Peter the Great and his paradise. About the peculiarities of the pathography of Peter I and his great interest in anatomy, which grew into mania Alexey Mikhailovich. Polish engraving. XVII century

Man playing

There is probably no figure in world historiography about whom as much has been written as about Peter I. And despite this, his personality still remains a mystery: this man was too bright and controversial. He radically changed the life and customs of the Russian court, reformed the army, conquered new lands - and at the same time so undermined the country's economy that most of the territorial acquisitions subsequently had to be abandoned. He proclaimed himself emperor, but killed his own son, jeopardizing the continuation of the dynasty. He founded Russia's first museums and libraries, and personally participated in torture and executions. He organized gallant assemblies and blasphemous “all-joking councils.” Almost all of his numerous biographers were surprised how two such different natures could coexist in one person.

Perhaps the answer lies in the fact that Peter tried to turn his life into a game and was most afraid of clashes with reality, because it did not promise him anything good.

As magnificent and perfect as Peter was in his games, he became just as vile and disgusting when confronted with reality. Starting with amusing campaigns and flotillas, he gradually expanded the scope of his games, moving them from the village of Preobrazhenskoye to the Crimean steppes, then to the fields of the Northern War and sincerely enjoyed it. He loved and forgave those who supported the game, but took cruel revenge on those who did not want to participate in it.

First toys

Peter was the fourteenth child of Tsar Alexei and the first-born of his second wife, Natalya Kirillovna Naryshkina. Queen Natalya was brought up in the family of the boyar Artamon Matveev, a lover of everything Western, so she brought her familiar European environment into the palace: Peter was surrounded by foreign things from infancy: musical boxes, German-made dulcimers, as well as a clevichord with copper strings are mentioned . Natalya loved music - but Peter subsequently did not show any ear for music - he preferred the army drum to all other instruments.

Alexey Mikhailovich. Polish engraving. XVII century

Natalya Naryshkina. Unknown artist. XVII century

Seeing the boy's interest in military affairs, Natalya purchased for him a whole arsenal of toy weapons: the prince had miniature fortresses, wooden arquebuses, cannons, horses and figurines of soldiers.

His father, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, nicknamed the Quietest for his calm, easy-going character, was the second tsar of the Romanov dynasty. He was a very educated man, like his wife, who was interested in European culture. It was under him that social life appeared in Moscow: books of non-spiritual content appeared. He built a “comedy mansion” in the village of Preobrazhenskoye, where Pastor Gregory from Nemetskaya Sloboda staged plays.

The king was very fond of books and even wrote a treatise on hunting himself. Everyone knows the quotation from this work, which has turned into a saying: “There is time for business, an hour for fun.”

He was married twice: to Maria Ilyinishna Miloslavskaya, with whom he had 13 children, and to Natalya Kirillovna Naryshkina, who bore him three offspring.

Being a late child, Peter lost his father very early: in the fourth year of his life. This was the first intrusion of harsh reality into his comfortable existence. At that time, Peter was not considered the heir to the throne: after all, he had older brothers and sisters - the children of the first wife of Alexei Mikhailovich - Sophia, Fyodor and John and several other princesses. It should be noted that all the sons of Maria Miloslavskaya were distinguished by extremely poor health, some of them died in childhood, others in adolescence, and no one crossed the age of thirty.

After the death of Alexei Mikhailovich, the throne was taken by fifteen-year-old Fyodor - an intelligent, educated man, but very sick. His Miloslavsky relatives, to put it mildly, did not like Natalya Kirillovna and her children. They suspected the young, active and beautiful widow of intending to cast a spell on the new king, attributing his numerous ailments to witchcraft.

The situation of Natalya Kirillovna and her son deteriorated sharply. The Miloslavskys tried to remove all her relatives away from Moscow: brothers, uncles... even the teacher Matveev was exiled to the north, to Pustozersk (a now disappeared town near present-day Naryan-Mar). Natalya Kirillovna tried to be at court less and settled with her daughter and son in the village of Preobrazhenskoye, the favorite palace of her late husband.

Meanwhile, Peter was already five years old - the age when the royal children were supposed to begin their studies. They hired him a teacher - clerk Nikita Moiseev, Zotov's son, who, although he did not know sciences and languages, was quite knowledgeable in history, and especially in our country. Unfortunately, Zotov was very fond of drinking: Peter later even appointed him president of the clownish college of drunkenness - a kind of gesture towards the “first teacher.”

Nikita Moiseevich told the prince about people and events of the past, using “amusing books with books” - that is, with drawings. The queen specially ordered these “amusing notebooks” from the masters of the Armory Chamber. From there, squeaks, carbines and drums were continually brought to the young sovereign for familiarization. In addition, Zotov showed him the “Article with all military exercises,” compiled under Alexei Mikhailovich. The teacher also introduced Peter to the life of the West through pictures depicting “notable European cities, magnificent buildings, ships, etc.” But the “digital alphabet,” that is, arithmetic, was not included in the tsarist education program.

Zotov went through the alphabet, book of hours, Psalter, Gospel and Apostle with Peter. According to ancient Russian pedagogical rules, “to pass” meant to learn by heart. Even in adulthood, Peter could quote these books by heart. But literacy left much to be desired: the future king wrote with absolutely incredible errors, for example, inserting hard signs between two consonants. Probably, modern psychologists would diagnose Peter with dyslexia - a feature of perception of the world characteristic of creative people with unconventional thinking.

Bloody end of childhood

As soon as Peter was ten years old, reality asserted itself again: in the spring of 1682, at the age of twenty, Tsar Fedor died. And then the intrigue began!

From Maria Miloslavskaya, Alexei Mikhailovich had another son - John, a weak and sickly boy. Therefore, the Naryshkins remaining in the capital began to persuade the patriarch to proclaim Peter king - bypassing John. In retaliation, the Miloslavskys began to spread rumors that Tsarevich John was killed by the Naryshkins in the Moscow Kremlin. This provoked the first Streltsy riot, which is also known as the Moscow Troubles, or Khovanshchina.

The Miloslavskys hoped to use the archers for their own purposes, setting them against the Naryshkins, but events got out of control: a massacre began that none of the Miloslavskys could have foreseen.

On May 11, 1682, a crowd of archers captured the Kremlin, and in front of ten-year-old Peter, many relatives and friends of his mother were hacked to death and stabbed to death, including Artamon Matveev, who had returned from Pustozersk. To calm the archers and save the rest, Natalya Kirillovna and the children went out onto the porch, directly towards the angry crowd. She presented the archers with a living and more or less healthy John, who assured everyone that his stepmother did not offend him and took care of him as if he were her own, but this did not convince everyone. The people sent continued to convince the people that the Tsar was being slowly poisoned, which is why the boy was pale!

The archers were led by Ivan Khovansky, a mediocre commander who did not win a single battle, but earned the nickname Pustomelya - for his love of public speeches. Now he moved on to real banditry: the archers completely seized power in the city, beggars and tramps joined them, and robberies began. The royal family found themselves hostages in the besieged Kremlin.

Tsarina Natalya Kirillovna shows Ivan V to the archers to prove that he is alive and well. Nikolay Dmitriev-Orenburgsky. XIX century

The Naryshkins were blamed for all the people's troubles - from crop shortages to scrofula. Natalya Kirillovna has not yet been touched: after all, she is a queen, but her brothers were demanded to be killed.

Natalya resisted for several days, but in the end she had to give it away - Sophia insisted.

“Your brother can’t leave because of the archers, and we shouldn’t all die for him!” - she repeated.

Kirill was torn to pieces right in the palace. Ivan Naryshkin was confessed, given communion and unction in the Church of the Savior behind the Golden Lattice, and then with an icon in his hands he went out to the rebels. They dragged him to the dungeon and tortured him for a long time, hoping to get a confession that he and the queen tried to destroy King John - this would serve as an excuse for their rebellion. But Naryshkin was silent. Having achieved nothing, the archers quartered him on Red Square.

Sofya Aleksevna. Unknown artist of the 17th century.

This was not the only execution - the riot continued for another week. One after another, the archers submitted “petitions,” and the Kremlin hostages obediently fulfilled all the demands: they tonsured them as monks and expelled those they disliked, and gave them money from the treasury. For this purpose, even silver dishes were melted down into coins.

Satisfied archers, having received “freedom,” feasted in the Kremlin chambers. They did not object to Sophia declaring herself a ruler - regent under two young kings, John and Peter: anyway, Khovansky considered himself the real ruler. But already in the fall of that year he realized how deeply mistaken he was. However, it was too late: Sophia sent him to the chopping block. She executed several more leaders - and spared everyone who came over to her side.

These events forced the young king to grow up early: a year later, a foreign ambassador mistook him for a 16-year-old. At the same time, he suffered his first epileptic seizure. Convulsions, seizures, migraines and attacks of panic fear and uncontrollable anger would torment him throughout his life from then on. These attacks looked very scary: “He made various terrible grimaces and movements with his head, mouth, arms, shoulders, hands and feet... He rolled his eyes and jerked his legs back and forth.” During his fits, Peter was truly dangerous: the Danish envoy Just Jul describes how he hacked to death an innocent soldier.

Sofya Alekseevna Romanova, by all accounts, was an intelligent, strong and talented woman. She knew Latin and Polish, read a lot, and wrote poetry. But no one needed all this, because Sophia was a woman. Her fate was predetermined in advance: the young princesses were kept locked in their chambers, and then tonsured into a monastery. Even marriage was not a possibility for them: Russian suitors were considered unworthy of the Tsar’s daughters, and foreign ones professed a different faith. Sophia was not happy with this fate, and at first she entered into the struggle for power quite successfully. The situation in Russia in those years was strange: the “senior king” was John, the “younger king Peter” and the regent Sophia. She was the real ruler of Russia in those years.

Merry German Settlement

After the terrible events of 1682, Tsarina Natalya Kirillovna finally retired to Preobrazhenskoye, trying not to remind herself of Moscow, where the Miloslavskys ruled. She lived very modestly, constantly needed money, but did not skimp on her son: the surviving palace records still mention arquebuses and amusing cannons that the growing Peter played with. It was then that he acquired a “funny” army and every now and then he organized campaigns in the surrounding villages, ruining peasant gardens and fields. While examining the barns of his second cousin, Nikita Ivanovich Romanov, Peter found an old English boat, which became the ancestor of the entire Russian fleet.

All Russian tsars of his age had “amusing” troops and “amusing” stables. Funds from the treasury were allocated for them, the amusing soldiers were paid a salary - but no one took them seriously, despite the fact that after the toy battles, real dead and wounded remained in the fields.

The history of Russia could have turned out completely differently if not for the proximity of two settlements on the Yauza River - Preobrazhenskoye and Nemetskaya Sloboda. While scouring the surrounding area, Peter inevitably wandered there too.

However, there is an anecdote that connects Peter’s introduction to Western culture with the astrolabe, a device for measuring distances, given to him by Prince Dolgoruky. Neither Dolgoruky nor Peter himself had any idea how to use it, and through the court physician, a German by birth, they tried to find a knowledgeable person in the German settlement. It turned out to be the Dutchman Timmerman, under whose guidance Peter began to study arithmetic, geometry, artillery and fortification. Timmerman invited young Peter to the German Settlement and introduced him to Franz Lefort, a famous reveler. Foreigners called Franz Lefort a man of great intelligence, well aware of the state of Europe, and pleasant to deal with.

In Lefort’s house, Peter “began to make friends with foreign ladies and Cupid began to be the first to visit a merchant’s daughter,” there he “learned to dance in Polish”; mastered fencing and horse riding, learned foreign languages. Loving and appreciating Lefort, Peter appointed him admiral general.

“The Merchant's Daughter” - German Anna Mons was the daughter of a wine merchant from the German settlement. For more than ten years, she was considered the official favorite of Peter, who was very attached to her, and, according to rumors, was even thinking about marrying her. He gave her rich gifts, built a stone house for Anna, and granted estates to her relatives.

This romance ended sadly, but not through Peter’s fault. On the contrary, he loved Anna “with rare tenderness,” but the girl turned out to be ungrateful, and a breakup followed in 1704. The wife of the English ambassador, Lady Rondo, in a letter to a friend conveys the following gossip:

“One fateful day he (Tsar Peter - M.G.) accompanied by his own and foreign ministers, went to inspect the fortress he had built at sea. On the way back, the Polish minister accidentally fell from the bridge and drowned, despite all attempts to save him. The Emperor ordered all papers to be taken out of his pockets and sealed in front of everyone. When the pockets were searched, the portrait fell out; the emperor picked it up, and imagine his surprise: he saw that it was a portrait of that same lady. In a sudden fit of anger, he opened some papers and found several letters written by her to the deceased in the most tender terms. He immediately left the company, arrived alone at my narrator’s apartment and ordered her to send for the lady. When she came in, he locked himself in the room with the two of them and asked her how it came to her mind to write to such a person. She denied it; then he showed her a portrait and letters, and when he told her about his death, she burst into tears, and he reproached her with such rage for ingratitude that he was ready to kill his lady. But he suddenly also began to cry and said that he forgave her because he felt so deeply how impossible it is to win the inclination of the heart, “for,” he added, “despite the fact that you returned my adoration with deceit, I feel that I cannot hate you.” , although I hate myself for the weakness of which I am guilty. But I would deserve complete contempt if I continued to live with you. Therefore, leave while I can restrain my anger without going beyond the bounds of philanthropy. You will never be in need, but I don’t want to see you again.” He kept his word and soon after married her to a man who served in a distant region and was always concerned about their well-being.”

Portrait of an unknown person, presumably Anna Mons. Unknown artist. 1700

In fact, after the breakup, Anna was subjected to strict house arrest, and only in April 1706 was she allowed to attend church. At the same time, Peter opened a trial about bribes that Anna’s relatives took.

As for her marriage, the Prussian ambassador Keyserling wanted to marry Anna Mons, but he received permission only in 1711. They did not live long: Keyserling soon died, leaving Anna with two children. She died in 1714 from tuberculosis.

But Lefort was not the only interesting person with whom Peter made acquaintance in the German Settlement! It is impossible not to tell about Andrei Andreevich Vinius, a Dutch merchant who taught Peter I his language. A translator and compiler of dictionaries, he is also known for his collection of maps, plans, engravings and books. Works on geography and Dutch engravings introduced young Peter to a foreign way of life and greatly interested the prince.

Peter's relationship with Vinius was difficult.

At first, his career developed very successfully, but already in 1703 he was convicted of bribery, beaten with a whip and sentenced to pay 7,000 rubles.

“There is a custom here that first a person is given the opportunity to accumulate a lot, and then some kind of accusation is brought against him - and everything he has accumulated is taken away under torture,” one of the foreigners noted about his arrest.

In 1706, Vinius fled to Holland, but already in 1708 he came to Russia again, having received the forgiveness of Peter I. The tsar, having mercy, ordered the return of his property “the house was unsealed, the villages were returned,” only the clerk’s huge library was not in the house: valuable books were handed over to the Pharmacy Order. But then they fixed that too. But after the death of Vinius in 1717, Peter again took the books for himself, and then they ended up in the Academy of Sciences.

Faithful Dunka

Peter's mother did not like such liberties, and in order to bring her 17-year-old son to reason, Natalya Kirillovna decided to quickly marry him. The bride was chosen even without the required bridesmaid ceremony - in absentia. Peter did not contradict his mother, and in January 1689 they celebrated the wedding of the “junior tsar” and twenty-year-old Evdokia Lopukhina, the daughter of the okolnichy.

In Russia at that time there was a custom: the royal bride and even her father changed their names, as if starting a new life, counting down time from the high honor bestowed upon them. The okolnichy’s daughter Praskovya became Evdokia, and the okolnichy Illarion himself became Fedor.

Evdokia Lopukhina in monastic vestments. Unknown artist of the 17th century.

This woman's life was unfortunate. Although she served as queen for 9 years, Peter did not love her, and her mother-in-law soon hated her. She is generally considered limited and stupid, but in fact she was exactly like thousands of boyars raised in towers, the old fashioned way, and did not deserve universal condemnation.

Evdokia loved her husband, during separations she wrote tender letters to him, in humiliated expressions, as befits a wife raised according to Domostroy:

“My darling, hello for many years! Yes, I ask you for mercy, how will you allow me to be with you? And please write about that, my dear. For this your wife beats you with her forehead.”

“To my most beloved sovereign, Tsar Peter Alekseevich. Hello, my light, for many years to come! Perhaps, my father, do not despise, O light, my petition: write to me, my father, about your health, so that when I hear about your health, I may rejoice. And your sister Princess Natalya Alekseevna is in good health. And with your mercy you deign to remember us, and Alyoshenka and I are alive. Your wife Dunka.”

Evdokia gave birth to Peter three sons, of whom only one survived - Alexey.

In 1698, she was exiled to Suzdal to the Intercession Monastery and was forcibly tonsured under the name of Elena. Six months later, Evdokia returned to worldly life, and then took a lover - officer Stepan Glebov. The tsar did not support his disgraced wife; her relatives sent her money. However, her life was bearable until Peter accused her son, Alexei, of treason. Then the lover of the former queen was impaled, and she herself was exiled to the distant Ladoga-Assumption Monastery, and then, after the death of Peter, the jealous Catherine imprisoned her rival in the Shlisselburg fortress. Fifty-eight-year-old Evdokia was freed by her grandson, Peter II, and spent the rest of her life in respect and prosperity.

Duel with sister

Sophia heard news about her stepbrother's military fun, and she could not help but understand that in a few years she would have to give up power. Her own brother John did not cause such fears: he was “sorrowful in his head” and, moreover, was fading away before our eyes. Sophia would have been crowned herself, but Patriarch Joachim was categorically against it: after all, she is a woman.

It was her gender that served as the reason for the first conflict with her brother. In 1689, on the feast of the Kazan Icon of the Mother of God, according to custom, a religious procession was held from the Kremlin to the Kazan Cathedral. Seventeen-year-old Peter approached his sister and declared that she should not dare to go along with the men in the procession. Sophia did not answer, but took the image of the Most Holy Theotokos in her hands and went to get the crosses and banners. Peter defiantly abandoned the holiday.

Further events are extremely unclear. It is generally accepted that Sophia again began to spread the rumor that Tsar Peter decided to occupy the Kremlin with his “amusing” ones, kill the princess, Tsar John’s brother, and seize power. The new chief of the archers, Shaklovity, gathered the regiments to march in a “great assembly” to Preobrazhenskoye and beat all of Peter’s supporters. But he did not take or did not have time to take any real action. And just at this time Peter had an epileptic seizure, coupled with the suspicion and anger characteristic of these painful attacks.

Having recovered, he left his mother and pregnant wife and, jumping on a horse, rushed off to the Trinity-Sergius Monastery. For what? After all, in Preobrazhenskoye he had “amusing” troops - and in the monastery he could only rely on the piety of the monks.

However, the very next day Peter pulled himself together: he transported both queens to the monastery and called in “amusing” troops. Then he publicly announced that Sophia was going to deprive him of power and be crowned king herself.

The confrontation between brother and sister continued throughout August. They took turns publishing “letters”, calling the troops to join them, but they hesitated, not knowing which side to take. As a result, most of the troops still obeyed Tsar Peter: after all, he was a man.

Sophia had to admit defeat. Soon she was imprisoned in the Novodevichy Convent under strict supervision, and Shaklovity was executed. The king's elder brother, John, met Peter at the Assumption Cathedral and officially transferred all power to him.

John V was considered a king, but never showed interest in state affairs. Most likely, he suffered from some kind of genetic disorder: at the age of 27 he looked completely decrepit, had poor vision and was partially paralyzed. He died at the age of 30 and was buried in the Archangel Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin.

John was married to Praskovya Fedorovna Saltykova and had several daughters from her, including Anna, who was elected Russian Empress in 1731. Another daughter of John, Catherine, was married to Duke Karl-Leopold of Mecklenburg-Schwerin and gave birth to a daughter, Anna Leopoldovna, who later became regent for her unfortunate son Ivan Antonovich.

Azov Games

For several more years after power passed into his hands, Peter did not do business, but continued to play and revel in the German Settlement. “Then debauchery began, drunkenness was so great that it is impossible to describe that for three days, locked in that house, they were drunk and that many happened to die as a result,” wrote Prince Kurakin. The death of Natalya Kirillovna at the beginning of 1694 only briefly interrupted the tsar’s usual way of life.

The “amusing” troops weren’t bored either. A few months after the death of his mother, the tsar organized the so-called Kozhukhov campaigns, in which “Tsar Fyodor Pleshbursky” (Fedor Romodanovsky) defeated “Tsar Ivan Semenovsky” (Alexander Borisovich Buturlin), leaving 24 killed and 59 wounded on the amusing battlefield.

The expansion of sea fun prompted Peter to travel to the White Sea twice, and during his trip to the Solovetsky Islands he was in serious danger due to a storm.

As a continuation of the games, Peter approached his first military campaigns - the Azov ones.

Military showdowns with the Tatars were traditional for Russia. The Tatars were supported by the Ottoman Empire - once powerful, but now increasingly weakening.

Peter set himself the goal of recapturing the Azov fortress, located at the confluence of the Don River and the Sea of ​​Azov.

The first campaign ended unsuccessfully: the Russians besieged the fortress from land, but they continued to bring supplies there by sea.

The mistakes were taken into account, and by the spring of next year a rowing flotilla was built. It was built at a shipyard near Voronezh, at the confluence of the Voronezh River and the Don. In April 1696, the 36-gun sailing and rowing frigate Apostle Peter was launched. It was created by a Dane named Meyer. The length of this flat-bottomed three-masted frigate, which also had 15 pairs of oars, almost reached 35 meters, and its width exceeded 7 and a half meters. This ship served for 14 years - until the unsuccessful Prut campaign.

In the spring of 1696, the Azov fortress, surrounded on all sides, surrendered.

The next step of the young king was the so-called. The Grand Embassy is a diplomatic mission to Western Europe, in which Peter’s faithful friend Lefort and, incognito, himself participated. For Russia, this was an unprecedented adventure: Russian tsars never left the country.

The initial goal was to boast of military successes, announce the capture of Azov and enlist the support of European governments in the further struggle against the Crimean Khanate. But instead, Peter abandoned the fight for Crimea and allowed himself to be drawn into the twenty-year Northern War. It is possible that he brilliantly foresaw the benefits for Russia from future territorial acquisitions in the North. May be. But something else is also quite likely: the young sovereign simply wanted to take part in the big European game.

Governor Fürstenberg, in a letter to Augustus II, describes in great detail how he received Peter as a guest and, by order of Augustus, pleased him in every possible way, indulging in the most absurd whims. A funny detail: Peter vomited incognito, and therefore ordered that no one should see him when visiting the castle. However, everyone was aware of his visit: the governor even had to post guards around the castle to drive away the curious.

Most of all, Peter was interested in the army and everything connected with it, as well as the Kunstkamera.

“During dinner, I ordered trumpeters and flute players to be placed on the balcony under his room, and also ordered the bodyguards, the Life Guards, dressed in Swiss dress with halberds, to march to the balcony, since I know that drums and whistles are his favorite music and in general, his taste is directed primarily towards everything related to war. I put him in such a wonderful mood that he himself took the drum and, in the presence of the ladies, began to beat with such perfection that he far surpassed the drummers.”

Told Viceroy Furstenberg.

The poor governor complained that, contrary to his own wishes, he was forced to drink a lot, since Peter demanded it. After the drinking party, he and the governor walked around the garden, and Peter went to where the carousel was located and swung on the lion for more than half an hour.

Here is the famous review of Elector Sophia of Hanover about Peter: “... he admitted to us that he does not really like music. I asked him: does he like hunting? He replied that his father loved him very much, but that from his youth he had a real passion for sailing and fireworks. He told us that he himself was working on building ships, showed us his hands and made us touch the calluses that had formed on them from work. We must admit that this is an extraordinary person. This sovereign is both very kind and very evil, his character is absolutely the character of his country. If he had received a better education, he would have been an excellent man, for he has much dignity and an infinite amount of natural intelligence.”

Peter was not a secular man. You can also get an impression of his manners from this note from a German courtier: “The Tsar outdid himself throughout the entire evening: he didn’t belch or champ, didn’t pick his teeth, at least I didn’t hear or see that, he talked completely at ease.” with the queen and princesses."

Tsar Executioner

The Grand Embassy was interrupted by a second Streltsy riot. They suppressed him very quickly, but Peter still hurriedly returned to Moscow. Investigations and executions began, in which all the worst qualities of Peter’s nature were revealed: he personally chopped off the heads of the hated archers, avenging the horror he experienced in childhood. “The Tsar, Lefort and Menshikov each took an ax. Peter ordered that axes be distributed to his ministers and generals. When everyone was armed, everyone set to work and cut off heads. Menshikov got down to business so awkwardly that the tsar slapped him in the face and showed him how heads should be cut off,” testified eyewitness Georg Gelbig.

About 800 people were executed at a time (except for those killed during the suppression of the riot), and subsequently several thousand more, until the spring of 1699.

Princess Sophia, who had previously simply been in the monastery, was now tonsured a nun under the name of Susanna. To further punish his hated sister, Peter ordered the executed archers to be hanged right at her windows.

Peter had every reason to regard this rebellion as a betrayal, a stab in the back. “Holy Rus'” betrayed - and she had to pay for it. Therefore, the tsar did not limit himself to reprisals against the rebels, but immediately began to change the established way of Russian life: right at the feast, he cut off the traditional Russian long-skirted clothes of dignitaries with scissors, and cut the beards of close boyars. He ordered everyone to change into European dress. By decree he introduced a new Julian calendar: canceling the calendar from the creation of the world and moving the New Year celebration to January 1. Before this, New Year was celebrated in the fall.

At the same time, Peter began to walk around with a large club in his hands, with which he beat courtiers who had committed misconduct.

The Emperor, turning a human figure on a lathe and being very happy that the work was going well, asked the mechanic Nartov:

- What is my point?

“Okay,” replied Nartov.

“That’s it, Andrei, I sharpen bones with a chisel pretty well, but I can’t sharpen stubborn people with a club.”

An old joke.

The Vile Story of Maria Hamilton

Gossip related to one of his mistresses, Maria Hamilton, also tells about the excessive cruelty of Peter the Great. It was as if he had executed her for treason, and when the beauty’s head rolled to the ground, he picked it up and began to talk about anatomy, showing the courtiers the severed spine and blood vessels.

Maria Hamilton before her execution. Pavel Svedomsky. 1904

In fact, the king’s atrocity is greatly exaggerated: Maria actually had an intimate relationship with him at one time, but the infatuation had long since passed. Since then, she had other lovers and was pregnant several times, but had miscarriages. She still gave birth to the last baby alive, but immediately drowned her in a vessel (i.e., in a chamber pot), and then threw the corpse into a latrine. It was for this heinous crime that she was sentenced to death, and quite humanely: her head was cut off, and not buried alive in the ground, as required by the Code of 1649. Maria's head was preserved in alcohol and kept in the Kunstkamera for some time, but then some sailors stole the vessel, drank the alcohol, and threw away the head.

Antichrist from the glass city

“The Most Joking and Most Drunken Council” is one of Peter’s most extravagant ideas. For him, this was an opportunity not only to have fun and indulge in revelry, but also to mock the real, serious life he hated. This is how the college of drunkenness arose, or “the most extravagant, all-joking and all-drunk cathedral.” It was presided over by the former royal teacher Nikita Zotov, the prince-pope, or “the most noisy and most humorous patriarch of Moscow, Kokuy and all Yauza.” Under him there was a conclave of 12 cardinals, notorious drunkards and gluttons, with a huge staff of the same bishops, archimandrites and other clergy, who bore frankly indecent nicknames.

Peter held the rank of protodeacon and himself composed the statutes of this cathedral, in which the rites of election of the patriarch and ordination to various degrees of the drunken hierarchy were defined down to the smallest detail. The first commandment of the order was to get drunk every day and not go to bed sober, and the goal was declared to be to glorify Bacchus by drinking excessively. The order of drunkenness, “serving Bacchus and honest dealing with strong drinks” was determined. The jesters had their own vestments, prayers and chants, there were even the most humorous mother-bishops and abbess, or rather, abbess - just like that, with a hint of an obscene word. One of them was Anastasia Petrovna Golitsyna - an intelligent woman, but devoid of any concepts of decent behavior and, moreover, an alcoholic. She knew how to amuse the sovereign and remained in favor for a long time - but then she was accused of treason in connection with the case of Tsarevich Alexei and was beaten with batogs. Humiliated and sick, she lived out her life in the Cheryomushki estate in the south of Moscow.

As in the ancient church they asked the person being baptized: “Do you believe?” - so in this cathedral the newly admitted member was asked the question: “Are you eating?” Sober people were excommunicated from all taverns in the state, and drunkards were anathematized.

Often during the holiday week, Peter gathered a huge company, about two hundred people, and spent the night riding sleighs around Moscow or St. Petersburg. At the head of the procession is the clownish patriarch in his vestments, with a staff and a tin miter; Behind him, a sleigh full of his co-workers rushes headlong, singing and whistling. The owners of houses honored with a visit from these glorifiers were obliged to treat them and pay for their glorification.

Once on Maslenitsa, the king arranged a service to Bacchus: the patriarch, prince-pope Nikita Zotov drank and blessed the guests kneeling before him, overshadowing them with two chibouks folded crosswise, just as bishops do with dikiri and trikiri; then, with a staff in his hand, the “lord” began to dance.

Yuletide fun was commonplace, but the jokes that the sovereign made during Lent offended many. Members of the All-Joking Cathedral rode out in sleighs drawn by pigs, bears and goats, wearing sheepskin coats turned inside out.

“Jester weddings” were often held. Peter could drop everything he was doing to compose another clownish “decree” or regulations for a clownish ritual. With the death of Peter, the cathedral ceased to exist, leaving behind a bad memory not only as an example of the emperor’s tyranny, but also as another proof that he really was the “Antichrist.”

Peter preferred vodka among alcoholic drinks. The boxes in which bottles of vodka were stored were shaped like the Gospel.

In those years, distillery production was still poorly developed. We would now call the vodka of that time poorly purified moonshine or raw alcohol. Its strength was no more than 18 degrees, but it desperately stank of fusel. At assemblies, Peter ordered vessels with this drink to be distributed throughout the park and forcefully fed it to guests, including ladies and clergy, until everyone was drunk to the point of swinishness.

These amusements gave rise to the legends about the impostor king and the antichrist king. Peter was declared the son of a German woman and “Lafert”, they said that in the “Glass Kingdom” (Stockholm) the real sovereign was kidnapped and, having been put in a barrel, put into the sea, and in his place they sent a “German woman”. The schismatics interpreted the sacred books, where it was written that the Antichrist would be born from an evil relationship from a bad wife and an imaginary maiden, from the tribe of Dan, and recalled that Peter was born from a second wife - an illegitimate one, concluding that the Danish tribe is the royal one tribe.

Was Peter such a notorious blasphemer or an unbeliever? This would be strange, given his upbringing. In addition, it is known for certain that Peter took care of the construction of churches and even drew sketches for the architects. So, according to his drawings, the Peter and Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg and the church on Novaya Basmannaya Street - very close to Yauza and Kukui - were built. In addition, having a good voice and hearing, Peter often sang in the choir, thereby expressing respect for the church and worship.

"Min Hertz" and orderlies

Alexander Danilovich Menshikov was the son of a baker, and became a close friend of Peter and the most serene prince of the Russian Empire, Duke of Izhora, member of the Supreme Privy Council, president of the Military Collegium, senator, field marshal general, and so on and so forth... He was a brave and successful military leader, but mediocre a diplomat, a talented organizer, but an unscrupulous bribe-taker. For embezzlement he was repeatedly beaten by Peter himself. Ultimately, Menshikov made a lot of enemies and was exiled to Berezov, where he died.

“Menshikov was strongly attached to the Tsar and sympathized with his rules regarding the enlightenment of the Russian nation. With foreigners, unless they considered themselves smarter than him, he was polite and kind. He also did not touch the Russians, who knew how to bend their backs. He treated inferiors meekly and never forgot the service rendered. In the greatest dangers he showed all the necessary courage and, once he fell in love with someone, became his zealous friend.

On the other hand, his ambition was immeasurable; He did not tolerate anyone superior to himself or an equal, much less a person who would think of surpassing him in intelligence. Greed was insatiable and an implacable enemy. He had no lack of intelligence, but his lack of education was reflected in his rude manner.”

Told by Colonel K. G. Manstein.

Menshikov is also associated with rumors about the alleged bisexuality of Peter the Great. One of the reasons for the emergence of these gossips is the dizzying career of the handsome Menshikov and the address that the tsar used in correspondence with him - “min herts” - “my heart”.

Another source of rumors is the memoirs of turner Andrei Konstantinovich Nartov, which says that in the absence of Catherine, Peter put young orderlies to sleep with him. However, Nartov explained this differently:

“The Emperor truly sometimes had such convulsions at night that he would put Murzin’s orderly on the bed with him, holding whose shoulder he would fall asleep, which I myself saw. During the day he often threw his head up. This began to happen in his body from the time of the riots, but before that it did not happen.”

Menshikov's excessive love for luxury was reflected in numerous anecdotes of that time. The court jester Balakirev often made fun of the royal favorite.

Jokes:

In St. Petersburg, Prince Alexander Danilovich Menshikov built a palace for himself on Vasilyevsky Island. This palace is modest by today's standards. Then it was considered one of the largest. The Emperor himself supervised the work and came more than once to admire the buildings being built. During one of these visits, he suddenly noticed that Balakirev, armed with a yardstick, with the air of an expert, was pacing importantly around what he had just completed, and, reasoning with himself, he was measuring everything.

Calling him over, Peter asked:

- How long ago, Balakirev, did you become a land surveyor and what are you measuring there?

“I have been a land surveyor, sir, since I began to walk on Mother Earth, and what I measure, you deign to see for yourself.”

- What is it?

- Earth.

- For what?

- Yes, I would like to measure from this foundation how much space of land Danilych will occupy when he dies.

The Emperor smiled and looked at Menshikov, who winced at Balakirev’s words.

One fine day, Balakirev once made fun of Menshikov for a particularly long and caustic time, so that the prince finally lost patience and wanted to beat the jester. The last one managed to escape.

“Okay, you swindler,” Menshikov shouted after him, “I can handle you just fine!” Not only the living, but also the dead, you will have no peace from me. Even the bones know my strength.

The next day after the threat, Balakirev came to the sovereign, bored and saddened.

- Father Tsar, have mercy! - he screamed.

- What does it mean? - asked Peter.

- Give me your club.

“You’re welcome, but first tell me what you need it for?”

“But this is why I need it: when I die, I will order it to be put with me in the grave.” And do you know why? Danilych is very afraid of her, so she will protect me. Otherwise the prince threatens that my bones will have no rest from him.

The Emperor smiled and promised to give him his royal club.

The next day, all the courtiers learned about this, and Menshikov began to treat Balakirev more friendly and favorably.

Prince Menshikov, angry at D’Acosta for something, shouted:

“I’ll beat you to death, you scoundrel!”

The frightened jester rushed to run as fast as he could and,

running to the sovereign, he complained about the prince.

“If he kills you for sure,” the sovereign said, smiling, “then I will order him to be hanged.”

“I don’t want that,” the jester objected, “but I wish that Your Royal Majesty would order him to be hanged first, while I am alive.”

Narva - it's burst!

In addition to Russia, the Northern Alliance against the Swedish king Charles XII included Denmark, Saxony and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (Poland). In order not to be distracted by Crimea, Peter urgently concluded a truce with the Ottoman Empire for a period of 30 years, and on August 19, 1700 he declared war on Sweden.

But, alas: this game did not work out for Peter at first; his allies failed him: Denmark almost immediately withdrew from the war, and the Polish king Augustus failed to take Riga. The Russian attempt to capture Narva ended in complete defeat. The Swedes even issued a medal with the image of Peter wandering sorrowfully and the gospel inscription: “And he wept bitterly when he went away.”

However, the Swedes rejoiced early: Peter knew how to learn from his mistakes. He reformed and retrained the army, cast cannons, built new ships, and already in 1702 won his first victories. “Narva, which had been brewing for 4 years, has now, thank God, burst,” Peter joyfully wrote in a letter. Access to the Baltic Sea was open.

Baltic beauty

In 1703, during the siege of the Marienburg fortress, Peter I met 19-year-old Marta Skavronskaya, a Baltic peasant woman. At first Menshikov liked her, but Peter took the beauty from him and made her his mistress. Soon she converted to Orthodoxy: Peter's half-sister Ekaterina (one of the daughters of Maria Miloslavskaya) became her godmother, and his son from his first marriage, Alexey, became her godfather. Since then, Marta began to be called Ekaterina Alekseevna.

The Frenchman Lavi described her appearance in 1715: “... has a pleasant fullness; her complexion is very white with an admixture of natural, somewhat bright blush. Her eyes are black and small, her hair of the same color is long and thick, her neck and arms are beautiful, her facial expression is meek and very pleasant.” Lavi noted that the king treated his wife “with special respect.”

It is interesting that, despite the abundance of portraits, many biographers stubbornly call Catherine a blonde. Not wanting to give up the image of a “blond German woman,” they even came up with the idea that Catherine specifically dyed her blonde hair black to suit Peter’s tastes. In this case, they should have mentioned that she was also the first person in history to wear dark contact lenses.

“Once, when the king was at dinner with the Danish king, at which he drank more than usual, the latter, wanting to joke, said:

- Oh, brother, I heard that you also have a mistress?

The king, finding such a joke far from his taste, objected:

“Brother, my favorites don’t cost me much, but your public women cost you thousands of thalers, which you could have used much better.”

In 1706, the king changed in Poland, and Charles XII began a new campaign against Russia, luring Hetman Ivan Mazepa to his side. But luck abandoned him: the battle near the village of Lesnoy and the Battle of Poltava decided the outcome of the war. The Swedish king with a handful of soldiers fled to Turkish possessions. There he was not greeted very kindly, and soon he was forced to return to his homeland, where in 1718 he died under mysterious circumstances.

Russian diplomacy and dancing on the table

The Swedish Queen Ulrika Eleonora tried to resist for two more years, but in the end she was forced to negotiate peace. In the fall of 1721, the Peace of Nystadt was concluded, ending more than twenty years of war. Russia gained access to the Baltic Sea and annexed the vast Baltic lands.

An anecdotal story is connected with the Nystadt peace negotiations, which were conducted by remarkable diplomats and generally outstanding people Andrei Ivanovich Osterman and Yakov Vilimovich Bruce. Peter, wanting to end the war as soon as possible, was ready to make concessions and give the Vyborg fortress to the Swedes. He sent Pavel Yaguzhinsky to negotiations, giving him the authority to conclude peace on Swedish terms. Osterman and Bruce, believing that the Swedes were about to agree to give up the fortress, sent people to meet Pavel Ivanovich with a letter addressed to the commandant of this very Vyborg. The letter contained a request to intercept the envoy, persuade him to go on a spree, get him drunk, and thus detain him on the road. The plan was a success. Yaguzhinsky was delayed for two days, and when, with a sore head and a hangover, he reached Nystadt, peace had already been concluded and became a triumph for Russian diplomats.

The conclusion of peace was celebrated with a seven-day masquerade. Peter was overjoyed and, forgetting his years and illnesses, sang songs and even danced on the tables.

Yakov Vilimovich Bruce- famous “sorcerer” and scientist. He came from a noble Scottish family and was a descendant of King Bruce of Scotland. His brother, Roman Bruce, was the first chief commandant of St. Petersburg. Their ancestors lived in Russia since 1647.

Yakov Vilimovich participated in all the wars that Peter fought and was awarded the Order of St. Andrew the First-Called, many titles and titles.

He was one of the most educated people in Russia, a naturalist and astronomer. He spoke six languages, was actively involved in translating and publishing scientific literature, collected a library of more than one and a half thousand volumes and a “cabinet of curious things”, which formed the basis of the Kunstkamera. He compiled the “Map of Lands from Moscow to Asia Minor” and was the author of the zodiacal radial-ring layout of Moscow.

Jacob Bruce. 18th century engraving

In 1702, Bruce opened the first observatory in Russia at the Navigation School in Moscow in the Sukharev Tower. His passion for astrology was expressed in the publication of the famous “Bruce calendars”.

People have created many legends about Bruce. Allegedly, Bruce once received guests at his estate, and in order to entertain them, he froze the pond in the July heat so that his guests could skate.

Name: Peter
Patronymic: Alekseevich
Last name: Romanov
Date of birth: May 30 (June 9), 1672
Date of death: January 28 (February 8), 1725
Diagnoses during life: gonorrhea, Kozhevnikov syndrome, uremia, utetritis, urethral stricture, cystitis, pyelonephritis (?), arterial hypertension
Cause of death: stroke

The barbarian who civilized his Russia; he, who built cities, but did not want to live in them; he, who punished his wife with a whip and gave the woman wide freedom - his life was great, rich and useful in public terms, in private terms the same as it turned out
August Strindberg.

Tsarevich Peter Alekseevich, the future first Russian emperor, was the fourteenth (!) child of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. However, the first was from his second wife, Tsarina Natalya Naryshkina. In Russian mythology, the first emperor occupies a triple position - firstly, he received the position of superman, given to him for his high height (two meters three centimeters) and remarkable strength. Secondly, it is a kind of symbol of the renewal of everything - and it’s clear why: a window to Europe, shaving beards, the Battle of Poltava and all that. And thirdly, at the same time, the greatest anti-hero is a cruel person (with fits of kindness and justice), a persecutor of the “old and good” and all that. Usually even his death is presented as mythological - the author remembers very well how at school they taught that an absolutely healthy man, Peter the Great, in early 1725 (in the prime of his life - only 52 years old!) caught a cold while rescuing drowning sailors and died. In fact, the medical history of Peter the Great is very extensive, and the final diagnosis is mysterious. But let's talk about everything in order.

It is curious that if we begin to analyze the history of the relationship between the first Russian emperor and medicine, we will again see duality: on the one hand, from a very young age we have a checkered history of Pyotr Alekseevich, on the other, the tsar himself showed his interest in medicine from his youth.

Peter as a doctor

To begin with, a little history (including art history). Do you remember Rembrandt's famous painting "The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Tulp"? In fact, this is not quite a picture. What is the first thing we see when entering a private clinic? That's right, diplomas of varying degrees of pretentiousness and a photograph of the team. But what were the doctors of the 17th century to do? That's right, invite an artist. And the more pretentious the artist, the cooler the clinic. Sorry, there were no clinics then. And there were guilds.

A person entered the Weight Chamber of Amsterdam, where the residence of the guild of surgeons was located, saw a gallery of portraits - and immediately understood who the real doctor was, and how much money doctors could now give to the artist. It came down to the coolest ones: for example, Rembrandt. And since simply painting a group portrait is not very correct, surgeons traditionally ordered their portrait in the setting of a very interesting activity: an anatomy lesson. This is how perhaps the most famous corporate “photo shoot” of the 17th century appeared: “Dr. Tulp’s Anatomy Lesson.”

Anatomy Lesson by Dr. Tulpa

At the time of the order for Rembrandt (1632), three “anatomy lessons”, written in 1603, 1619 and 1625, were already hanging in the chamber, but Dr. Nicholas Tulp (or Tulp - he took his surname in honor of the Dutch tulips) was not yet the head of the guild. Then, when the guild was headed by another doctor, Doctor Deyman, Rembrandt would paint a new portrait - “The Anatomy Lesson of Doctor Deyman” (1652). After Deyman, the guild will be headed by Frederik Ruysch. In 1670, the artist Adrian Bakker and in 1683, the artist Jan van Neck, would write two more “Anatomy Lessons of Dr. Ruysch” - the first would be an autopsy with a demonstration of the inguinal canal, the second would be Ruysch dissecting a baby.

Anatomy lesson by Dr. Ruysch by Adrian Bakker

Why are we telling this? And besides, fourteen years after painting the second portrait, Ruysch had an unusual guest. Having visited Holland with the Grand Embassy under the guise of a sergeant of the Preobrazhensky Regiment, Peter Mikhailov, on September 17, 1697, Peter asked the burgomaster of Amsterdam to personally introduce him to the outstanding physician and anatomist (by that time, Ruysch was already known for both his embalming method and his amazing collection of anatomical preparations).
Peter was delighted and left a note in the guest book: “I, the undersigned, during a trip to see most of Europe, visited here in Amsterdam to gain knowledge, which I always needed, examined things here, among which I not least of all, he saw art in the anatomy of Mr. Ruysch and, as is customary in this house, he signed it with his own hand. Peter".

One of the exhibits from the Ruysch collection

Two decades later, Peter, having learned that Ruysch was planning to sell his collection, ordered to buy it back - this will be the beginning of the Kunstkamera, but in the meantime the tsar himself was “sick” with surgery. He tried to be present at as many operations as possible. It is reliably known that St. Petersburg surgeons were afraid to carry out complex operations without calling the Tsar. In 1717, while in Paris, Peter learned about the skill of the local ophthalmic surgeon Voolguys and begged him to perform a demonstration operation especially for him. They write that a certain homeless man was found with cataracts, in which Voolguys showed the operation of squeezing out the cataract.

Peter constantly strived to improve his skills as a surgeon. Thus, especially for Peter I, the then famous anatomical atlas of Gottfried Bidloo “Anatomy of the Human Body in 105 Tables” (Anatomia humani corporis), published in 1685 in Amsterdam, was translated into Russian. This translation, by the way, was exclusively for one reader, and remained in the manuscript. The king himself constantly took part in autopsies - and his actions were sometimes very cruel.

Thus, they write that in 1705 the peasant Kozma Zhukov was accused of intending to commit regicide, sentenced to death, and after his death he was ordered to undergo an autopsy. Moreover, the tsar was often personally present at the autopsies of his relatives - for example, he endorsed the autopsy of his suddenly deceased daughter-in-law, the wife of Tsarevich Alexei (he also personally took part in his torture), Princess Charlotte. As the Austrian resident reported to his homeland, “After opening the body, Peter saw blood spasms, unexpectedly ordered nothing to be taken out, everything to be sewn up again, and gave orders for burial.” Apparently, the emperor wanted to make sure that his son had not poisoned his not very beloved wife.

Princess Charlotte

In general, Peter’s curiosity sometimes reached the point of inhuman cynicism. So, when the widow of his brother Fyodor, Marfa Matveevna, died, he also wanted to be present at the autopsy. The fact is that Fyodor Alekseevich, who was in very poor health (his legs almost didn’t work anymore), after the death of his first wife, married the 18-year-old young and beautiful Marfa, and died a few months later, and the widow, according to Tatishchev, “was a maiden.” remained there." And so, 33 years later, Marfa Matveevna, who led a reclusive lifestyle, died. As historian Pyotr Dolgorukov wrote, the tsar “wanted to find out the truth about this short marriage.” He was convinced and ordered that the queen’s will be carried out, transferring her enormous wealth into the possession of her brother, General Fyodor Matveevich Apraksin. And Peter I ordered his beloved sister Natalya Alekseevna not to be buried until his return from Europe - and the body was kept for more than a year on the glacier.

Marfa Matveevna Apraksina

However, Peter not only observed. We do not know whether he personally opened the bodies of his relatives or his subordinates. However, the fact that he performed operations on his subjects (and not only) is known for certain.
The simplest operation that Peter learned to do during the Great Embassy was the removal of a diseased tooth. As a historical anecdote, a story is given that is quite in the spirit of Peter, how the future emperor saw a traveling dentist, took him to a tavern, got him drunk and persuaded him to teach him how to pull his teeth. After which he regularly practiced on his subjects. The famous Russian historical journalist Sergei Shubinsky, who wrote at the turn of the 19th and 20th years, gives the following story (already with a touch of folklore):

“The sovereign’s valet Poluboyarov married a girl whom he did not like at all. She was forced to marry him, because Peter himself wanted this marriage, and her relatives considered such a match very profitable. After the wedding, the sovereign noticed that Poluboyarov was constantly walking around gloomy and preoccupied, and asked him about the reason. Poluboyarov admitted that his wife stubbornly avoids his caresses, using the excuse of toothache. “Okay,” said Peter, “I’ll teach her.” The next day, when Poluboyarov was on duty in the palace, the sovereign unexpectedly came to his apartment, called his wife and asked her: “I heard that your tooth hurts?” “No, sir,” answered the young woman, trembling with fear, “I am healthy.” “I see you’re a coward,” said Peter, “nothing, sit on this chair, closer to the light.” Poluboyarova, fearing the royal wrath, did not dare to object and silently obeyed. Peter pulled out her healthy tooth and affectionately remarked: “Obey your husband from now on and remember that a wife should be afraid of her husband, otherwise she will have no teeth.” Returning to the palace, the sovereign called Poluboyarov and, grinning, told him: “Go to your wife; I cured her; now she will not disobey you.”

Anecdotes are anecdotes, but the famous bag of teeth removed by Peter I is a historical reality. It was actually kept in the cabinet of curiosities. It is also known that Peter personally carried out more serious operations. Thus, it is reported (not as an anecdote) about the removal of an inguinal tumor from the manufacturer Tamsen and about the treatment of dropsy from the wife of the merchant Borget.

Anamnesis vitae

What do we know about the health of Peter himself? Unfortunately, we do not have the earliest information about the history of the future emperor, at least more or less trustworthy. Moreover, many important documents relating to Peter's health and illnesses were lost as a result of improper storage - they were lost already under Catherine II. So, for example, there is no protocol for Peter’s autopsy - we can judge about it only by references to contemporaries. “The History of Peter” gives us a lot of information, written by Alexander Pushkin, who, by the way, by the end of his short life (we refer you to the corresponding chapter of our book) turned from a talented scoundrel who wrote not only great poetry, but also stupid epigrams that spoiled life indiscriminately, into a very good historian who knew how to work with sources. “Tsidulki” give us a lot - notes that Peter sent to his wife, Catherine I (aka Marta Skavronskaya, aka Marta Kruse, aka Ekaterina Alekseevna Mikhailova).

Let's summarize what we know. Firstly, it must be said right away that Peter was not at all ugly, as it has become fashionable to write today (“Shemyakin truthfully portrayed the emperor with a disproportionately small head, etc/”). All the independent testimonies of those people who had no reason to flatter Peter at different times say the same thing: very tall, ideally built, thin, muscular, handsome in face.

Portrait of young Peter by Kneller

Here is what the Palatinate princess Sophia wrote about him:
“The king is tall, has beautiful facial features and noble bearing; He has great mental agility, his answers are quick and correct. But with all the virtues that nature has endowed him with, it would be desirable for him to have less rudeness. This sovereign is very good and at the same time very bad; morally he is a full representative of his country. If he had received a better upbringing, he would have emerged as a perfect man, because he has many virtues and an extraordinary mind.”

Princess Sofia

The only thing that frightened everyone who communicated with the king was the spasm that disfigured his face at times.

“...The look is majestic and welcoming when he watches himself and restrains himself, otherwise he is stern and wild, with convulsions on the face that are not repeated often, but distort both the eyes and the whole face, frightening everyone present. The spasm usually lasted one moment, and then his look became strange, as if confused, then everything immediately took on its normal appearance,” the famous French memoirist, Louis de Rouvroy, Duke of Saint-Simon, described this symptom.
Contemporaries wrote that this symptom appeared after the horror of the Streltsy riot experienced at the age of ten, which Vasily Klyuchevsky colorfully describes: “Peter... stood on the Red Porch of the Kremlin next to his mother... when the Streltsy picked up Artamon Matveev and his other supporters on spears , [among whom were the prince’s mentors]... the horrors of May 1682 were indelibly etched in his memory.”

The mutiny of the Streltsy in 1682. The Streltsy dragged Ivan Naryshkin out of the palace. While Peter I consoles his mother, Princess Sophia watches with satisfaction. Painting by A. I. Korzukhin, 1882

However, there is evidence that Peter had “nervous attacks” from early childhood. The same Pushkin is looking for other reasons for the emergence of such a neurological status: “the queen (Peter’s mother - author’s note), going one spring to a monastery, while crossing a flooded stream, she got scared and with her screams woke up Peter, who was sleeping in her arms. Peter was afraid of water until he was 14 years old. Prince Boris Alexandrovich Golitsyn, his chief chamberlain, cured him.” Sometimes the seizures led to fainting.

This was accompanied by sudden attacks of anger; the king could suddenly, for no apparent reason, beat those close to him with a club or fist. We have already spoken about the pathological cruelty of the tsar, which sporadically manifested itself, for example, in personal participation in the execution of archers. We also observe attacks of sudden motor activity - Peter could suddenly jump up from the table and run into another room to warm up. There were other mental symptoms as well. Thus, Peter the Great suffered from a fear of high ceilings and in many of the rooms where he lived, he demanded that a low false ceiling be installed, which many sources mistakenly call agoraphobia (in fact, it is spaciophobia - the fear of empty spaces).

Of course, the tsar’s neurological status could not but be affected by his addiction to alcohol - we are well aware of the All-Joking, All-Drunken and Extraordinary Councils of Peter I, from which not everyone made it out alive.

What caused this whole complex of symptoms? Some authors try to attribute neurosyphilis to the king, citing urological symptoms, which will be discussed later. Alas, too much does not fit here - neither into urology nor into neurology. We still dare to suggest that the king has as a symptom Kozhevnikov syndrome (focal convulsive seizures with an emerging myoclonic tic), as a disease - perhaps “frozen” Kozhevnikov-Rasmussen syndrome (usually it begins in early childhood and leads to serious disability). Of course, accurate diagnosis without magnetic resonance and even positron emission tomography is impossible. But alas, we will never see PET Peter.

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One of the reasons that gave rise to the version of the substitution of Tsar Peter I was the research of A.T. Fomenko and G.V. Nosovsky

The beginning of these studies was the discoveries made during the study of an exact copy of the throne of Ivan the Terrible. In those days, the zodiac signs of the current rulers were placed on the thrones. Thanks to the study of the signs placed on the throne of Ivan the Terrible, scientists have found that the actual date of his birth differs from the official version by four years.

Scientists have compiled a table of the names of Russian tsars and their birthdays, and thanks to this table it was revealed that the official birthday of Peter I does not coincide with the day of his angel, which is a blatant contradiction in comparison with all the names of Russian tsars. After all, names in Rus' at baptism were given exclusively according to the calendar, and the name given to Peter breaks the established centuries-old tradition, which in itself does not fit into the framework and laws of that time.

Photo by Stan Shebs from wikimedia.org

A. Fomenko and G. Nosovsky, based on the table, found out that the real name, which falls on the official date of birth of Peter I, is Isaac. This explains the name of the main cathedral of Tsarist Russia. Thus, the Brockhaus and Efron dictionary says: “St. Isaac’s Cathedral is the main temple in St. Petersburg, dedicated to the name of St. Isaac of Dalmatia, whose memory is honored on May 30, the birthday of Peter the Great.”

Image from lib.rus.ec

Let us consider the following obvious historical facts. Their totality shows a fairly clear picture of the replacement of the real Peter I with a foreigner:

1. An Orthodox ruler was leaving Russia for Europe, wearing traditional Russian clothing. Two surviving portraits of the tsar from that time depict Peter I in a traditional caftan. The Tsar wore a caftan even during his stay at the shipyards, which confirms his adherence to traditional Russian customs. After the end of his stay in Europe, a man returned to Russia who wore exclusively European-style clothes, and in the future the new Peter I never put on Russian clothes, including the attribute obligatory for the tsar - royal vestments. This fact is difficult to explain with the official version of a sudden change in lifestyle and the beginning of adherence to European canons of development.

2. There are quite good reasons to doubt the difference in the body structure of Peter I and the impostor. According to exact data, the height of the impostor Peter I was 204 cm, while the real king was shorter and denser. It is worth noting that the height of his father, Alexei Mikhailovich Romanov, was 170 cm, and his grandfather, Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov, was also of average height. The height difference of 34 cm stands out very much from the overall picture of real kinship, especially since in those days people over two meters tall were considered an extremely rare phenomenon. Indeed, even in the middle of the 19th century, the average height of Europeans was 167 cm, and the average height of Russian recruits at the beginning of the 18th century was 165 cm, which fits into the general anthropometric picture of that time. The difference in height between the real Tsar and the false Peter also explains the refusal to wear royal clothes: they simply did not fit the newly minted impostor.

3. In Godfried Kneller's portrait of Peter I, which was created during the Tsar's stay in Europe, a distinct mole is clearly visible. In later portraits the mole is missing. This is difficult to explain by the inaccurate works of portrait painters of that time: after all, portraiture of those years was distinguished by the highest level of realism.

4. Returning after a long trip to Europe, the newly-minted tsar did not know about the location of the richest library of Ivan the Terrible, although the secret of the location of the library was passed from tsar to tsar. Thus, Princess Sophia knew where the library was located and visited it, and the new Peter repeatedly made attempts to find the library and did not even disdain excavations: after all, the library of Ivan the Terrible contained rare publications that could shed light on many secrets of history.

5. An interesting fact is the composition of the Russian embassy that went to Europe. The number of people accompanying the tsar was 20, and the embassy was headed by A. Menshikov. And the returning embassy consisted, with the exception of Menshikov, only of Dutch subjects. Moreover, the duration of the trip has increased many times over. The embassy went to Europe with the tsar for two weeks, and returned only after two years of stay.

6. Returning from Europe, the new tsar did not meet with either his relatives or his inner circle. And subsequently, in a short period of time, he got rid of his closest relatives in various ways.

7. The Sagittarius - the guards and elite of the tsarist army - suspected something was wrong and did not recognize the impostor. The Streltsy revolt that began was brutally suppressed by Peter. But the Streltsy were the most advanced and combat-ready military units that faithfully served the Russian tsars. Sagittarius became by inheritance, which indicates the highest level of these units.

Image from swordmaster.org

It is characteristic that the scale of the destruction of the Streltsy was more global than according to official sources. At that time, the number of Streltsy reached 20,000 people, and after the pacification of the Streltsy rebellion, the Russian army was left without infantry, after which a new set of recruits was made and a complete reformation of the active army. A notable fact is that in honor of the suppression of the Streltsy revolt, a commemorative medal was issued with inscriptions in Latin, which had never before been used in the minting of coins and medals in Rus'.

Image from oboudnoda.org

8. The imprisonment of his legal wife Evdokia Lopukhina in a monastery, which the tsar did in absentia while at the Grand Embassy in London. Moreover, after the death of Peter, Lopukhina, by order of Catherine I, was transferred to the Shlisselburg fortress, which was famous for its harsh conditions of detention. Subsequently, Peter would marry Marta Samuilovna Skavronskaya-Kruse, a native of the lower classes, who after his death would become Empress Catherine I.

Image from wikimedia.org

Now let's look at the greatest steps the newly-minted tsar took for Russia.

All official versions claim that Peter I was the greatest reformer who laid the foundations for the formation of the most powerful Russian Empire. In fact, the main activity of the impostor was to destroy the foundations of the former statehood and spirituality of the people. Among the most famous great “acts” of Peter there are both well-known and little-known facts that testify to the true appearance and reforms of the new king.

- Introduction of the Russian form of slavery- serfdom, which completely limited the rights of peasants both on old and conquered lands. In one form or another, the consolidation of peasants has existed since the 15th century, but Peter I carried out a tough reform in relation to the peasants, completely depriving them of their rights. A remarkable fact is the fact that serfdom was not widespread either in the Russian North or in Siberia.

- Carrying out tax reform with the introduction of a strict tax system. At the same time, small silver coins began to be replaced with copper ones. Having created the Ingermanland Chancellery, headed by Menshikov, Peter introduced ruinous taxes, which included taxes on private fishing, wearing a beard, and baths. Moreover, adherents of the old rituals were subject to double tax, which served as an additional incentive for the resettlement of the Old Believers to the most remote places of Siberia.

- Introduction of a new chronology system in Rus', which put an end to the countdown of time “from the creation of the world.” This innovation had a strong negative impact and became an additional incentive for the gradual eradication of the original Old Believer faith.

- Transfer of the capital from Moscow to the newly built St. Petersburg. Mention of Moscow as an ancient sacred place is found in many sources, including Daniil Andreev in his work “Rose of the World”. The change of capital also served to weaken spirituality and reduce the role of the merchants in Rus'.

The destruction of ancient Russian chronicles and the beginning of rewriting the history of Rus' with the help of German professors. This activity acquired a truly gigantic scale, which explains the minimal number of surviving historical documents.

- Refusal of Russian writing, which consisted of 151 characters, and the introduction of the new alphabet of Cyril and Methodius, which consisted of 43 characters. With this, Peter dealt a severe blow to the traditions of the people and stopped access to ancient written sources.

- Cancellation of Russian measurements, such as fathom, elbow, vershok, which subsequently caused dramatic changes in traditional Russian architecture and art.

- Reducing the influence of the merchant class and the development of the industrial class, who was given gigantic powers, even to the point of creating his own pocket armies.

- The most brutal military expansion into Siberia, which became the forerunner of the final destruction of Great Tartary. At the same time, a new religion was implanted in the conquered lands, and the lands were subject to severe taxes. The time of Peter also saw the peak of the looting of Siberian graves, the destruction of holy places and the local clergy. It was under Peter the Great’s rule that numerous detachments of mound workers appeared in Western Siberia, who, in search of gold and silver, opened old burial places and plundered holy and sacred places. Many of the most valuable “finds” made up the famous collection of Scythian gold of Peter I.

- Destruction of the system of Russian self-government- zemstvos and the transition to a bureaucratic system, which, as a rule, was headed by hirelings from Western Europe.

- The most severe repressions against the Russian clergy, the virtual destruction of Orthodoxy. The scale of repression against the clergy was global. One of Peter’s most significant punishers was his close associate Jacob Bruce, who became famous for his punitive expeditions to Old Believer monasteries and the destruction of ancient church books and property.

- Widespread distribution of narcotic drugs in Rus' that cause rapid and sustained addiction - alcohol, coffee and tobacco.

- Complete ban on growing amaranth, from which both butter and bread were made. This plant not only improves human health, but also prolongs life by 20-30%.

- Introduction of the provincial system and strengthening of the punitive role of the army. Often the right to collect taxes was given directly to the generals. And each province was obliged to maintain separate military units.

- The actual ruin of the population. So, A.T. Fomenko and G.V. Nosovsky point out that according to the 1678 census, 791,000 households were subject to taxation. And the general census conducted in 1710 showed only 637,000 households, and this despite the fairly large number of lands subordinated to Russia during this period. It is typical, but this only affected the increase in tax taxes. Thus, in provinces where the number of households was decreasing, taxes were collected according to the data of the old census, which led to the actual plunder and destruction of the population.

- Peter I distinguished himself for his atrocities in Ukraine. Thus, in 1708, the hetman’s capital, the city of Baturyn, was completely plundered and destroyed. More than 14,000 people out of the city's 20,000 population died in the bloody massacre. At the same time, Baturin was almost completely destroyed and burned, and 40 churches and monasteries were looted and desecrated.

Contrary to popular belief, Peter I was by no means a great military leader: de facto, he did not win a single significant war. The only “successful” campaign can only be considered the Northern War, which was rather sluggish and lasted for 21 years. This war caused irreparable damage to the Russian financial system and led to the virtual impoverishment of the population.

One way or another, all of Peter’s atrocities, called “reform activities” in official versions of history, were aimed at the complete eradication of both the culture and faith of the Russian people, and the culture and religion of the peoples living in the annexed territories. In fact, the newly-minted tsar caused irreparable damage to Russia, completely changing its culture, way of life and customs.

Do you have regular bouts of fear of certain things or phenomena? Obviously, this is a phobia - an obsessive state of fear. There are a huge number of types of phobias: obsessive fear of blushing - erythrophobia, fear of closed spaces - claustrophobia, fear of sharp objects - oxyphobia, fear of heights - gypsophobia. And there is even a fear of experiencing fear: phobophobia.

Here, for example, is a phobia described by a famous doctor. “He is frightened by a girl playing the flute; as soon as he hears the first note played on the flute, he is seized with horror.” The fear of the flute is called aulophobia, and the doctor who described this condition was Hippocrates.

Nowadays, doctors count more than 500 different phobias. No one knows for sure what the cause of the phobia is. Some experts believe that the nature of the phenomenon is psychological, others that it is biological. But there is more and more evidence that it is a combination of both. It is known that phobias tend to be inherited. If one of your parents had a phobia, you may be predisposed to it, but not necessarily the same one.

Some phobias are more severe than others. If your fears seriously interfere with your life, you should seek professional help. To one degree or another, every person has phobias, it’s just that not everyone is in a hurry to admit it. The greats were no exception. Here is a brief description of some of the phobias.

Napoleon was afraid of horses

One of the greatest historical characters, the conqueror of Europe, Napoleon Bonaparte was afraid of what do you think? - white horses. Psychiatrists see two phobias here: fear of horses (hippophobia) and fear of the color white (leukophobia). Numerous canvases where Bonaparte is depicted riding a white horse are nothing more than the artist’s imagination. The short artilleryman hated and feared these animals, however, they were never in his stables.

Peter the Great avoided free space

However, Russian autocrats were not without some phobias. When visiting the house of Peter the Great and his summer palace in St. Petersburg, one is struck by the modesty of the autocrat: low ceilings, small rooms. The summer house generally has a so-called “false ceiling”: a lower one is suspended from a higher one, creating the feeling of a box. It turned out that it was not a matter of modesty. The king could not feel comfortable in large spacious rooms with high ceilings. This indicates ecophobia and spacephobia (fear of one's home and empty spaces). Peter’s phobias were not limited to these: all his life he suffered from acarophobia (fear of insects).

The Generalissimo's Fears

The fears of Comrade Stalin, obviously, largely determined the tragic fate of many of his comrades. Thus, the Generalissimo suffered from toxicophobia (fear of poisoning). Stalin was also pathologically afraid of air travel (aviaphobia). So, being commander-in-chief, he was never at the front. And he went to Potsdam for the peace conference by train under heavy security. In addition, Stalin's famous night vigils make it possible to suspect that he had somniphobia (fear of going to bed). It is known that he fell asleep in a state of complete exhaustion, to which he brought himself at night.

Gogol foresaw the future

Nikolai Gogol suffered from tatephobia (fear of being buried alive) from his youth. This fear was so painful that he repeatedly gave written instructions to bury him only when signs of obvious decomposition appeared. In addition, from the age of thirty, Gogol suffered from pathophobia - a fear of diverse things.

Fear of women: it happens

The outstanding Russian artist, author of “The Demon,” Mikhail Vrubel experienced fear of the women he liked (caliginephobia). In his youth, due to an unsuccessful love, he cut his chest with a knife. Lost and timid in front of the object of his love, the artist easily resorted to the services of prostitutes. From one of them he contracted syphilis, which led him to loss of vision and damage to the nervous system.

Reading time: 8 min

Peter I is a great Russian emperor and an incredibly attractive and creative personality, so interesting facts from the biography of the tsar of the Romanov dynasty will be of interest to everyone. I will try to tell you something that is definitely impossible to find in any school textbooks.

According to the new style, Peter the Great was born on June 8, according to the zodiac sign - Gemini. It is not surprising that it was Peter the Great who became an innovator for the conservative Russian Empire. Gemini is an air sign, which is characterized by ease in decision-making, a sharp mind and amazing imagination. Only the “horizon of expectation” usually does not justify itself: the rough reality is too different from the blue dreams.

An unusual fact about the character of Peter the Great

According to calculations of the Pythagorean square, the character of Peter 1 consists of three units, which means that the emperor had a calm character. It is believed that a person with three or four units is most suitable for working in government agencies.

For example, a person with one or five or six units has a despotic character and is ready to “go over their heads” for the sake of power. So, Peter the Great had all the prerequisites for occupying the royal throne.

Is he the heir?

There is an opinion that Peter the Great is not the natural son of Alexei Mikhailovich Romanov. The fact is that the future emperor was in good health, unlike his brother Fyodor and sister Natalya. But this is just a guess. But the birth of Peter was predicted by Simeon of Polotsk, he informed the sovereign that he would soon have a son, who would go down in Russian history as a great almighty!

But the Emperor’s wife, Catherine I, was of peasant origin. By the way, this is the first woman who was aware of all government affairs. Peter discussed everything with her and listened to any advice.

Innovator

Peter the Great introduced many new ideas into Russian life.

• While traveling in Holland, I noticed that skating is much more convenient if they are not tied to shoes, but are tightly attached to special boots.

• To prevent the soldiers from confusing right and left, Peter I ordered hay to be tied to the left leg and straw to the right. During drill training, the commander, instead of the usual “right - left”, commanded “hay - straw”. By the way, previously only educated people were able to distinguish between right and left.
• Peter intensively struggled with drunkenness, especially among the courtiers. To completely eradicate the disease, he came up with his own system: giving out seven-kilogram cast-iron medals for every binge. This award was hung around your neck at the police station and you had to wear it for at least 7 days! It was impossible to remove it on your own, and asking someone else was dangerous.
• Peter I was impressed by the beauty of overseas tulips; he brought flower bulbs from Holland to Russia in 1702.

Peter I's favorite pastime was dentistry; he took such interest in pulling out diseased teeth from anyone who asked. But sometimes he got so carried away that he could vomit even healthy ones!

Substitution of Peter I

The most unusual and interesting fact in Russian history. Researchers A. Fomenko and G. Nosovsky claim that there was a substitution and provide significant evidence to confirm it. In those days, the names of the future heirs to the throne were given in accordance with the day of the angel and the Orthodox canons, and this is where a discrepancy emerged: the birthday of Peter the Great falls in the name Isaac.

From his youth, Peter the Great was distinguished by his love for everything Russian: he wore a traditional caftan. But after a two-year stay in Europe, the sovereign began to wear exclusively fashionable European clothes and never again put on his once beloved Russian caftan.

• Researchers claim that the impostor who returned from distant countries had a body structure different from Peter the Great. The impostor turned out to be taller and thinner. It is believed that Peter 1 was not actually two meters tall before; this is logical, because his father’s height was 170 cm, his grandfather - 167. And the king who came from Europe was 204 cm. Therefore, there is a version that the impostor did not wear the king's favorite clothing due to the discrepancy in size.
• Peter I had a mole on his nose, but after his stay in Europe, the mole mysteriously disappeared, this is confirmed by numerous portraits of the sovereign.
• When Peter returned from a campaign abroad, he did not know where the oldest library of Ivan the Terrible was located, although the secret of its location was passed down from generation to generation. Princess Sophia constantly visited her, and the new Peter could not find the repository of rare publications.
• When Peter returned from Europe, his entourage consisted of Dutchmen, although when the tsar just set off on his journey there was a Russian embassy of 20 people with him. Where 20 Russian subjects went during the two years of the Tsar’s stay in Europe remains a mystery.
• After arriving in Russia, Peter the Great tried to avoid his relatives and associates, and then got rid of everyone in different ways.

It was the archers who announced that the returning Peter was an impostor! And they staged a riot, which was brutally suppressed. This is very strange, because only those close to the tsar were selected for the Streltsy troops, the title of Streltsy was inherited with the confirmation of the tsar.

Therefore, each of these people was definitely dear to Peter the Great before his trip to Europe, and now he suppressed the uprising in the most brutal way; according to historical data, 20 thousand people were killed. After this, the army was completely reorganized.

In addition, while in London, Peter the Great imprisoned his wife Lopukhina in a monastery without announcing the reason and took as his wife the peasant woman Marta Samuilovna Skavronskaya-Kruse, who in the future would become Empress Catherine I.

Researchers note that the calm and fair Peter the Great became a real despot after returning from a campaign abroad.

All his orders were aimed at destroying Russian heritage: Russian history was rewritten by German professors, many Russian chronicles disappeared without a trace, a new chronology system was introduced, the abolition of customary measures of measurement, repressions against the clergy, the eradication of Orthodoxy, the spread of alcohol, tobacco and coffee, the ban on growing medicinal amaranth and much more.

Is this really so, one can only guess; all the historical documents of those times that we have cannot be considered valid, because everything was rewritten many times. We can only guess and assume; you can also watch a film on this topic.

In any case, Peter I is a significant figure in Russian history.