Peter the Great
Peter grew up at Izmaylovo Estate, where his education began under tutors commissioned by his father. Nikita Zotov, Patrick Gordon, and Paul Menesius taught the young boy during these early years. When his father died in 1676, sovereignty passed to Peter's elder half-brother Feodor III. The government was largely run by Artamon Matveyev, a political head of the Naryshkin family who served as one of Peter's greatest childhood benefactors.
This arrangement changed when Feodor died in 1682 without leaving any children. A dispute arose between the Miloslavsky family and the Naryshkin family over who should inherit the throne. The Boyar Duma chose the ten-year-old Peter to become tsar, with his mother acting as regent. A hole was cut in the back of the double-seated throne used by Ivan and Peter so that Sophia could sit behind the throne and whisper information to the two boys while they conversed with nobles.
The Moscow Grand Discharge started in 1677 and was completed in 1688, affecting noble families with high ranks in administration. This provoked fierce reactions from those affected. Sophia led a rebellion of the streltsy in April and May 1682. In the subsequent conflict, some of Peter's relatives and friends were murdered, including Artamon Matveyev. Peter witnessed acts of political violence during these turbulent years.
From 1682 to 1689, Peter and his mother were banned to Preobrazhenskoye. At age sixteen, he discovered an English boat on the estate and had it restored. He learned to sail and received a sextant, though he did not know how to use it initially. Peter became fascinated by sundials and began searching for foreign experts in the German Quarter. He befriended Andrew Vinius, a bibliophile who taught him Dutch, along with two Dutch carpenters named Frans Timmerman and Karsten Brandt.
In March 1697, Peter traveled incognito to Western Europe on an eighteen-month journey with a large Russian delegation known as the Grand Embassy. He used a fake name to escape social and diplomatic events, yet his height made deception difficult since he stood taller than most others. One goal was to seek aid from European monarchs, but Peter's hopes were dashed when France remained a traditional ally of the Ottoman Sultan.
Peter arrived in Zaandam on the 18th of August 1697, after renting a ship in Emmerich am Rhein. He studied sawmills, manufacturing, and shipbuilding there before leaving after one week. The log-cabin he rented became known as the Czar Peter House. Through the mediation of Nicolaas Witsen, an expert on Russia, the tsar gained practical experience in a shipyard belonging to the Dutch East India Company for four months under Gerrit Claesz Pool's supervision.
During this stay, Peter assisted in constructing an East Indiaman named Peter and Paul specially laid down for him. He felt that the ship's carpenters in Holland worked too much by eye and lacked accurate construction drawings. The tsar engaged many skilled workers including builders of locks, fortresses, shipwrights, and seamen. Cornelis Cruys, a vice-admiral who later became Peter's advisor in maritime affairs under Franz Lefort, joined the effort.
In England, Peter arrived at Victoria Embankment on the 11th of January 1698 with four chamberlains, three interpreters, two clockmakers, a cook, a priest, six trumpeters, seventy soldiers from the Preobrazhensky regiment, four dwarfs, and a monkey purchased in Amsterdam. Jacob Bruce accompanied him throughout these travels. At some point during his visit, Peter had an affair with actress Letitia Cross while staying at twenty-one Norfolk Street.
Peter declared war on Sweden which was led by the young King Charles XII. Russia was ill-prepared to fight the Swedes, and their first attempt at seizing the Baltic coast ended in disaster at the Battle of Narva in 1700. During this conflict, Charles XII attacked immediately using a blinding snowstorm to his advantage rather than employing slow methodical siege tactics.
After the battle, Charles XII decided to concentrate forces against the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, giving Peter time to reorganize the Russian army. He conquered Nyenschantz in the Ingrian campaign. Following the defeat at Narva, Peter ordered church bells melted into cannons and mortars for future use. In 1701, he ordered construction of Novodvinsk Fortress north of Archangelsk.
While Poles fought the Swedes, Peter founded Saint Petersburg on the 29th of June 1703 on Hare Island. He forbade building stone edifices outside Saint Petersburg so that all stonemasons could participate in constructing the new city. While the city developed along the Neva River, Peter lived in a modest three-room log cabin with a study but without a fireplace. The first buildings appearing were a shipyard at the Admiralty, Kronstadt between 1704 and 1706, and the Peter and Paul Fortress in 1706.
In July 1708, Charles defeated Peter at Golovchin after crossing into Russia. However, in the Battle of Lesnaya, Charles suffered his first loss when Peter crushed Swedish reinforcements marching from Riga. Deprived of this aid, Charles abandoned his proposed march on Moscow. The Swedish army was forced to halt its advance during winter 1708-1709 due to scorched earth tactics employed by Russian forces.
In 1711, Peter established by decree a new state body known as the Governing Senate. Normally the Boyar duma would have exercised power during the monarch's absence, but Peter mistrusted the boyars. He abolished the Duma and created a Senate of ten members to supervise all judicial, financial, and administrative affairs. Originally established only for the time of the monarch's absence, the Senate became a permanent body after his return.
A special high official called the Ober-Procurator served as the link between ruler and senate, acting in Peter's own words as the sovereign's eye. Without his signature no Senate decision could go into effect. This institution became one of the most important bodies of Imperial Russia throughout subsequent centuries.
After 1718, Peter established collegiums replacing old central agencies including foreign affairs, war, navy, expense, income, justice, and inspection departments. Each college consisted of a president, vice-president, councilors, assessors, and procurator. Some foreigners were included in various colleges but never as presidents since Peter lacked enough loyal or educated persons to put in full charge of departments.
Peter issued decrees establishing an Engineering School in Sukharev Tower in 1701, 1705, and 1712 which was supposed to recruit up to one hundred students but had only twenty-three. Therefore he issued another decree in 1714 calling for compulsory education dictating that all Russian ten-to-fifteen-year-old children of nobility must learn basic arithmetic, trigonometry, and geometry.
In December 1699, Peter introduced the Julian calendar changing the celebration date from September 1 to January 1. Traditionally years were reckoned from the purported creation of the World, but after reforms they counted from Christ's birth. Thus in year 7207 of the old Russian calendar, Peter proclaimed the Julian Calendar effective making it year 1700.
On the shores of the Neva River, Peter founded Saint Petersburg, a city famously dubbed by Francesco Algarotti as the window to the West. In 1712, Peter relocated the capital from Moscow to St. Petersburg, a status retained until 1918. He commanded courtiers and officials to wear European clothing without caftans and cut off long beards causing Boyars and Old Believers great upset since they were very fond of their facial hair.
Boyars seeking to retain beards paid an annual beard tax of one hundred rubles. In the same year, Peter sought to end arranged marriages which were norm among Russian nobility because he thought such practice barbaric and led to domestic violence when partners resented each other. The tsar also ordered civil script reform largely designed by himself replacing Cyrillic numerals with Arabic ones between 1705 and 1710.
Peter encouraged research of deformities while trying to debunk superstitious fear of monsters. He had a cabinet of curiosities containing malformed creatures or exceptions to natural law. Some three thousand five hundred new words entered Russian during his period, roughly one-fourth being shipping and naval terms originating from German, French, Dutch, English, Italian, and Swedish languages.
In 1700, when the office fell vacant, Peter refused to name a replacement for Patriarch of Moscow allowing the patriarch's coadjutor to discharge duties. Peter could not tolerate the patriarch exercising power superior to the tsar as indeed happened in case of Philaret between 1619 and 1633 and Nikon between 1652 and 1666. The Alexander Nevsky Lavra was constructed between 1710 and 1712 while Saints Peter and Paul Cathedral developed between 1712 and 1733.
In 1716 he invited Theophan Prokopovich, a pietist and astronomer, to come to capital. The Ecclesiastical Regulations of 1721 based on ideas of August Hermann Francke abolished the patriarchate replacing it with Holy Synod under control of Procurator. In 1721, Peter followed advice of Prokopovich designing Holy Synod as council of ten clergymen.
For leadership in church, Peter turned increasingly to Ukrainians who were more open to reform but not well loved by Russian clergy. He implemented law stipulating no Russian man could join monastery before age fifty since too many able men wasted on clerical work when they could join new improved army. Peter had great interest in dissenters visiting gatherings of Quakers and Mennonites without believing in miracles.
Peter's legacy has always been major concern of Russian intellectuals since his death. Some believe reforms divided country socially and weakened it spiritually. Riasanovsky points to paradoxical dichotomy in black and white images such as God versus Antichrist, educator versus ignoramus, architect of Russia's greatness versus destroyer of national culture, father of country versus scourge of common man.
Voltaire's 1759 biography gave eighteenth-century Russians a man of Enlightenment while Alexander Pushkin's The Bronze Horseman poem of 1833 provided powerful romantic image of creator-god. Slavophiles in mid-nineteenth century deplored westernization of Russia which they viewed as destruction of traditional values. Western writers recounted secret will supposedly revealing grand evil plot for world control via conquest of Constantinople, Afghanistan, and India though forgery made in Paris at Napoleon's command during invasion of Russia in 1812.
Stalin admired how Peter strengthened state, wartime diplomacy, industry, higher education, and government administration writing in 1928 about original attempt to leap out framework of backwardness. Soviet historiography emphasizes both positive achievement and negative factor of oppressing common people. After fall of Communism in 1991 scholars and general public gave fresh attention to Peter role in Russian imperial past seeing reign as decisive formative event.
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Common questions
When did Peter the Great become tsar of Russia?
Peter the Great became tsar on the 27th of February 1682 when the Boyar Duma chose him at age ten. His mother acted as regent while he shared a double-seated throne with his half-brother Ivan V.
Where was Peter the Great born and raised during his early years?
Peter grew up at Izmaylovo Estate where his education began under tutors commissioned by his father. He later lived in Preobrazhenskoye from 1682 to 1689 after being banned there along with his mother.
What major city did Peter the Great found on the Neva River?
Peter founded Saint Petersburg on the 29th of June 1703 on Hare Island. He relocated the capital from Moscow to this new city in 1712, retaining that status until 1918.
How many years did Peter the Great rule as tsar of Russia?
Peter ruled as tsar from 1682 to 1725 for a total of forty-three years. He died in 1725 leaving behind a legacy of significant reforms and territorial expansion.
When did Peter the Great introduce the Julian calendar to Russia?
Peter introduced the Julian calendar in December 1699 changing the celebration date from September 1 to January 1. This reform made year 7207 of the old Russian calendar become year 1700 counting from Christ's birth.