The empress was a great lover of art and books, and ordered the construction of the Hermitage in 1770 to house her expanding collection of paintings, sculpture, and books. The construction was supervised by his fellow architect Ilya Neyelov and the master mason Pinchetti. Her tomb, from which her body was removed in 1910, still remains in Cathedrale Notre-Dame in Lausanne. In 1769, a last major Crimean–Nogai slave raid, which ravaged the Russian held territories in Ukraine, saw the capture of up to 20,000 slaves. [50] In a 1790 letter to Baron de Grimm written in French, she called the Qianlong emperor "mon voisin chinois aux petits yeux" ("my Chinese neighbour with small eyes"). 1892 This is the first in a series of biographical essays about the men who served Emperor Nicholas II between 1894 to 1917, researched primarily from Russian sources by Independent Researcher Paul Gilbert. fue un militar y estadista ruso, que disfrutó de gran protagonismo durante el reinado de Catalina II de Rusia Catherine wanted to become an empress herself and did not want another heir to the throne. Potemkin had the task of briefing him and travelling with him to Saint Petersburg. The serfs had very limited rights, but they were not exactly slaves before the rule of Catherine. [6][failed verification], Sophie's childhood was very uneventful apart from the duel. Theodore (Fedor) Grigorievich Orlov, Count (1741-1796), Russian general, first distinguished himself in the Seven Years' War. Orlov was no statesman, but he had a quick wit, a fairly accurate appreciation of current events, and was a useful and sympathetic counselor during the earlier portion of Catherine's reign. born Oct. 8 [Oct. 19, New Style], 1786, Moscow, Russia. In the south, the Crimean Khanate was crushed following victories over the Bar confederation and Ottoman Empire in the Russo-Turkish War, 1768-1774 due to the support of the United Kingdom, and Russia colonised the territories of Novorossiya along the coasts of the Black and Azov Seas. By 1759, Catherine and he had become lovers; no one told Catherine's husband, the Grand Duke Peter. Catherine's undated will, discovered in early 1792 by her secretary Alexander Vasilievich Khrapovitsky among her papers, gave specific instructions should she die: "Lay out my corpse dressed in white, with a golden crown on my head, and on it inscribe my Christian name. The Corps then began to take children from a very young age and educate them until the age of 21, with a broadened curriculum that included the sciences, philosophy, ethics, history, and international law. In 1796, immediately after the death of Catherine II, on the orders of her son and successor Paul I, Peter’s remains were transferred first to the church in the Winter Palace and then to the Peter and Paul Cathedral, the burial site of the Romanovs. [81] She wrote comedies, fiction, and memoirs. ", Alan W. Fisher, "Şahin Girey, the reformer khan, and the Russian annexation of the Crimea. Elizabeth requested her legal heir from Catherine. [121] Orthodox Russians disliked the inclusion of Judaism, mainly for economic reasons. The imperial couple moved into the new Winter Palace in Saint Petersburg. The attitude of the serfs toward their autocrat had historically been a positive one. [86] In the third category fell the work of Voltaire, Friedrich Melchior, Baron von Grimm, Ferdinando Galiani, Nicolas Baudeau and Sir William Blackstone. The ultimate goal for the Russian government, however, was to topple the anti-Russian shah (king), and to replace him with a half-brother, Morteza Qoli Khan, who had defected to Russia and was therefore pro-Russian. Peace ensued for 20 years in spite of the assassination of Gustav III in 1792. She sent the Russian army into Poland to avoid possible disputes. Mistresses and minions of Russian Emperors and Empresses, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Grigory_Orlov&oldid=987899316, Russian military personnel of the Seven Years' War, Wikipedia articles with SNAC-ID identifiers, Wikipedia articles with SUDOC identifiers, Wikipedia articles with WORLDCATID identifiers, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 9 November 2020, at 22:09. Under her leadership, she completed what Peter III had started: The church's lands were expropriated, and the budget of both monasteries and bishoprics were controlled by the College of Economy. However, if the tsar's policies were too extreme or too disliked, she was not considered the true tsar. She had the book burned and the author exiled to Siberia. Madame Vigée Le Brun vividly describes the empress in her memoirs:[93], Madame Vigée Le Brun also describes the empress at a gala:[94], Catherine held western European philosophies and culture close to her heart, and she wanted to surround herself with like-minded people within Russia. [46], In the Far East, Russians became active in fur trapping in Kamchatka and the Kuril Islands. Catherine separated the Jews from Orthodox society, restricting them to the Pale of Settlement. Finally, it was the Annals by Tacitus that caused what she called a "revolution" in her teenage mind as Tacitus was the first intellectual she read who understood power politics as they are, not as they should be. [100] This work emphasised the fostering of the creation of a 'new kind of people' raised in isolation from the damaging influence of a backward Russian environment. As the president of the Free Economic Society, he was also their most prominent advocate in the great commission of 1767, though he aimed primarily at pleasing the empress, who affected great liberality in her earlier years. This spurred Russian interest in opening trade with Japan to the south for supplies and food. Historical accounts portray Johanna as a cold, abusive woman who loved gossip and court intrigues. After this over the years Catherine carried on sexual liaisons with many men, including Stanisław August Poniatowski, Grigory Grigoryevich Orlov (1734–1783), Alexander Vasilchikov, Grigory Potemkin, and others. Grigory Potemkin was involved in the coup d'état of 1762. [12], Sophie first met her future husband, who would become Peter III of Russia, at the age of 10. The serfs probably followed someone who was pretending to be the true tsar because of their feelings of disconnection to Catherine and her policies empowering the nobles, but this was not the first time they followed a pretender under Catherine's reign. At the time of Catherine's reign, the landowning noble class owned the serfs, who were bound to the land they tilled. [96], Catherine appointed Ivan Betskoy as her advisor on educational matters. But Russia's Baltic Fleet checked the Royal Swedish navy in a tied battle of Hogland (July 1788), and the Swedish army failed to advance. The statute sought to efficiently govern Russia by increasing population and dividing the country into provinces and districts. Given the frequency which this story was repeated together with Catherine's love of her adopted homeland and her hippophilia, it was an easy step to apply this scurrilous story as the cause of her death. In 1771, he was sent as first Russian plenipotentiary to the peace congress of Focşani, but he failed in his mission, owing partly to the obstinacy of the Ottomans, and partly (according to Panin) to his own outrageous insolence. Old Believers were allowed to hold elected municipal positions after the Urban Charter of 1785, and she promised religious freedom to those who wished to settle in Russia. The artist M.O. Assisted by highly successful generals such as Alexander Suvorov and Pyotr Rumyantsev, and admirals such as Samuel Greig and Fyodor Ushakov, she governed at a time when the Russian Empire was expanding rapidly by conquest and diplomacy. In 1783, storms drove a Japanese sea captain, Daikokuya Kōdayū, ashore in the Aleutian Islands, at that time Russian territory. Orlov (Russian: Орлóв) is the name of a Russian noble family which produced several distinguished statesmen, diplomats and soldiers. He led the coup which overthrew Catherine's husband Peter III of Russia, and installed Catherine as empress. Grigory Orlov was born on October 17, 1734, into a Russian noble family which produced several distinguished statesmen, diplomats, and soldiers. [36], Peter the Great had succeeded in gaining a toehold in the south, on the edge of the Black Sea, in the Azov campaigns. [112] Nevertheless, Catherine's Russia provided an asylum and a base for regrouping to the Jesuits following the suppression of the Jesuits in most of Europe in 1773. By 1782, Catherine arranged another advisory commission to review the information she had gathered on the educational systems of many different countries. Grigory was born in 1734 in the family of state councilor Grigory Ivanovich Orlov, who rather late married Lukerya Ivanovna Zinovyeva. In the east, Russia started to colonise Alaska, establishing Russian America. According to Alexander Hertzen, who edited the version of Catherine's memoirs, while living at Oranienbaum, Catherine had her first sexual relationship with Sergei Saltykov as her marriage to Peter had not been consummated, as Catherine later claimed. / 5 de octubre de 1737 greg.-24 de diciembre de 1807 jul. [143] An autopsy confirmed stroke as the cause of death. Grigory Orlov Grigory Orlov was a Russian statesman and favorite of Catherine the Great who organized the coup to place her on the Russian throne and subsequently helped the Empress rule the country. Poland ceased to exist as an independent nation.[139]. Russia got territories east of the line connecting, more or less, Riga–Polotsk–Mogilev. While the gift was unsuccessful in maintaining Catherine’s affection for him, his name will forever be associated with one of the greatest diamonds in the world. Russian economic development was well below the standards in western Europe. Peter also still played with toy soldiers. As Duke of Holstein-Gottorp, Peter planned war against Denmark, Russia's traditional ally against Sweden. The endowments were often much less than the original intended amount. Converted Jews could gain permission to enter the merchant class and farm as free peasants under Russian rule. At first, she simply attempted to revise clerical studies, proposing a reform of religious schools. The positions on the Assembly were appointed and paid for by Catherine and her government as a way of regulating religious affairs. https://painting-planet.com/portrait-of-count-g-g-orlov-in-lats-by-fedor-rokotov 485-496. In 1785, Catherine declared Jews to be officially foreigners, with foreigners' rights. The empress prepared the "Instructions for the Guidance of the Assembly", pillaging (as she frankly admitted) the philosophers of Western Europe, especially Montesquieu and Cesare Beccaria.[88][89]. ", James A. Duran, "The Reform of Financial Administration in Russia during the Reign of Catherine II.". The British ambassador James Harris, 1st Earl of Malmesbury reported back to London: Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, the British ambassador to Russia, offered Stanisław Poniatowski a place in the embassy in return for gaining Catherine as an ally. [102], Not long after the Moscow Foundling Home, at the instigation of her factotum, Ivan Betskoy, she wrote a manual for the education of young children, drawing from the ideas of John Locke, and founded the famous Smolny Institute in 1764, first of its kind in Russia. However, usually, if the serfs did not like the policies of the tsar, they saw the nobles as corrupt and evil, preventing the people of Russia from communicating with the well-intentioned tsar and misinterpreting her decrees. She bore him a daughter named Anna Petrovna in December 1757 (not to be confused with Grand Duchess Anna Petrovna of Russia, the daughter of Peter I's second marriage). To rekindle Catherine's affection, Grigory presented to her one of the greatest diamonds of the world, known ever since as the Orlov Diamond. By 1786, Catherine excluded all religion and clerical studies programs from lay education. See, harvnb error: multiple targets (2×): CITEREFMassie2011 (, Frank T. Brechka, "Catherine the Great: The Books She Read. Her rise to power was supported by her mother's wealthy relatives, who were both nobles and royal relations. After defeating Polish loyalist forces in the Polish–Russian War of 1792 and in the Kościuszko Uprising (1794), Russia completed the partitioning of Poland, dividing all of the remaining Commonwealth territory with Prussia and Austria (1795). ", when Catherine angrily dismissed his accusation. They had an illegitimate son, Aleksey who was named after the village of Bobriki, and from whom descends the line of the Count Bobrinsky.