A big shout out to the people who follow me. Unfortunately I’ve had to leave Russia. It became impossible to receive any funds from the US. I am currently living in Batumi, Georgia.
This is my family in the living room of my apartment in Kimovsk, Russia. I am a disabled Vietnam veteran. Seventy six years of age. My son Aleksandr (left), and my granddaughter Dasha (center) look in on me. Here, I had hoped to live out my retirement years.
"She's only fourteen! What if she can't bear Napoleon a child in the first year of marriage?" Empress Maria Feodorovna asked. "Then he'll want to divorce her or have children at the cost of her honor."
Alexander listened thoughtfully to his mother. Napoleon had offered Poland if he were allowed to marry Grand Duchess Anna Pavlovna. But knowing the French Emperor, the Russian Tsar doubted anything would come of his proposal. Napoleon always turned situations to his advantage. If their relationship with him worsened even further, his sister could find herself in a very difficult situation.
"If you agree to the marriageu, you will ruin Anna."
"Calm down, Mother," Alexander replied softly. "Only you can decide her fate." I will submit to your decision.
Anna Pavlovna was born in January 1795. She was the eighth child of the Grand Ducal couple Maria Feodorovna and Pavel Petrovich. Empress Catherine, upon learning of the birth of her sixth granddaughter, sadly remarked:
"There are so many girls, we can't marry them all off!"
The Empress never learned of her ...
In the memory of posterity, Tsar Feodor Ivanovich, son of Ivan the Terrible, remains an almost comical figure—a gentle, pious, "simple-minded" monarch whose reign was merely a prologue to the rise of Boris Godunov. This image of a benevolent ruler incapable of power, who preferred the ringing of bells to matters of state, is firmly ingrained in history. However, the actual circumstances of his rise to power shatter this stereotype. They are full of drama, fierce political intrigue, and surprising paradoxes. The first days of the reign of the last Rurikovich on the Moscow throne were not a quiet transfer of power, but a veritable political thriller. Let's uncover some of the most unexpected facts hidden behind the façade of official history.
1. "Child of the Great War": The Tsar Whose Childhood Was Spent to the Roar of Cannons
The year of Feodor's birth, 1557, was perhaps the "last year of tranquility" for the Muscovite state. The country stood at the height of its power, enjoying the fruits of recent victories. The ...
Introduction: The Gentle Son of a Terrible Father
When we hear the name Ivan the Terrible, the image of a powerful, furious, and cruel autocrat springs to mind—a titan whose will redrew the map of the Russian state, and whose wrath terrified boyars and entire cities. Against this colossal figure, his son and heir, Tsar Feodor Ivanovich, seems almost a shadow. Contemporaries and subsequent generations of historians often described him as a man of "simple mind," otherworldly, immersed in prayer and church services, completely unsuited to the burden of power.
He was called the "monk tsar" and "the blessed one on the throne." His entire life seemed the complete opposite of his father's: silence instead of thunder, mercy instead of executions, humble piety instead of sovereign ambitions. But what if behind this mask of meekness lurked a character of unexpected depth and a steely will? What if, at key moments in his life, this "quiet" tsar displayed a firmness capable of crushing both the will of his formidable father and the plots of the most cunning...
Gradually, the narrative reached the time of Peter the Great. And I'm very glad about this – my favorite period in Russian history has begun. And today, having covered the circumstances of Peter the Great's childhood, we'll discuss the era when Russia nearly experienced a true revolution and a complete shift in the vectors and directions of national development.
Today we'll discuss the gripping and often dramatic story of how Tsarevna Sophia Alexeyevna attempted to become the country's sole ruler, at one point cleverly sidestepping two brothers, Ivan and Peter, on her path to the throne. Imagine the situation: 1682, the young Tsar Feodor III dies childless, leaving behind a complex inheritance – two young brothers (and pretenders to the throne), both from different mothers. And this is where the most interesting part begins – the events that almost led to a new Time of Troubles in our country.
Tsarevna Sophia - portrait by an unknown artist.
After a very difficult meeting, the Moscow nobility took the fate of the country into their own hands. And very soon, after ...
