to collecting art, Catherine commissioned an array of new cultural projects, including an imposing bronze monument to Peter the Great, Russias first state library, exact replicas of Raphaels Vatican City loggias and palatial neoclassical buildings constructed across St. Petersburg. Madame Vige Le Brun vividly describes the empress in her memoirs:[85], the sight of this famous woman so impressed me that I found it impossible to think of anything: I could only stare at her. Catherine the Great was Russia's longest-serving female leader. Her father, Christian August, Prince of Anhalt-Zerbst, belonged to the ruling German family of Anhalt. She credited her survival to frequent bloodletting; in a single day, she had four phlebotomies. It was fighting and winning wars, modernising and revitalising. Did you know that cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death for women, causing 1 in 3 deaths every year? ", [Kazimir Valishevsky. [82], During Catherine's reign, Russians imported and studied the classical and European influences that inspired the Russian Enlightenment. [CDATA[// >