Imperial Russia

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The Romanovs: An Imperial Family (Romanovy: Ventsenosnaya Semya) - with ENGLISH subtitles (Import) Sale Price: $24.99   Eligible for free shipping! Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days

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Imperial List Price: $59.99 Sale Price: $37.16 You save: $22.83 (38%)   Eligible for free shipping! Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days

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Victoria's Secret Fashion Show 2005 - Imperial Russia

A long and violent history of Russia. Peter the Great. Part1

The early Romanovs were undistinguished rules, but at the close of the 17th century that dynasty gave Russia a Tsar who was as powerful as Ivan the Terrible, yet without Ivan's destructiveness. He was peter the Great, the architect of modern Russia.

Like Ivan, peter suffered a traumatic childhood. His father died when ha was 10, and the boy was named co-Tsar, forced by court politics to share the title with a mentally retarded half-brother. He grew up an eyewitness to vicious power struggles and even murders in the corridors of the Kremlin: he once saw a close family friend dragged from a hiding place and killed.

But Peter was frequently able to escape to the imperial estate outside Moscow. There he led a remarkably free existence, roaming the countryside by himself and wandering through the local village. By watching and helping, he acquired an astonishing set of skills. Although his talents may have been exaggerated in contemporary accounts, he could it was said build a stone house, cobble shoes, pull teeth, even cast a cannon.

According to one story, the young peter came upon a sailing-boat in the imperial storehouse and was struck by its unusual design. Unlike the flat-bottomed craft that plied Russian rivers, this one was a round-bottomed boat, with a pointed prow and a keel. Peter put it in the water and found a Dutch-born boatbuilder to teach him how to sail it. From this experience may have come Peter's lifelong love of boats and the sea, a passion that would eventually lead him to establish the Russian Navy.

In 1696, when Peter was 24, his half-brother died and Peter became sole ruler. By this time he was a giant of a man, 2.03 metres tall and of legendary strength. It was said that he could bend heavy silver plates as if they were paper and could fell a tree with an axe in seconds. His appetite for food and drink was gargantuan, and he preferred to indulge it in the easy company of the foreign craftsmen – English, Scottish, Swiss and Danish – who lived in Moscow. At court, he hugely enjoyed telling coarse jokes that offended many of his listeners.

Peter saw that Russia was backward socially and technologically, and he determined to "open window to the West" for progressive European ideas. Accordingly, he set forth in 1697 for an epoch-making tour of Europe.

Peter was travelling incognito, as "Seaman Peter Mikhailov". But this pose was less than successful, since the "seaman" had a retinue of about 270 people. His journey, which lasted for 18 months, took him to Germany, then down to the Rhine River to Holland, where he lived and worked for three months as a carpenter in a shipyard, earning a shipbuilder's certificate. Elsewhere, he studied anatomy and surgery by watching a dissection, explored museums art galleries, and learnt how to cup up whale blubber. In England, he observed Parliament in session from the upper galleries.

The English government lodged him in a nobleman's house. This he left in such disarray – its furniture broken, its portraits used for target practice – that the owner submitted a large bill for damages. According to one story, Peter paid up by hanging the man a huge uncut diamond wrapped in a piece of dirty paper.

Peter planned to visit Venice next, but his trip was cut short by news of a palace revolt. In his absence, conservative officers of the Streltsy Guard, fearful of his innovative ideas, sought to depose him. Peter rushed home in a fury, only to find that the uprising had already been put down, with hundreds of rebels killed and more than a thousand thrown in jail. But Peter was not satisfied. He ordered the prisoners to be roasted alive on a spit, one by one.  As each one neared death, his head was chopped off (Peter himself reputedly participated in this grisly finale). Then Peter had the heads impaled and placed throughout Moscow, to rot.

For all his barbaric behaviour, Peter continued to believe that Russia should be modernized. He began symbolically, compelling Russians to adopt the Western styles of dress he had observed in Europe. Men were ordered to shave their beards or else pay a tax; Peter even assisted in the shaving of some noblemen. Short coats were to be substituted for the long Russian kaftan; women were to shed their veils and attend parties in the tight-waisted, deeply cut gowns worn by French ladies.

His other reforms were more practical. He encouraged the construction of factories and founded schools of mathematics, navigation, astronomy, medicine, philosophy, geography and politics. He also started the first Russian newspaper, ordered the printing of 600 books and built a theatre in Moscow's Red Square.

About the Author

Stephanie Kio runs several bilingual websites with different themes - including coffee makers website in English and Russian. On this website you can read more quality information on the best Cuisinart Home Coffee Makers and many other brands.