Neither before Peter the Great nor after him did the Russian state know the ruler who had radically changed the country like him. What is the transformation of the dense, wild Muscovy, trampled on all sides by the more developed kingdoms of that time, into a strong power with its own army and navy? Russia's access to the sea, and not just one, became the first major defeat in the history of relations with our country for the monarch of Europe.
Great in everything
Undoubtedly, the transformation of a huge northern country rich in resources, without its own trade routes and doomed to sell goods on the terms of foreign merchants, into a formidable, militant power was not longed in Europe. Western rulers were more comfortable with the dense Muscovy, who could not defend her rights. They tried with all their might to "drive her back into the forests and swamps", as they then expressed themselves abroad. And Peter the Great, on the contrary, longed to lead his people out of poverty and dirt into the civilized world. But the emperor had to fight not only with the stubborn rulers of Europe, but also with his own subjects, who were satisfied with their settled lazy life, and the unknown civilization of mossy boyars was not at all interested. But Peter's wisdom and steadfastness turned the tide of events in Russia.
Great ruler, converter, reformer, helmsman. Throughout his reign and centuries after the death of the first Russian emperor, many epithets called him. But initially the invariable "Great" was attributed to them. The reign of Peter the Great as if divided the history of our state into segments “before” and “after”. Particularly significant was the last decade of his reign - from 1715 to 1725. Educational institutions were established, which before Peter simply did not exist in the country, books were printed, not only manufactories and factories were built - numerous fortresses and entire cities were erected. Thanks to the revolutionary ideas of the tsar, today we have the good fortune of being in a beautiful city on the Neva, named after him. It is impossible to list in several chapters everything that was created by Peter in his reign. Volumes of historical works are devoted to this period.
Until the sole reign
Where did the boy brought up by illiterate clerks Nikita Zotov and Athanasius Nesterov find such a lively and perspicacious mind, the desire to exalt not himself, but the whole people entrusted to him, can only guess. But the entire biography of Peter the Great confirms that his birth was a salvation for Russia. The most famous offspring of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, the future reformer was born on the night of May 30, 1672, presumably in the village of Kolomenskoye. Although some historians call the Kremlin’s Terem Palace his birthplace, while others call the village of Izmailovo.
Peter's mother was Alexey's second wife, Natalya Kirillovna Naryshkina. The newborn prince was the 14th child of his father. But all his older brothers and sisters are from the first wife of the ruler, and only he is from the second. The boy was brought up in the Kremlin chambers until the age of four, until the death of Alexei Mikhailovich. During the reign of Peter’s half-brother, Fyodor Mikhailovich, who entered the throne, Natalya Kirillovna was sent with her son to the village of Preobrazhenskoye, where the future Tsar Peter the First gathered his army years later.
Sick Fedor, sincerely glad for his younger brother, died, having managed to reign only six years. Ten-year-old Peter became his successor. But the Miloslavskys - relatives of the first wife of Alexei Mikhailovich - insisted on the proclamation of him as co-ruler of the frail and meek, but at the same time completely harmless Ivan - the younger uterine brother of Fedor. The guardian over them was proclaimed sister, Princess Sophia. The struggle for power between her and Peter lasted for many years until he became so strong that he was forced to win his right to the throne by force. The seven-year period of Sophia’s reign was remembered by several failed trips to the Crimea and unsuccessful attempts to win the archers to their side in order to prevent the infamous younger, and also half-brother, from ascending the throne.
Rehearsal on amusing
Most of Peter's childhood and youth passed in Preobrazhensky. Moving away from the real reign by virtue of age, he nevertheless prepared for it using all available methods. Feeling a true passion for the military sciences, he insisted that boys of his age be brought to him from all the surrounding villages for a peculiar lively game of "soldiers".
For the fun of the young king, wooden sabers, rifles, and even guns were made on which he honed his skills. Dressed in caftans of foreign troops, since in the time of Peter the Great it was almost impossible to get others, and he honored foreign military science above the domestic one, amusing regiments, a few years later spent in recreational battles, strengthened and trained, began to pose a very real threat to the regular army . Especially when Peter ordered to pour real guns for him and deliver other firearms and stabbing weapons to his residence.
By his 14 years here, on the banks of the Yauza River, he had a whole amusing town with its own regiments - Preobrazhensky and Semenovsky. About wooden weapons in this fortress, called Presburg, no longer remembered, practicing on the present. The first teacher of the wisdom of military science in those years was for Peter the firearm master Fyodor Sommer. But he received more complete knowledge, including arithmetic, from the Dutchman Timmerman. He told the young king about the sea vessels, merchant and military, after one day they together found a leaky English boat in an abandoned barn. This shuttle, repaired and launched, became the king's first floating ship. Descendants, recalling Peter the Great, attribute the stories with the bot found to be of great importance. Say, it was from him that the victorious Russian fleet subsequently began.
To be a sea power!
Of course, the famous slogan of Peter sounds somewhat different, but does not change the essence of this. Once falling in love with naval warfare, he never cheated on him. All of his most significant victories became possible only thanks to a strong fleet. The first rowing ships of the Russian flotilla began to be built in the autumn of 1695 near Voronezh. And by May 1696, the 40,000th army, supported from the sea by several dozen different ships, led by the "Apostle Peter", besieged Azov - the stronghold of the Ottoman Empire on the Black Sea. The fortress, realizing that it could not withstand the Russian military superiority, surrendered without a fight. So Peter the Great laid the foundation for his subsequent great victories. It took him less than a year to translate the idea into reality and build an operational fleet. But these were not the ships he dreamed about.
For the construction of real warships, the king did not have enough money or specialists in sufficient numbers. The first Russian fleet was created under the leadership of foreign engineers. Having captured Azov, Peter only opened a loophole for himself to the Black Sea, the Kerch Strait - a strategically important navigable artery - still remained with the Ottomans. It was too early to fight Turkey further, strengthening its superiority at sea, and there was nothing to do with it.
At the beginning of his independent reign, Peter the Great met more resistance than help from his subjects. Boyars, merchants and monasteries did not want to share their good with the king, and the construction of the flotilla fell directly on their shoulders. The king literally had to approve a new affair from under a stick.
But the more intensively he imposed construction on his subjects, the more acute was the problem of the shortage of shipbuilders. You could find them only in Europe. In March 1697, Peter sent abroad the sons of the most noble Russian noblemen to study maritime affairs, where he himself went incognito under the name of the officer of the Preobrazhensky regiment Peter Mikhailov.
Great embassy
A few years before the king’s departure to Europe, the first reform of Peter the Great was carried out in the country - in 1694 the weight of silver cents was reduced by a few grams. The released precious metal provided much-needed savings for minting coins aimed at the war with Sweden. But more significant amounts were needed, moreover, the Turks propped up from the south. To combat them, it was necessary to enlist the support of allies abroad. Peter with his voyage to the West pursued several goals at once: to learn ship mastery and get hold of his own specialists, as well as to find like-minded people in the confrontation with the Ottoman Empire.
We traveled thoroughly, for a long time, planning to visit all the leading capitals of Europe. The embassy consisted of three hundred people, 35 of whom traveled directly for training crafts necessary for shipbuilding.
Peter himself, among other things, longed to personally look at the Western "polites", about which he had heard so much from his chief adviser Franz Lefort. Life, culture, social order - Peter absorbed them in Courland, Austria, England, Holland. Luxembourg particularly struck him. Peter brought potatoes and tulip bulbs to Russia from Holland. For a year and a half, as part of the embassy, the Russian tsar visited the English parliament, Oxford University, the Mint in London, and the Greenwich Observatory. He especially appreciated his acquaintance with Isaac Newton. Seen and heard in Europe in many respects influenced the decrees of Peter the Great following the return to Russia . Since August 1698, they literally fell on the heads of his subjects.
Royal import substitution
Peter could not fully realize his plan. Not having time to agree with the monarchs of Europe on the creation of a coalition against Turkey, the tsar was forced to return to Russia - in Moscow the streltsy revolt kindled by Sofia flared up. Suppressed him severely - torture and executions.
Eliminating the unwanted, the king took up the transformation of the state. The reforms of Peter the Great in those years were aimed at increasing the competitiveness of Russia in all areas: trade, military, and cultural. In addition to permission to sell tobacco, introduced in 1697, and a decree to shave beards, perceived by contemporaries as abuse, everywhere in the country began to carry out recruitment for military service.
Streltsy regiments were disbanded, and not only Russians, but also foreigners were recruited into soldiers (recruits). Engineering, navigation, and medical schools were established and developed. Peter also attached great importance to the exact sciences: mathematics, physics, geometry. Specialists needed their own, not foreign, but with knowledge not lower.
In addition to raw products, there was practically nothing to trade with foreign merchants: neither their metal, nor fabrics, nor paper - everything was bought abroad for a lot of money. The first reform of Peter the Great, aimed at developing its own industry, consisted of a ban on the export of several types of raw materials from the country, for example flax. Cloth and other fabrics were to be produced in their own state. The Tsar’s wardrobe was made exclusively of Russian fabrics. Felt hats, stockings, lace, sailing canvas - soon everything appeared.
True, they were built and developed slowly and practically without tangible income, manufactories and factories. Only mines turned out to be profitable. In the vicinity of Moscow, factories were built where they brought the raw materials extracted in Siberia, and guns, rifles, and pistols were cast here. But to develop mining far from the mountains was unreasonable. Ironworks were set up in Tobolsk and Verkhotur. Silver mines and coal mines opened. Manufacturing enterprises opened throughout the country. By 1719, 36 foundries were operating in only one Kazan province, three less than in Moscow itself. And in Siberia, the glory of Russia was forged by Demidov.
City of Petra
The protracted Northern War with Sweden demanded the strengthening of its position on the originally conquered Russian lands. In 1703, the first stone of the fortress was laid on the banks of the Neva, which later became the capital city of the Russian state. Briefly he was called Peter, although the full name given to him in honor of the Apostle Peter was different - St. Petersburg. The king in the construction of the city took a direct part. It is to this day that the most famous monument to Peter the Great, the Bronze Horseman, stands.
Although by the time the city was practically erected, the land beneath it was still considered Swedish. To prove in practice to whom the property belongs, to emphasize that there is no longer any old Muscovy and that the country is developing according to European standards, the tsar ordered all important state institutions to be transferred here after the city was completed. In 1712, St. Petersburg was proclaimed the capital of the Russian Empire.
Peter retained his status a little more than a century. He personified all that is new, modern and advanced that the king instilled in his people. The pro-European western city became a counterweight to the White Stone, considered a relic of the past. Intelligent, cultural capital of Russia - such was seen by Peter the Great. To this day, St. Petersburg is perceived by the descendants no differently than during the years of its first prosperity. They say about him that even the homeless here behave like noble lords.
Wives and lovers
There were few women in Peter's life, and he valued only one of them so much that he listened to her opinion when making important political decisions - his second wife, Catherine. With the first, Evdokia Lopukhina, he was married at the behest of Natalya Kirillovna, who hoped to stabilize her son by early marriage, since the tsar was only 17 years old.
But nepotism did not affect his desire to act in the interests of the state, create an army, build a fleet. He disappeared for months at shipyards, military exercises. Even the birth of a son a year after marriage did not stabilize Peter the Great. In addition, he did not feel any special feelings for his wife, except for duty, since for many years his lover was a German Anna Mons.
Peter met Catherine, nee Marta Skavronskaya, in 1703 during the Northern War. The 19-year-old widow of a Swedish dragoon was captured as a military booty and was in the wagon train of Alexander Menshikov, the king’s faithful ally for many years.
Despite the fact that Alex herself liked Marta himself, he meekly gave it to Peter. She alone had a beneficial effect on the king, she could calm, calm down. After some events in the early years of the reign, during the confrontation with Sophia, Peter's seizures began in moments of great excitement, similar to apoplexy, but in a lighter form. In addition, he very quickly, almost instantly, was furious. Only Marta could get Peter out of a state of extreme psychosis - the tsar’s wife, lawful since 1712, Ekaterina Alekseevna. An interesting fact: during the adoption of Orthodoxy, the patronymic of the newly-made Christian was given to the son of Peter - Alexei, who became the godfather of the beloved king.
So different descendants
In total, Peter the Great had three children from Evdokia Lopukhina and eight from Catherine. But only one daughter - the illegitimate Elizabeth - reigned, although she was not considered a pretender, since after the death of Peter he still had male heirs. The first-born Alexei fled from Russia in 1716, hiding for some time in Austria with Emperor Karl, but two years later he was extradited to his father. An investigation was instituted over the heir. There are documents confirming that he was tortured. Alex was found guilty of a conspiracy against his father, but while awaiting execution he unexpectedly died in a casemate. The other two children of the king from Evdokia, the sons Alexander and Paul, died shortly after birth.
Death in infancy is a fairly common occurrence of the time. So, of the eight children born from Catherine, only Elizabeth, the Russian Empress, survived to a very old (as it was thought) old age. Daughter Anna died at the age of 20, having managed to be married and have two children. Just her son Peter under Elizabeth was considered the heir to the throne, was married to the German princess Fick, later Catherine the Great. The remaining six - four girls and two boys - did not please their parents for long. But unlike Alexei, Anna and Elizabeth loved and respected their father. The latter, ascending the throne, in everything wanted to be like him.
Unprecedented Transformations
The first great reformer of Russia is Peter the Great. The history of his reign is replete with many decrees, published laws that affect all aspects of human life and the political system. After the inglorious completion of the case of Tsarevich Alexei, Peter adopted a new provision on succession, according to which the first applicant could be anyone whom the ruler appoints at his discretion. Similar in Russia did not happen before. However, after 75 years, Emperor Paul the First canceled this decree.
The purposeful line of Peter, affirming the absolute, sole royal authority, led to the elimination of the Boyar Duma in 1704 and the creation of the Governing Senate in 1711, dealing with both administrative and judicial matters. In the early 20s of the XVIII century, he weakened the power of the church, establishing the Holy Synod - the spiritual collegium - and subordinating it to the state.
Reforms of local and central self-government, monetary, military, tax, cultural - Peter changed almost everything. One of the latest innovations is the ranking card, adopted three years before death. The death of the king was so incredible that until recently, few believed in it. And his associates and associates were extremely confused: what to do next? The will of Peter the Great never existed, he did not have time to leave it, because he died suddenly, presumably from pneumonia, at dawn on January 28 (February 8), 1725. He also did not appoint a successor. Therefore, the king’s legal wife was erected on the throne, crowned in 1722 by Catherine the First, the former widow of the Swedish dragoon Marta Skavronska.