Her face was left uncovered, and her fair hand rested on the bed. . [11] Despite Joanna's interference, Empress Elizabeth took a strong liking to Sophie, and Sophie and Peter eventually married in 1745. At the time, it was widely assumed that Catherine was behind this, but historians aren't so sure."The circumstances and cause of death, and the intentions and degree of responsibility of those . While the nobility provided appreciable amounts of money for these institutions, they preferred to send their own children to private, prestigious institutions. The most widely known story of Catherine the Great involves her death at age 67 in 1796. Dogs Rhetorical Exercise In Catharine Sedgwick's, Dogs, she uses the rhetorical appeal, logos, to help make it clear to the reader that animal cruelty is wrong, and to argue that goodness trumps genius. Peter and Catherine had both been involved in a 1749 Russian military plot to crown Peter (together with Catherine) in Elizabeth's stead. Her son Pavel later was inoculated as well. Spread fertilizer over the soil, all the way to the edges of the canopy. Children of serfs were born into serfdom and worked the same land their parents had. I am very fond of the arts, especially painting. Subsequently, in 1792, the Russian government dispatched a trade mission to Japan, led by Adam Laxman. After Peter took a mistress, Catherine became involved with other prominent court figures. They refused to comply, and in 1764, she deported over 20,000 Old Believers to Siberia on the grounds of their faith. On 16 November 1796, Catherine woke up and followed her usual routine. Converted Jews could gain permission to enter the merchant class and farm as free peasants under Russian rule. Although the government knew that Judaism existed, Catherine and her advisers had no real definition of what a Jew is because the term meant many things during her reign. Catherine's son Paul had started gaining support; both of these trends threatened her power. At first, the institute only admitted young girls of the noble elite, but eventually it began to admit girls of the petit-bourgeoisie as well. [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. | Peter . Catherines contributions to Russias cultural landscape were far more successful than her failed socioeconomic reforms. She was given the last rites and died the following evening around 9:45. Instead she pioneered for Russia the role that Britain later played through most of the 19th and early 20th centuries as an international mediator in disputes that could, or did, lead to war. She consulted British education pioneers, particularly the Rev. Awaking from her delirium, however, Sophie said, "I don't want any Lutheran; I want my Orthodox father [clergyman]". A portrait of Catherine the Great by Fedor Rokotov, 1763. 12. pp. But while the empress did have her fair share of lovers12 to be exactshe was not the sexual deviant of popular lore. In 1775, the empress decreed a Statute for the Administration of the Provinces of the Russian Empire. As many of the democratic principles frightened her more moderate and experienced advisors, she refrained from immediately putting them into practice. Historical accounts portray Joanna as a cold, abusive woman who loved gossip and court intrigues. Due to various rumours of Catherine's promiscuity, Peter was led to believe he was not the child's biological father and is known to have proclaimed, "Go to the devil!" She acted as mediator in the War of the Bavarian Succession (17781779) between the German states of Prussia and Austria. Catherine the Great died in 1796 at the age of 67 and was buried at the Peter and Paul Cathedral in Saint Petersburg. In 1780, Emperor Joseph II, the son of Holy Roman Empress Maria Theresa, toyed with the idea of determining whether or not to enter an alliance with Russia, and asked to meet Catherine. She nationalised all of the church lands to help pay for her wars, largely emptied the monasteries, and forced most of the remaining clergymen to survive as farmers or from fees for baptisms and other services. CATHERINE THE GREAT was Russia's longest ruling female leader after she succeeded her husband in the 18th century. [121][122] The percentage of state money spent on the court increased from 10% in 1767 to 11% in 1781 to 14% in 1795. Catherine's decree also denied Jews the rights of an Orthodox or naturalised citizen of Russia. However, the Legislative Commission of 1767 offered several seats to people professing the Islamic faith. Catherine perceived that the Qianlong Emperor was an unpleasant and arrogant neighbour, once saying: "I shall not die until I have ejected the Turks from Europe, suppressed the pride of China and established trade with India". If all went as planned, according to Massie, the proposed legal code would raise the levels of government administration, of justice, and of tolerance within her empire. But these changes failed to materialize, and Catherines suggestions remained just that. In 1772, Catherine wrote to Potemkin. Ruth P. Dawson, "Perilous News and Hasty Biography: Representations of Catherine II Immediately after her Seizure of the Throne." [31], Catherine agreed to a commercial treaty with Great Britain in 1766, but stopped short of a full military alliance. Catherine tried to keep the Jews away from certain economic spheres, even under the guise of equality; in 1790, she banned Jewish citizens from Moscow's middle class.[112]. While the majority of serfs were farmers bound to the land, a noble could have his serfs sent away to learn a trade or be educated at a school as well as employ them at businesses that paid wages. And if you can't find enough dirt to your satisfaction, make stuff up. Catherine's main interests were in education and culture. 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. It's unclear if the murder was ordered by Catherine the Great, or carried out without her consent. They saw a woman who slept her way to the top, a woman who was not meant to rule but stole the throne from her husband. Russians continue to admire Catherine, the German, the usurper and profligate, and regard her as a source of national pride. Ruler of Russia from 1762 to 1796, Catherine championed Enlightenment ideals, expanded her empires borders, spearheaded judicial and administrative reforms, dabbled in vaccination, curated a vast art collection that formed the foundation of one of the worlds greatest museums, exchanged correspondence with such philosophers as Voltaire and Dennis Diderot, penned operas and childrens fairy tales, founded the countrys first state-funded school for women, drafted her own legal code, and promoted a national system of education. [91] This work emphasised the fostering of the creation of a 'new kind of people' raised in isolation from the damaging influence of a backward Russian environment. After holding more than 200 sittings, the so-called Commission dissolved without getting beyond the realm of theory. 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. Catherine was eventually able to put down the uprising, but the carnage exacted on both sides was substantial. Rumour and degrading slander became the weapon by which they would take jabs at her legacy. [14][15] Catherine nonetheless left the final version of her memoirs to Paul I in which she explained why Paul had been Peter's son. A key principle was responsibilities defined by function. Catherine supported Poniatowski as a candidate to become the next king. However, usually, if the serfs did not like the policies of the empress, they saw the nobles as corrupt and evil, preventing the people of Russia from communicating with the well-intentioned empress and misinterpreting her decrees. Writing in The Romanovs, Montefiore characterizes Catherine as an obsessional serial monogamist who adored sharing card games in her cozy apartments and discussing her literary and artistic interests with her beloved. Many sordid tales of her sexuality can, in fact, be attributed to detractors who hoped to weaken her hold on power. [92] The Establishment of the Moscow Foundling Home (Moscow Orphanage) was the first attempt at achieving that goal. Cause of Death: Stroke. By building new settlements with mosques placed in them, Catherine attempted to ground many of the nomadic people who wandered through southern Russia. One of her lovers, Pyotr Zavadovsky, received 50,000 roubles, a pension of 5,000 roubles, and 4,000 peasants in Ukraine after she dismissed him in 1777. Although she mastered the language, she retained an accent. From there, they governed the duchy (which occupied less than a third of the current German state of Schleswig-Holstein, even including that part of Schleswig occupied by Denmark) to obtain experience to govern Russia. 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. Catherine then left with the Ismailovsky Regiment to go to the Semenovsky Barracks, where the clergy was waiting to ordain her as the sole occupant of the Russian throne. The most famous of these rumors is that she died after having sex with her horse. With the support of Great Britain, Russia colonised the territories of New Russia along the coasts of the Black and Azov Seas. [111] Orthodox Russians disliked the inclusion of Judaism, mainly for economic reasons. 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. Meilan Solly is Smithsonian magazine's associate digital editor, history. She was especially impressed with his argument that people do not act for their professed idealistic reasons, and instead she learned to look for the "hidden and interested motives". She soon became popular with several powerful political groups that opposed her husband. Peter also intervened in a dispute between his Duchy of Holstein and Denmark over the province of Schleswig (see Count Johann Hartwig Ernst von Bernstorff). Uniting Cossacks, peasants, escaped serfs and other discontented tribal groups and malcontents, Pugachev produced a storm of violence that swept across the steppes, writes Massie. And yet it was important to me that there were tent poles of things that were true, [like] her being a kid who didn't speak the language, marrying the wrong man and responding to that by deciding to change the country.. She sent the Russian army into Poland to avoid possible disputes. But when he arrived at his palace and found it abandoned, he realized what had occurred. She believed in the . Cartoons drawn by foreign press perpetuated them, consistently degrading Catherine and exaggerating her apparent promiscuity. [139][140] According to lisabeth Vige Le Brun: "The empress's body lay in state for six weeks in a large and magnificently decorated room in the castle, which was kept lit day and night. Posterity will never forgive me., Contrary to Catherines dire prediction, Peters death, while casting a pall over her rule, did not completely overshadow her legacy. Teplov, T. von Klingstedt, F.G. Dilthey, and the historian G. Muller. The future Peter III was born Karl Peter Ulrich in 1728, in Kiel, Germany. Her father, Christian August, Prince of Anhalt-Zerbst, belonged to the ruling German family of Anhalt. [44] Another source of tension was the wave of Dzungar Mongol fugitives from the Chinese state who took refuge with the Russians. The belief at the time was that women were inferior to men, whose role was to be subordinate to their husbands. [98] One system that particularly stood out was produced by a mathematician, Franz Aepinus. Catherine's undated will, discovered in early 1792 among her papers by her secretary Alexander Vasilievich Khrapovitsky, gave specific instructions should she die: "Lay out my corpse dressed in white, with a golden crown on my head, and on it inscribe my Christian name. The bloodless shift in power was so easily accomplished that Frederick the Great of Prussia later observed, [Peter] allowed himself to be dethroned like a child being sent to bed.. In reality, Catherine the Great died of a stroke and she was discovered collapsed on the floor in her washroom. [citation needed] Catherine chose to assimilate Islam into the state rather than eliminate it when public outcry became too disruptive. After this, Catherine carried on sexual liaisons over the years with many men, including Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski, Grigory Grigoryevich Orlov (17341783), Alexander Vasilchikov, Grigory Potemkin, Ivan Rimsky-Korsakov, and others. They indeed helped modernise the sector that totally dominated the Russian economy. They submitted recommendations for the establishment of a general system of education for all Russian orthodox subjects from the age of 5 to 18, excluding serfs. This spurred Russian interest in opening trade with Japan to the south for supplies and food. By 1786, Catherine excluded all religion and clerical studies programs from lay education. All of this was true before Catherine's reign, and this is the system she inherited. This war was another catastrophe for the Ottomans, ending with the Treaty of Jassy (1792), which legitimised the Russian claim to the Crimea and granted the Yedisan region to Russia. [113] This re-established the separate identity that Judaism maintained in Russia throughout the Jewish Haskalah. The cause of death was confirmed by autopsy. Grigory Orlov, the grandson of a rebel in the Streltsy Uprising (1698) against Peter the Great, distinguished himself in the Battle of Zorndorf (25 August 1758), receiving three wounds. Catherine was worried that Potemkin's poor health would delay his important work in colonising and developing the south as he had planned. Catherine, for her part, claimed in her memoirs that all his actions bordered on insanity. By claiming the throne, she wrote, she had saved Russia from the disaster that all this Princes moral and physical faculties promised.. Legend has it Catherine was intimately involved with one of her prized stallions, with who she often spent a great deal of unsupervised time with. [9] It was during this period that she first read Voltaire and the other philosophes of the French Enlightenment. As a result of this plot, Elizabeth likely wanted to leave both Catherine and her accomplice Peter without any rights to the Russian throne. The statute sought to efficiently govern Russia by increasing population and dividing the country into provinces and districts. Born without a drop of Russian blood inside her veins, the German-born Sophie Friederike Auguste died as Catherine the Great of Russia, whose successful 34-year reign became known as the Golden Age of Russia. In 1772, Catherine's close friends informed her of Orlov's affairs with other women, and she dismissed him. The plan was another attempt to force nomadic people to settle. In 1768, she formally became the protector of political rights of dissidents and peasants of the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth, which provoked an anti-Russian uprising in Poland, the Confederation of Bar (17681772), supported by France. Catherine saw Orlov as very useful, and he became instrumental in the 28 June 1762 coup d'tat against her husband, but she preferred to remain the dowager empress of Russia rather than marrying anyone. Construction of many mansions of the nobility, in the classical style endorsed by the empress, changed the face of the country. However, military conscription and the economy continued to depend on serfdom, and the increasing demands of the state and of private landowners intensified the exploitation of serf labour. [103], Catherine took many different approaches to Islam during her reign. Always in search of romantic intimacy, she once admitted, The trouble is that my heart is loath to remain even one hour without love.. [89] In 1764, she sent for Dumaresq to come to Russia and then appointed him to the educational commission. Following the war and the defeat of Pugachev, Catherine laid the obligation to establish schools at the guberniya a provincial subdivision of the Russian empire ruled by a governor on the Boards of Social Welfare set up with the participation of elected representatives from the three free estates.[97]. Yekaterina Alexeevna or Catherine II, also known as Catherine the Great (Russian: II , Yekaterina II Velikaya; 2 May 1729 - 17 November 1796), was the most renowned and the longest-ruling female leader of Russia, reigning from 9 July 1762 until her death in 1796 at the age of 67. Shuvalov under Elizabeth and under Peter III. She was a patron of the . Peter was her second cousin. In 1777, the empress described to Voltaire her legal innovations within a backward Russia as progressing "little by little". She fell into a coma and died the next day whilst lying in her bed. "The circumstances and cause of death, and the intentions and degree of responsibility of those involved can never be known," wrote Robert K. Massie in his seminal biography, Catherine the Great . [135], Later, several rumours circulated regarding the cause and manner of her death. It was charged with admitting destitute and extramarital children to educate them in any way the state deemed fit. [30], Catherine's foreign minister, Nikita Panin (in office 17631781), exercised considerable influence from the beginning of her reign. "Despot" is not derogatory in this context. Empress Elizabeth knew the family well and had intended to marry Princess Joanna's brother Charles Augustus (Karl August von Holstein); however, he died of smallpox in 1727 before the wedding could take place. Her enemies, however, saw things differently. Russian local authorities helped his party, and the Russian government decided to use him as a trade envoy. In 1757, Poniatowski served in the British Army during the Seven Years' War, thus severing close relationships with Catherine. But Russia's Baltic Fleet checked the Royal Swedish navy in the tied Battle of Hogland (July 1788), and the Swedish army failed to advance. Catherine de' Medici, also called Catherine de Mdicis, Italian Caterina de' Medici, (born April 13, 1519, Florence [Italy]died January 5, 1589, Blois, France), queen consort of Henry II of France (reigned 1547-59) and subsequently regent of France (1560-74), who was one of the most influential personalities of the Catholic-Huguenot wars. [27] Her coronation marks the creation of one of the main treasures of the Romanov dynasty, the Imperial Crown of Russia, designed by Swiss-French court diamond jeweller Jrmie Pauzi. In July 1762, barely six months after becoming emperor, Peter lingered in Oranienbaum with his Holstein-born courtiers and relatives, while his wife lived in another palace nearby. 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. It was unthinkable they could rule a nation, especially one successfully. Catherine I died two years after Peter I, on 17 May 1727 at age 43, in St. Petersburg, where she was buried at St. Peter and St. Paul Fortress.