Intoxicated with wine and malice,
The killers are coming in secret,
Insolence on the faces, fear in the heart ...
The unfaithful sentry is silent,
The drawbridge was lowered silently,
The gates are open in the darkness of the night
The hand of treachery hired...
A.S. Pushkin
M
Ikhailovsky or Engineering Castle of St. Petersburg.
It is not only a historical and architectural monument. This is the mystical castle-palace of Emperor Paul I, which became a predictor of his death. Around it, legends and traditions of past centuries are twisted, and even now there is still a lot of mystical and inexplicable in the castle.
Some historical sources claim that the name is associated with the appearance of the Archangel Michael or his envoy to the guard soldier at the place where the castle was subsequently erected (perhaps in memory of this there is a small soldier in a niche near the bridge). This is how the decision of the sovereign was explained earlier, immediately after the start of construction, to call the castle "Mikhailovsky".
The palace was being built in an emergency... Pavel was in a hurry, taking building and finishing materials from other objects. And here's your first legend. Not only coins were laid in the foundation (as it should be for good luck). Pavel personally also laid commemorative jasper bricks.
I have a separate post about the construction of the castle-palace and its history in Pavlovian times and after it...
On November 8 (21), 1800, on the day of St. Michael the Archangel, the castle was solemnly consecrated, but work on its interior decoration still continued until March 1801. The assassination of the emperor took place 40 days after the housewarming...
In a niche near the bridge, steadfast tin soldiers stand guard day and night. Even the shadow of the emperor is visible.
Some believe that this is Lieutenant Kizhe, a kind of Lieutenant Rzhevsky from the time of Paul I. He will bring good luck if you hit his head with a coin. Then he swears...
Listen carefully, the place where he will send you is the promised land for you... (just kidding).
The lieutenant is not the only mystical guardian of the Mikhailovsky Castle.
They say the ghost of the murdered Emperor Paul still walks at night through the dark corridors.
This is no longer a joke. His silhouette was seen immediately after his death, then during the years of revolutionary change. Even at the time of Soviet anti-religious terry atheism, the ghost regularly made you chatter your teeth in fear.
The spirit of the murdered emperor frightens both religious people and atheists. He usually arrives at exactly midnight. Pavel knocks, looks out the window, pulls the curtains, creaks the parquet... even winks, moving into his own portrait. Some see light from the glow of a candle that Paul's spirit carries before him.
Doors slam loudly here at night (even if all windows are closed). And the especially lucky and impressionable even hear the muffled sound of playing the flageolet - an ancient musical instrument, which the emperor loved to listen to during his lifetime ...
There is a belief that every year on the day of his death, Paul stands at his bedroom window and looks down. He counts passers-by... and takes the soul of the 48th with him... however, you shouldn't panic, it's just a legend. And he can take the soul only if the moon is bright in the sky.
Attention! In order not to incur the wrath of a ghost, you need to lower your head when you meet and say: “Good night, Your Imperial Majesty!”. The emperor will immediately disappear... otherwise, there may be trouble.
Shalit and a portrait of the emperor... for those who are interested, watch the video in the post under the link below.
In addition, according to legend, a casket with great Christian relics of the Order of Malta, including the Grail, is hidden in the dungeons of the Mikhailovsky Castle. This legend is not based on an empty place! I have already written about it in detail, so I will not repeat myself.
During the Great Patriotic War, the military received information from the deceased monk about a secret room under the cellars of the castle where there is a silver casket with Christian relics and a certain mystical object that allowed you to travel in time and look into the future.
After the war, a commission on anomalous phenomena worked in the palace. Whether the reason was the desire to find the casket or frequent complaints about ghosts, it is no longer possible to find out. But the commission, which consisted of Soviet atheist scientists, counted more than 17 inexplicable facts and inexplicable night glows (ghosts) in the castle. The materials were classified - no one was going to frighten the religious population and amuse the communists.
In 2003, a monument to Paul I by the sculptor V. E. Gorevoy, architect V. I. Nalivaiko was erected in the courtyard of the castle.
Surprisingly, during the repair, an old plafond (a huge painting on the ceiling) from the main hall of the Catherine Palace was found in it. Previously, the ceiling was considered lost. Now it is in its historical place. The plafond was rolled up into a huge roll, which lay quietly near the corner, littered with various old rubbish. But there were inventories throughout the Soviet period! I wrote a detailed post on Mail about this, I will move it over time.
From secular legends - supposedly the color of the walls was chosen in honor of the glove of the Emperor's favorite Anna Gagarina (Lopukhina).
But it's time to move on to the main legend and the tragedy of the castle - assassination of Paul I
The brutal murder of Emperor Paul I in the Mikhailovsky Castle gave rise to many legends. According to testimonies, a few days before the murder, the spirit of Peter I appeared to Paul, who warned his grandson about the danger that threatened him. It was also said that on the day of the murder itself, Pavel saw in one of the mirrors a reflection of himself with a broken neck.
On the day of his death, Paul was cheerful. But at breakfast he suddenly became sad, then abruptly stood up and said, "What will be, that cannot be avoided!"
Some researchers believe that Paul knew about the imminent death and tried to avoid it in the palace. There is a legend that Hieroschemamonk Abel told Paul the approximate date of his death. Paul believed the soothsayers and this particular elder, because he accurately predicted the date of the death of his mother, Catherine the Great. Allegedly, Paul asked him about his death and heard in response - "The number of your years is like the count of the letters of the saying above the gates of your castle, in which the promise is truly about your royal family."
This inscription was a modified text of the Psalm of David (Ps. 92:6):
“YOUR HOUSE IS SUITABLE FOR THE HOLY HOUSE OF THE LORD IN THE LONGITY OF DAYS ”
This inscription with copper letters, by order of Paul, the builders brought from St. Isaac's Church, and for Isaac he was "stolen" from the Voskresensky Novodevichy Convent.
Perhaps by the holiness of the test, Paul wanted to remove the "curse" of prediction from himself. Or maybe he just gave himself into the hands of God.
There are 47 letters in the inscription, and Paul I was killed precisely at the age of 47.
When the conspirators came to kill Paul, he could use the secret passage that was in his bedroom. There was enough time for that. But for some reason, Pavel did not want to ... that he was hiding from the conspirators in the fireplace, it is quite possible that the assassins invented it.
An underground passage was dug from the Mikhailovsky Castle to the Vorontsov Palace. 3.5 km! It was at that time the longest underground passage in Russia, and possibly in the world. Some historians believe that it was on him that the conspirators entered the palace.
Here is the floor plan of the castle. I won’t write how the murder was committed, Google will tell about it no worse than me.
The conspirators failed to get him to abdicate the throne and ...
As you know, the emperor died from an apocalyptic blow ... with a snuffbox on the head (black humor of those times).
Not everyone knows that Pavel (for the first time for Russia), instead of the image of his profile, ordered the inscription to be minted on a silver ruble:
"NOT TO US, NOT TO US, BUT TO YOUR NAME."
The emperor took religion seriously.
Researchers generally consider the number 4 magical for Paul. The total term of Paul's reign is 4 years, 4 months and 4 days. Mikhailovsky Castle (his main and favorite brainchild) was under construction for 4 years. And only 40 days the emperor managed to live in it.
Engraving by Utwait after a drawing by Philippoto.
Pavel tried to make the castle impregnable. Perhaps he foresaw future upheavals (according to some reports, he was predicted the future of all the Romanovs) and Paul wanted to protect his descendants, build a protected house-fortress for them. Which would be guarded by soldiers and cannons and the Lord God himself.
The palace was surrounded by water from all sides - from the north and east by the Moika and Fontanka rivers, and from the south and west by the Church and Voznesensky canals. The palace could only be entered via three drawbridges, which were very heavily guarded. In addition to bayonets, Paul was protected by guns and secret passages and numerous secret rooms of the castle.
But all this did not help Paul. The elder's prophecy came true... and his castle, instead of a defender of the autocracy in Russia, turned into a mystical "dirty" place - no one else dared to trust the castle with their lives, because he could not even protect his creator, Emperor Paul.
It so happened that Paul I died in the same place where he was born. He erected the building of the Mikhailovsky Castle on the site of the wooden Summer Palace, where on October 1 (September 20), 1754, Grand Duchess Ekaterina Alekseevna gave birth to him...
The image of a ghost was actively used by senior cadets of the Nikolaev Engineering School, which settled in the Mikhailovsky Castle, to intimidate the younger ones.
The fame of the ghost of Pavel was brought by the story of N.S. Leskov "Ghost in the Engineering Castle".
In Soviet times, there were complaints about slamming doors, footsteps involuntarily opening the windows in the castle at night (which led to the alarm). In the 1980s, employees of the Commission on Anomalous Phenomena at the Russian Geographical Society of the Russian Academy of Sciences conducted a limited and unofficial study of the alleged anomalous activity in the building (which is simply amazing for that time).
The study consisted of a detailed interview of employees, shooting the premises with a film camera, measuring the magnetic field, and even examining the premises with a “frame” or “dowsing” place. The findings of the study are being kept secret.
They met a long time ago - great-grandfather with great-grandson ... I'm sure they had something to tell each other about. If Pavel were alive, the history of Russia would definitely have turned out differently. And not the fact that it would be less great, Paul was preparing to take India in alliance with Napoleon. At the very least, the war with Napoleon would certainly have been avoided, but it would obviously have been necessary, together with Napoleon, to fight with England and seize India. I don't even know which is better.
Some photos and info (C) Wikipedia and other Internet
Mikhailovsky (Engineering) Castle- one of the most unusual places in St. Petersburg, which is associated with many legends and legends. At this place, in the Summer Palace of Elizabeth Petrovna, Paul the First was born. Here, in his bedroom in the Mikhailovsky Castle, he was killed. It is said that his ghost still haunts these walls.
Mikhailovsky Castle in St. Petersburg, facade from the Moika
Previously, on the site of the Mikhailovsky Castle stood summer palace Empress Elizabeth Petrovna, built by the architect Bartolomeo Francesco Rastrelli (1700-1771) in 1741-1744. Here, on September 20, 1754, the future Emperor Paul was born. Over time, Elizabeth began to visit the Summer Palace less often, giving preference. The palace gradually deteriorated. First it was given to Grigory Orlov, then to Grigory Potemkin.
Summer Palace of Empress Elizabeth Petrovna in St. Petersburg. Hood. L.F. Bonstedt (based on a drawing by M. I. Makhaev, 1753), 1847
The legend about the beginning of the construction of the Mikhailovsky Castle
In 1796, the Summer Palace was demolished and the construction of the castle began in its place. There are several legends why this place was chosen. According to one of them, the emperor, being a mystically inclined person and possessing a certain gift of foresight, wished to die where he was born. According to another legend, the archangel Michael appeared to a soldier standing on guard. M.I. Pylyaev in his essay “Old Petersburg” describes this phenomenon in the following way (spelling preserved):
One day, a young man appeared in a radiance to a soldier who was on guard at the Summer Palace and told the dumbfounded sentry that he, the Archangel Michael, ordered him to go to the emperor and say that a temple was built on the site of this old Summer Palace in the name of the Archangel Michael. The soldier reported the vision he had had to his superiors, and when this was reported to the emperor, he replied: “I already know the desire of the Archangel Michael; his will will be done." Following this, he ordered the construction of a new palace, in which a church in the name of Archangel Michael should be built, and the palace itself was ordered to be called the Mikhailovsky Castle.
On November 28, 1796, in the first month of his accession to the throne, Emperor Paul issued a decree: “to build a new impregnable palace-castle with haste for the permanent residence of the sovereign. He should stand in the place of the dilapidated Summer House. Supervised the construction Vincenzo Brenna(1745-1820), architect was Vasily Ivanovich Bazhenov(1737 or 1738 - 1799). Pavel sketched several drawings of the future palace.
Construction of the Mikhailovsky Castle
The solemn laying ceremony took place on February 26, 1797. An inscription was carved on the foundation stone: “In the summer of 1797, on the 26th day of February, at the beginning of the reign of the Sovereign Emperor and All Russia, Autocrat Pavel Pervago, the foundation was laid for the building of the Mikhailovsky Castle by His Imperial Majesty and His wife Empress Maria Feodorovna”.
The construction was carried out with great haste, so that the draft castle was ready in the same year, 1797. The work did not stop day or night. At night, the construction site was illuminated by the light of torches and fires. From 2,500 to 6,000 people were employed daily in the construction, not counting the overseers and craftsmen. It was allocated 791,200 rubles at a time and 1,173,871.10 rubles for three years.
View of the Mikhailovsky Castle in 1800-1801. Engraving by A.I. Daugel from an 1800 watercolor
There was a shortage of building materials. The stone galleries of the palace in Pella were dismantled. In addition, the marble and stones of St. Isaac's Cathedral, which was being built at that time, also went to the construction of the Mikhailovsky Castle. On this occasion, the well-known author of jokes at that time A.D. Kopiev wrote about Isaac:
This is a monument of two kingdoms,
Both so decent:
Its base is marble,
And the top is brick.
Appearance
The consecration of the Mikhailovsky Castle and the church attached to it took place on November 8, 1800. The castle was magnificent. It resembled a renaissance palazzo. It was surrounded by ditches with drawbridges thrown over them. The facades were decorated with marble statues, later transferred to the Winter Palace. The castle was quadrangular in plan, inside there were three courtyards: the main one was octagonal, facing the Fontanka River - pentagonal, towards the Tsaritsyn meadow (Field of Mars) - triangular. Only members of the imperial family and envoys were allowed to enter the main courtyard through the Resurrection Gate.
Mikhailovsky Castle in St. Petersburg, the facade from the Fontanka and the Main facade
On the main cornice is the inscription: “Holiness to the Lord is fitting for your house in the length of days”. According to legend, the emperor was predicted that he would live as many years as there are letters in this inscription. And so it happened - the emperor died at the age of 47.
Mikhailovsky Castle in St. Petersburg, Resurrection Gates
Monument to Peter I
Previously, the Mikhailovsky Castle was surrounded by a wall. Three linden and birch alleys, planted during his lifetime, led to the castle from Bolshaya Sadovaya Street. In front of the castle was a large parade ground - Connetable. Here, at the Mikhailovsky Castle, monument to Peter the Great. Signature below: "Great-grandfather's great-grandson 1800".
This monument has a long history. Its original idea belonged to Anna Ioannovna. It was supposed to be placed on Vasilyevsky Island, in the place where the university is now located. It was cast by the caster Martilli according to the project of Rastrelli in the reign of Elizabeth Petrovna. During the time of Catherine the Great, the monument was under a canopy on the banks of the Neva near St. Isaac's Bridge.
If you look closely at the monument, you can see a strange thing - one of the legs of a human horse. At the same time, in numerous paintings and lithographs, the legs of the horse are depicted as normal. The bas-reliefs on the pedestal are worn to a shine - it is believed that this brings good luck.
Dampness in the Mikhailovsky Castle
The decoration of the main chambers was magnificent, however, according to contemporaries, the castle had many passages, stairs, passages, which created great inconvenience. In addition, due to the haste with which the work was carried out, there was a strong dampness in the Mikhailovsky Castle. So, Pylyaev notes:
According to the stories of contemporaries, traces of destructive dampness in the large hall in which the paintings hung, despite the constant fire in the fireplaces, were visible in the form of strips of ice from top to bottom in the corners and ceiling. The palace was so damp that the first time the emperor gave a ball there, the rooms were so mist from burning wax candles that there was a thick haze everywhere, and thousands of candles flickered like dim lanterns on the street. The guests could be distinguished with great difficulty at the end of each of the halls; they moved like shadows in the darkness. All the ladies' attire and attire were damp, and in the semi-darkness they seemed to be of the same color. The palace was extremely inconvenient for everyone, it was constantly necessary to pass through the corridors in which the wind was blowing through.
Paul literally fell in love with his castle. When Empress Maria Fedorovna presented him with a gift of a service with views of the Mikhailovsky Castle, he shed a tear. However, the emperor lived here for a very short time - only 40 days. On the night of March 12, 1801, he was killed by conspirators in his bedroom in the Mikhailovsky Castle.
(From the book: K. Valishevsky, Son of the Great Catherine. Emperor Paul I. Edition of T-va A.S. Suvorin - "New Time")
Plan of the Belle-floor of the Mikhailovsky Castle, according to fig. Brenn
Castle after the death of Paul and in our time
After Pavel's death, almost all decorations were removed from the Mikhailovsky Castle. The interior decoration was preserved only in the Throne Hall and in the Round Room; in some rooms, picturesque plafonds were preserved on the ceilings. Various institutions were located inside: the gendarmerie half-squadron of the Life Guards, the Institute for the Blind, the committee for charitable work, the office of the Minister of Spiritual Affairs and Education. In 1820, according to the project of the architect Karl of Russia, the area around the castle was re-planned, ditches were filled up, drawbridges were removed. In 1822 it was renamed the Engineer's Castle. In 1823, the Main Engineering School (now the Military Engineering and Technical University) was located here.
Petersburg under Paul I
In 1797, Paul I established a depot of maps, where for the first time the Atlases of St. Petersburg were prepared, which give a vivid picture of St. Petersburg, its geography and buildings of the late 18th century. Pavel was very interested in topographically accurate images of St. Petersburg and its environs. It should be noted the wide development of the art of landscape engraving and watercolor.
According to the memoirs of contemporaries, the first thing that was remembered in St. Petersburg during the time of Paul I. were striped guard boxes and barriers. First of all, they were placed at outposts to control the entry and exit from the city of residents and guests, as well as the import and export of goods. This measure was necessary for the collection of taxes, on the one hand, and on the other, to prevent any smuggling from revolutionary France. The emperor’s orders regarding clothing and fashion were also a fight against the revolutionary infection: a ban on wearing tailcoats and round hats, the desire to dress everyone in a uniform.
Being a pedant and living according to a schedule, Paul I regulated the life of the court and all his subjects: home dinners, performances in theaters, balls had to start at a certain time and end before midnight. The main thing: there should not have been an empty pastime, unjustified idleness and excessive panache. It was difficult to get used to the new ways of life in St. Petersburg, it caused discontent and ridicule. This was a kind of background against which the peculiar and unique cultural life of St. Petersburg developed.
 J.L. Monier. Portrait President of the Academy of Arts Count A.S. Stroganov |
It was in the era of Paul I. that new names of architects emerged. So A. Porto built two very strict buildings: the Mint on the territory of the Peter and Paul Fortress and the Medical and Surgical Academy on the Vyborg side, which are still used for their original purpose. Talented architects F. Demertsov and F. Volkov actively worked in the field of civil architecture, they built buildings of educational institutions, military barracks, hospitals, churches. It is characteristic that it was civil architecture that prevailed in the short reign of Paul I.
As for the solution of serious urban planning problems, it should be emphasized that it was during this period that the construction of the Kazan Cathedral on Nevsky Prospekt was conceived by the Academy of Arts, headed by Count A.S. Stroganov, a competition for the best project was announced. In 1800, the construction of the cathedral was started according to the project of A. Voronikhin.
Under Paul I, three monuments were erected: a statue of Peter the Great, an obelisk "Rumyantsev's Victories" designed by Brenna on the Field of Mars and a monument to A.V. death of the emperor.
In the middle of the XVIII century. the predominant architectural style was baroque. Bartolomeo Rastrelli, a native of Italy, was the largest Russian architect of that time. He built the Winter Palace, the ensemble of the Smolny Monastery, the Stroganov Palace in St. Petersburg, the Great Catherine Palace in Tsarskoye Selo, the Great Palace in Peterhof.
In the second half of the XVIII century. Classicism prevailed in architecture as well. Lush baroque buildings were replaced by emphatically laconic buildings, strictly symmetrical, devoid of secondary details. Both the capital's palaces and the houses of provincial landowners were built in the style of classicism.
The largest architects of the second half of the XVIII century. were V.I. Bazhenov, M.F. Kazakov and I.E. Starov.
Bazhenov's most famous work is the Pashkov House in Moscow (the old building of the Russian State Library). He also developed the project of the Mikhailovsky Castle in St. Petersburg. Bazhenov's largest projects - the Grand Kremlin Palace and the palace in the Tsaritsyno estate - did not materialize.
The creative fate of M.F. Kazakova was happier. According to his projects, the building of Moscow University, the Senate in the Kremlin, the Golitsyn (1st Gradskaya) hospital in Moscow, the Noble Assembly, a number of estates and churches were built.
Second half of the 18th century - the heyday of Russian painting, especially portraiture. The rise of portrait art was caused by the desire of the nobility to immortalize themselves on the canvases of artists. Major portrait painters of the 18th century were F.S. Rokotov, D.G. Levitsky and V.L. Borovikovsky.
Along with the portrait in Russian painting of the XVIII century. landscape and genre scenes appeared. Paintings were also painted on historical themes, for example, the election of Mikhail Romanov to the kingdom, Alexander Nevsky on Lake Peipsi, etc.
The outstanding master of sculpture was F.I. Shubin, who created a gallery of sculptural portraits of statesmen and generals of Russia. But the most famous sculpture in Russia was created by the Frenchman E. Falcone, the author of The Bronze Horseman.
|
INTERNAL POLICY OF RUSSIA AT THE TURN OF THE XVIII-XIX CENTURIES |
1. The reign of Paul I
By the end of the XVIII century. in the domestic policy of Russia, many unresolved problems accumulated, the main of which were serfdom and the absence of any restriction of tsarist power by representative bodies or law. The only guarantee against the transformation of the monarchy into despotism was the personality of an enlightened monarch - Catherine II. In the last years of her life, the empress worked hard on new legislation, trying to enshrine in law the civil rights of her subjects and to formulate the powers of the monarch, which would have already been a certain limitation of autocratic power. However, under the influence of the French Revolution, Catherine hesitated to implement the planned reforms, fearing upheavals in Russia. She did not have time to carry out her plans.
In 1796, after the death of Catherine II, the Russian throne was taken by Paul I. Brought up in educational ideals, over the years he was completely disappointed in them under the influence of a conflict with his mother. Paul romanticized medieval chivalry, considering it a model of honor and nobility. If the Age of Enlightenment put forward the principles of natural rights and the social contract, then Paul considered it the duty of subjects to unquestioningly obey the monarch, who commands them like a father - children. Hating his mother, Paul considered everything she had done harmful and deserving of destruction.
Having come to power, Paul tried to destroy the system of power created by Catherine. He restored the colleges abolished during the provincial reform, destroyed the estate self-government in cities and provinces (city dumas and provincial noble assemblies), and limited the rights of district noble assemblies. Letters of grant to the nobility and cities were abolished. Considering the nobility as a knightly class, whose main business is serving the monarch, Paul persistently limited class privileges for non-serving nobles. The nobility even lost their freedom from corporal punishment.
Pavel was characterized by petty interference in the private life of his subjects: he personally determined what cut of dress should be worn, when to dine, what dances to dance, etc. Of course, Pavel was far from Peter I in this respect, but over the past decades, the nobility got used to much greater freedom. The fact that at the beginning of the XVIII century. perceived as a heavy but inevitable duty, at the end of the century it looked like an unacceptable violation of rights. In addition, Paul's policy was contradictory and inconsistent. The king was irritable, often without serious guilt subjected courtiers and officers to arrest, exile, imprisonment in a fortress. No one in Paul's circle could be sure of the future. All this extremely irritated the nobles.
The nobility was also dissatisfied with the policy of Paul I on the peasant issue. For the first time under Paul, the serfs took the oath to the new emperor along with the freemen. This emphasized that they were, first of all, subjects not of the master, but of the king. It was forbidden to sell peasants at auctions. In the spring of 1797, a decree was issued limiting corvée to three days a week. True, the manifesto was mainly advisory in nature and, as a rule, was not implemented.
However, this was still the first attempt by the government to limit the exploitation of the peasants. All this still does not allow us to speak of Paul's policy as anti-noble. The king sought to emphasize that the monarch is the patron and protector of all subjects, regardless of class. According to V.O. Klyuchevsky "Paul turned equality of rights into general lack of rights." Along with attempts to somewhat limit serfdom, Paul took many steps that strengthened serfdom. He widely distributed state peasants to the landowners, again allowed non-noble factory owners to buy peasants to work in manufactories.
The extraordinary love of Paul for drill and parade caused ridicule. The tsar admired the order of Prussia and tried to remake the Russian army according to the Prussian model, and began by introducing the Prussian military uniform and training the troops in the Prussian front step. In the army, this was regarded as a mockery of the combat experience of Catherine's times, especially since many combat generals of the previous reign were dismissed.
Finally, extreme dissatisfaction was caused by the foreign policy turn made by Paul in 1800 - the conclusion of an alliance with Napoleon. It was not only that the First Consul in Russia was considered a usurper of legitimate royal power. The break with England was unprofitable for the Russian nobility and merchants, since it was this country that was the main consumer of Russian flax, timber and bread and a supplier of manufactured goods to the Russian market.
All this led to a palace coup on March 11-12, 1801. Many high-ranking dignitaries took part in the conspiracy. Alexander, the heir to the throne, also knew about the preparations for the coup. With his tacit consent, the conspirators (General - Governor of St. Petersburg Count Palen, General L.L. Bennigsen, the last favorite of Catherine, Platon Zubov with his brothers, etc.) broke into the emperor's chambers in the Mikhailovsky Castle, where Pavel moved from the Winter Palace, considering it not safe enough . The king was killed. The official version was that he died of apoplexy. Alexander I came to the throne.
Coronation: |
|
Predecessor: |
Catherine II |
Successor: |
Alexander I |
Birth: |
|
Buried: |
Peter and Paul Cathedral |
Dynasty: |
Romanovs |
Admiral General |
|
Catherine II |
|
1. Natalya Alekseevna (Wilhelmina of Hesse) |
|
(from Natalia Alekseevna): no children (from Maria Feodorovna) sons: Alexander I, Konstantin Pavlovich, Nikolai I, Mikhail Pavlovich daughters: Alexandra Pavlovna, Elena Pavlovna, Maria Pavlovna, Ekaterina Pavlovna, Olga Pavlovna, Anna Pavlovna |
|
Autograph: |
|
Relations with Catherine II
Domestic politics
Foreign policy
Order of Malta
Conspiracy and death
Versions of the birth of Paul I
Military ranks and titles
Paul I in art
Literature
Cinema
Monuments to Paul I
Pavel I (Pavel Petrovich; September 20 (October 1), 1754, Elizabeth Petrovna's Summer Palace, St. Petersburg - March 11 (23), 1801, Mikhailovsky Castle, St. Petersburg) - Emperor of All Russia from November 6, 1796, from the Romanov dynasty, son of Peter III Fedorovich and Catherine II Alekseevna.
Childhood, education and upbringing
Pavel was born on September 18 (October 1), 1754 in St. Petersburg, in the Summer Palace of Elizabeth Petrovna. Subsequently, this castle was destroyed, and the Mikhailovsky Palace was built in its place, in which Pavel was killed on March 10 (23), 1801.
On September 20, 1754, in the ninth year of her marriage, Her Imperial Highness Grand Duchess Ekaterina Alekseevna finally had her first child. Empress Elizaveta Petrovna, Grand Duke Peter and the Shuvalov brothers were present at the birth. Washed and sprinkled with holy water, the newborn baby Elizaveta Petrovna immediately picked up and carried into the hall to show the courtiers the future heir. The Empress baptized the baby and ordered him to be named Pavel. Catherine, like Peter III, was completely removed from raising her son.
Due to the vicissitudes of the relentless political struggle, Paul was essentially deprived of the love of those close to him. Of course, this affected the child's psyche and his perception of the world. But, we should pay tribute to the Empress Elizabeth Petrovna, she ordered to surround him with the best, in her opinion, teachers.
The first teacher was the diplomat F. D. Bekhteev, who was obsessed with the spirit of all kinds of charters, clear orders, military discipline, comparable to drill. This created, in the impressionable boy's mind, that this is how things happen in everyday life. And he thought of nothing but soldiers' marches and battles between battalions. Bekhteev came up with a special alphabet for the little prince, the letters of which were cast from lead in the form of soldiers. He began to print a small newspaper in which he told about all, even the most insignificant deeds of Paul.
The birth of Paul was reflected in many odes written by contemporary poets.
In 1760, Elizaveta Petrovna appointed a new teacher for her grandson. They became, at her choice, Count Nikita Ivanovich Panin. He was a forty-two-year-old man who occupied a very prominent place at court. Possessing extensive knowledge, he had previously spent several years on a diplomatic career in Denmark and Sweden, where his worldview was formed. Having very close contacts with the Freemasons, he picked up the ideas of the Enlightenment from them and even became a supporter of the constitutional monarchy. His brother Pyotr Ivanovich was a great local master of the Masonic order in Russia.
The first wariness towards the new teacher soon disappeared, and Pavel quickly became attached to him. Panin opened Russian and Western European literature to young Pavel. The young man was very willing to read, and in the next year he read quite a lot of books. He was well acquainted with Sumarokov, Lomonosov, Derzhavin, Racine, Corneille, Moliere, Werther, Cervantes, Voltaire and Rousseau. He was fluent in Latin, French and German, loved mathematics.
His mental development proceeded without any deviations. One of Pavel's junior mentors, Poroshin, kept a diary in which, day after day, he noted all the actions of little Pavel. It does not note any deviations in the mental development of the personality of the future emperor, about which numerous haters of Pavel Petrovich were so fond of discussing later.
On February 23, 1765, Poroshin wrote: “I read to His Highness Vertotov the story of the Order of the Knights of Malta. He deigned, then, to amuse himself and, having tied the admiral's flag to his cavalry, present himself as a gentleman of Malta.
Already in his youth, Paul began to be occupied with the idea of chivalry, the idea of honor and glory. And in the military doctrine presented at the age of 20 to his mother, who by that time was already the Empress of All Russia, he refused to conduct an offensive war, explained his idea by the need to observe the principle of reasonable sufficiency, while all the efforts of the Empire should be directed to creating an internal order.
The Tsarevich's confessor and mentor was one of the best Russian preachers and theologians, Archimandrite and later Metropolitan Platon (Levshin) of Moscow. Thanks to his pastoral work and instructions in the law of God, Pavel Petrovich became a deeply religious, true Orthodox man for the rest of his short life. In Gatchina, until the revolution of 1917, they kept a rug wiped by Pavel Petrovich's knees during his long nightly prayers.
Thus, we can notice that in childhood, adolescence and youth, Paul received an excellent education, had a broad outlook, and even then came to chivalrous ideals, firmly believed in God. All this is reflected in his future policy, in his ideas and actions.
Relations with Catherine II
Immediately after his birth, Paul was moved away from his mother. Catherine could see him very rarely and only with the permission of the Empress. When Paul was eight years old, his mother, Catherine, relying on the guards, carried out a coup, during which Paul's father, Emperor Peter III, was killed. Paul was to take the throne.
Catherine II removed Paul from interfering in the decision of any state affairs, he, in turn, condemned her whole way of life and did not accept the policy that she pursued.
Pavel believed that this policy was based on love of glory and pretense, dreamed of establishing in Russia, under the auspices of the autocracy, strictly legal administration, limiting the rights of the nobility, and introducing the strictest, Prussian-style, discipline in the army. In the 1780s he became interested in Freemasonry.
All the time, the aggravated relationship between Paul and his mother, whom he suspected of complicity in the murder of his father, Peter III, led to the fact that Catherine II gave her son the Gatchina estate in 1783 (that is, she “removed” him from the capital). Here Pavel introduced customs that were sharply different from those in St. Petersburg. But in the absence of any other concerns, he concentrated all his efforts on creating the "Gatchin army": several battalions placed under his command. Officers in full uniform, wigs, tight uniforms, impeccable order, punishment with gauntlets for the slightest omissions and a ban on civilian habits.
In 1794, the Empress decided to remove her son from the throne and hand him over to her eldest grandson Alexander Pavlovich, but she met opposition from the highest state dignitaries. The death of Catherine II on November 6, 1796 opened the way for Paul to the throne.
Domestic politics
Paul began his reign with a change in all the orders of Catherine's government. During his coronation, Paul announced a series of decrees. In particular, Paul canceled the Peter's decree on the appointment of his successor on the throne by the emperor himself and established a clear system of succession to the throne. From that moment on, the throne could only be inherited through the male line; after the death of the emperor, he passed to the eldest son or the next eldest brother, if there were no children. A woman could take the throne only when the male line was suppressed. By this decree, Paul excluded palace coups, when emperors were overthrown and erected by the power of the guard, the reason for which was the lack of a clear system of succession to the throne (which, however, did not prevent the palace coup on March 12, 1801, during which he himself was killed). Also, in accordance with this decree, a woman could not occupy the Russian throne, which excluded the possibility of the appearance of temporary workers (who accompanied the empresses in the 18th century) or a repetition of a situation similar to the one when Catherine II did not transfer the throne to Paul after he came of age.
Pavel restored the system of colleges, attempts were made to stabilize the financial situation of the country (including the famous action of melting palace services into coins).
Manifesto on a three-day corvee forbade the landlords to send corvee on Sundays, holidays, and more than three days a week (the decree was almost never implemented locally).
Significantly narrowed the rights of the nobility in comparison with those that were granted by Catherine II, and the procedures established in Gatchina were transferred to the entire Russian army. The most severe discipline, the unpredictability of the behavior of the emperor led to mass dismissals of nobles from the army, especially the officers of the guard (out of 182 officers who served in the Horse Guards Regiment in 1786, only two did not quit by 1801). Also, all the officers on the staff who did not appear by decree in the military collegium to confirm their service were dismissed.
Paul I started the military, as well as other reforms, not only out of his own whim. The Russian army was not at its peak, discipline in the regiments suffered, titles were given out undeservedly: in particular, children of the nobility were assigned to one or another regiment from birth. Many, having a rank and receiving a salary, did not serve at all (apparently, such officers were fired from the state). For negligence and laxity, rough treatment of soldiers, the emperor personally tore off the epaulettes from officers and generals and sent them to Siberia. Paul I pursued the theft of generals and embezzlement in the army. And Suvorov himself attributed corporal punishment in his Science to win(Whoever does not save a soldier - sticks, who does not save himself - to that sticks too), is also a supporter of the strictest discipline, but not a senseless drill. As a reformer, he decided to follow the example of Peter the Great: he took as a basis the model of the modern European army - the Prussian one. The military reform was not stopped even after the death of Paul.
During the reign of Paul I, personally devoted to the emperor, Arakcheev, Kutaisov, Obolyaninov rose to prominence.
Fearing the spread of the ideas of the French Revolution in Russia, Paul I forbade young people to go abroad to study, the import of books, including notes, was completely banned, and private printing houses were closed. The regulation of life reached the point that the time was set when it was supposed to put out the fires in the houses. By special decrees, some words of the Russian language were withdrawn from official use and replaced by others. So, among the confiscated were the words “citizen” and “fatherland” with a political connotation (replaced by “philistine” and “state”, respectively), but a number of Paul’s linguistic decrees were not so transparent - for example, the word “detachment” was changed to “detashment” or "command", "execute" to "execute", and "doctor" to "healer".
Foreign policy
Paul's foreign policy was inconsistent. In 1798, Russia entered into an anti-French coalition with Great Britain, Austria, Turkey, and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. At the insistence of the allies, the disgraced A.V. Suvorov was appointed commander-in-chief of the Russian troops. Austrian troops were also transferred to his jurisdiction. Under the leadership of Suvorov, Northern Italy was liberated from French rule. In September 1799, the Russian army made the famous crossing of the Alps by Suvorov. However, already in October of the same year, Russia broke off the alliance with Austria due to the failure of the Austrians to fulfill their allied obligations, and Russian troops were withdrawn from Europe.
Order of Malta
After Malta surrendered to the French without a fight in the summer of 1798, the Order of Malta was left without a Grand Master and without a seat. For help, the knights of the order turned to the Russian emperor and Defender of the Order since 1797, Paul I.
On December 16, 1798, Paul I was elected Grand Master of the Order of Malta, in connection with which the words “... and Grand Master of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem". In Russia, the Order of St. John of Jerusalem was established. The Russian Order of St. John of Jerusalem and the Order of Malta were partly integrated. The image of the Maltese cross appeared on the Russian coat of arms.
Shortly before the murder, Paul sent the Don army on a campaign against India - 22,507 people. The campaign was canceled immediately after the death of Paul by decree of Emperor Alexander I.
Conspiracy and death
Pavel I was brutally beaten and strangled by officers in his own bedroom on the night of March 11, 1801 in the Mikhailovsky Castle. The conspiracy was attended by Agramakov, N.P. Panin, Vice-Chancellor, L.L. Benningsen, commander of the Izyum Light Horse Regiment, P. A. Zubov (Ekaterina's favorite), Palen, governor-general of St. Petersburg, commanders of the guards regiments: Semenovsky - N.I. Depreradovich, Kavalergardsky - F.P. Uvarov, Preobrazhensky - P.A. adjutant of the emperor, Count Pyotr Vasilievich Golenishchev-Kutuzov, who immediately after the coup was appointed commander of the Cavalier Guard regiment.
Initially, the overthrow of Paul and the accession of the English regent were planned. Perhaps the denunciation to the tsar was written by V.P. Meshchersky, in the past the head of the St. Petersburg regiment, quartered in Smolensk, perhaps by the Prosecutor General P.Kh. Obolyaninov. In any case, the plot was uncovered, Lindener and Arakcheev were called in, but this only accelerated the execution of the plot. According to one version, Pavel was killed by Nikolai Zubov (Suvorov's son-in-law, Platon Zubov's elder brother), who hit him with a golden snuffbox (there was a joke at court later: "The Emperor died with an apoplectic blow to the temple with a snuffbox"). According to another version, Paul was strangled with a scarf or crushed by a group of conspirators who, leaning on the emperor and each other, did not know exactly what was happening. Mistaking one of the murderers for his son Konstantin, Pavel shouted: “Your Highness, are you here? Have mercy! Air, Air!.. What have I done wrong to you?” Those were his last words.
The funeral service and burial took place on March 23, Great Saturday; committed by all members of the Holy Synod, headed by Metropolitan of St. Petersburg Ambrose (Podobedov).
Versions of the birth of Paul I
Due to the fact that Pavel was born almost ten years after the wedding of Peter and Catherine, when many were already convinced of the futility of this marriage (and also under the influence of the free personal life of the Empress in the future), there were persistent rumors that the real father Paul I was not Peter III, but the first favorite of the Grand Duchess Ekaterina Alekseevna, Count Sergei Vasilyevich Saltykov.
historical anecdote
The Romanovs themselves belonged to this legend
(about the fact that Paul I was not the son of Peter III)
with great humour. There is a memoir about
how Alexander III, having learned about her,
crossed himself: "Thank God, we are Russians!"
And having heard a refutation from historians, again
crossed himself: “Thank God we are legal!”.
The memoirs of Catherine II contain an indirect indication of this. In the same memoirs, one can find a hidden indication of how the desperate Empress Elizaveta Petrovna, so that the dynasty would not fade away, ordered the wife of her heir to give birth to a child, no matter who his genetic father would be. In this regard, after this instruction, the courtiers assigned to Catherine began to encourage her adultery. Nevertheless, Catherine in her memoirs is rather sly - in the same place she explains that the long-term marriage did not bring offspring, since Peter had some kind of obstacle, which, after the ultimatum given to her by Elizabeth, was eliminated by her friends who performed a violent surgical operation on Peter, in in connection with which he nevertheless turned out to be able to conceive a child. The paternity of other children of Catherine, born during her husband's lifetime, is also doubtful: Grand Duchess Anna Petrovna (born 1757) was most likely the daughter of Poniatovsky, and Alexei Bobrinsky (born 1762) was the son of G. Orlov and was born secretly. More folklore and in line with the traditional ideas about the "changed baby" is the story that Ekaterina Alekseevna allegedly gave birth to a dead child (or girl) and he was replaced by a certain "Chukhonian" baby. They even pointed out who this girl grew up with, “the real daughter of Catherine” - Countess Alexandra Branitskaya.
A family
Pavel I was married twice:
- 1st wife: (since October 10, 1773, St. Petersburg) Natalya Alekseevna(1755-1776), born Princess Augusta-Wilhelmina-Louise of Hesse-Darmstadt, daughter of Ludwig IX, Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt. Died in childbirth with a baby.
- 2nd wife: (since October 7, 1776, St. Petersburg) Maria Fedorovna(1759-1828), born Princess Sophia Dorothea of Württemberg, daughter of Frederick II Eugene, Duke of Württemberg. Had 10 children:
- Alexander I(1777-1825), Russian Emperor
- Konstantin Pavlovich(1779-1831), Grand Duke.
- Alexandra Pavlovna (1783-1801)
- Elena Pavlovna (1784-1803)
- Maria Pavlovna (1786-1859)
- Ekaterina Pavlovna (1788-1819)
- Olga Pavlovna (1792-1795)
- Anna Pavlovna (1795-1865)
- Nicholas I(1796-1855), Russian emperor
- Mikhail Pavlovich(1798-1849), Grand Duke.
Illegitimate children:
- Veliky, Semyon Afanasyevich
- Inzov, Ivan Nikitich (according to one version)
- Marfa Pavlovna Musina-Yurieva
Military ranks and titles
Colonel of the Life Cuirassier Regiment (July 4, 1762) (Russian Imperial Guard) Admiral General (December 20, 1762) (Russian Imperial Navy)
Paul I in art
Literature
- A masterpiece of Russian literature is the story of Yu. N. Tynyanov "Lieutenant Kizhe", based on an anecdote, but vividly conveying the atmosphere of the era of the reign of Emperor Paul I.
- Alexandre Dumas - "Fencing teacher". / Per. from fr. ed. O. V. Moiseenko. - True, 1984
- Dmitry Sergeevich Merezhkovsky - "Paul I" ("drama for reading", the first part of the trilogy "The Kingdom of the Beast"), which tells about the conspiracy and murder of the emperor, where Paul himself appears as a despot and tyrant, and his killers are guardians for the good of Russia.
Cinema
- "Lieutenant Kizhe"(1934) - Mikhail Yanshin.
- "Suvorov"(1940) - film by Vsevolod Pudovkin with Apollon Yachnitsky as Pavel.
- "Ships storm the bastions"(1953) - Pavel Pavlenko
- "Bagration"(1985) as Arnis Licitis
- "Assa"(1987) - a film by Sergei Solovyov with Dmitry Dolinin as Pavel.
- "Emperor's Steps"(1990) - Alexander Filippenko.
- "Countess Sheremeteva"(1994), in the role - Yuri Verkun.
- "Poor, poor Paul"(2003) - a film by Vitaly Melnikov starring Viktor Sukhorukov.
- "Golden age"(2003) - Alexander Bashirov
- "Adjutants of Love"(2005), in the role - Vanguard Leontiev.
- "Favorite"(2005), in the role - Vadim Skvirsky.
- "Maltese cross"(2007), in the role - Nikolai Leshchukov.
Monuments to Paul I
At least six monuments were erected to Emperor Paul I on the territory of the Russian Empire:
- Vyborg. In the early 1800s, in Mon Repos Park, its then owner, Baron Ludwig Nicolai, in gratitude to Paul I, placed a high granite column with an explanatory inscription in Latin. The monument has been successfully preserved.
- Gatchina. On the parade ground in front of the Great Gatchina Palace there is a monument to Paul I by I. Vitali, which is a bronze statue of the Emperor on a granite pedestal. It was opened on August 1, 1851. The monument has been safely preserved.
- Gruzino, Novgorod region. on the territory of his estate, A. A. Arakcheev installed a cast-iron bust of Paul I on a cast-iron pedestal. Until now, the monument has not been preserved.
- Mitava. In 1797, near the road to his estate Sorgenfrei, the landowner von Driesen erected a low stone obelisk in memory of Paul I, with an inscription in German. The fate of the monument after 1915 is unknown.
- Pavlovsk. On the parade ground in front of the Pavlovsk Palace there is a monument to Paul I by I. Vitali, which is a cast-iron statue of the Emperor on a brick pedestal lined with zinc sheets. It was opened on June 29, 1872. The monument has been safely preserved.
- Spaso-Vifanovsky Monastery. In memory of the visit to the monastery in 1797 by Emperor Paul I and his wife, Empress Maria Feodorovna, an obelisk of white marble was erected on its territory, decorated with a marble plaque with an explanatory inscription. The obelisk was installed in an open gazebo, supported by six columns, near the chambers of Metropolitan Platon. During the years of Soviet power, both the monument and the monastery were destroyed.
- St. Petersburg. In the courtyard of the Mikhailovsky Castle in 2003, a monument to Paul I was erected by sculptor V. E. Gorevoy, architect V. P. Nalivaiko. Opened May 27, 2003.
