When Sophia of Stettin came over to Russia to be the heir’s betrothed, she took her new name of Catherine upon converting to Russian Orthodoxy. She could have kept her old name, Sophia was a proper Russian name, but some think Elizabeth felt it an imprudent choice, considering the history of another woman with that name who was quite the usurper. She probably didn’t want to give Catherine any ideas in that area.
Little did she know.
Well, whether Catherine thought much on her name change at the time, I don’t know, but later on in her life, there was a work attributed to her where she commented on the regent Sophia - “Much has been said about this princess, but I believe that she has not been given the credit she deserves...she conducted the affairs of the Empire for a number of years with all the sagacity that one could hope for. When one considers the business that passed through her hands, one cannot but concede that she was capable of ruling.”
I had my own little geek out over Sophia, on my previous journey to Moscow. There was a very particular exhibit at the Kremlin Arsenal that I was excited to see. It was hardly unassuming. A double seated throne covered in ornamentation of snakes and eagles. But carved out of it, a tiny square window, and that was what I came to see. A singularly perfect physical manifestation of one woman’s attempt at power.
See, Sophia would have been in a pretty sweet spot, if she’d been born with a Y chromosome. When her brother Feodor II died, she would have had a straight shot at the throne. The only other male offspring were her younger brother Ivan, and a half-brother Peter.
Ivan was nearly an invalid, partially blind and not in complete control of his wits.That’s what inbreeding gets you. Peter on the other hand, had the strikes against him of being only 10, and being a child of the Tsar’s less legitimate second wife. Other than that, as you might guess from his later nickname of Peter the Great he was pretty capable.
A story from the time of when the Swedish king visited, and when the two tsars had to ask about his health as per custom "the hand of the elder tsar had to be raised to his cap by his young attendant, and a babbling noise issued from his lips." In contrast, the king took eleven year old Peter to be around 16.
So, appearances aside, Russia couldn’t really be ruled by a child and a half-wit, but fortunately, elder sister Sophia was more than happy to step up and be regent. She was 27 at the time of her accession to power, and it was a move pretty much unprecedented for women in Russia.
On that double-seated throne sat young Peter and foolish Ivan. Either in front on a lower bench, or in the back, whispering through that hole (that would be covered by a curtain) would be Sophia. Sophia was the real ear for nobles to catch if they wanted anything done, and she sought to catch the public’s eye as well, putting herself on coinage and seals next to the two young tsars. Most of the sources I find that mention the hole in the throne tend towards saying Sophia’s whispers through it were more a symbolic story than her actual method of rule. Rats, shoulda known a symbol that perfect was fake.
How well she actually ruled is a murky subject. Much the same way that any history of Peter III’s brief reign is colored by whether or not the writer liked his successor Catherine, any history of Sophia is colored by the writer’s opinion of Peter the Great, which as you can guess by the sobriquet is usually at the least deep respect, if not outright worship.
But in her time behind the throne, roughly from 1682-89, Moscow began to be a more organized metropolis and the building and art styles known as Moscow baroque became the dominant one. She was a very pious woman, but that didn’t stop her from executing anyone who had opposed her taking over as regent, nor acquiring Kiev, nor warring with Turkey, nor annexing a chunk of Poland (but what Russian ruler doesn’t at least try that?)
Peter however was growing older, and began to dislike the idea of having a regent. He also, being none too dumb himself, recognized that she might not like being a regent much longer, and might prefer another title. One that would be easier to get if he was dead. By 1688, when the Crimean campaigns took a turn for the worst, and the taxes they were costing the people began to feel burdensome, Peter, in some eyes, no longer seemed to need a regent.
In July of 1689, he confronted her during a church feast, and then fled to a nearby town. With his own personal regiment. That he threatened to unleash to deal with her “dishonorably” if she came anywhere near his stronghold. Sophia, who was holed up in the Kremlin, started issuing decrees that were contrary to the decrees of Peter, who was holed up in the Trinity Monastery. She even at one point flirted with the idea of becoming sovereign herself, the proposed coronation engravings surviving to be used against her later.
She spent that summer behind the walls of the Kremlin, watching desperately as her supporters one by one either defected or were arrested and made to confess to intrigues against Peter. Her advisor and possible lover Vasily Galitzine, was implicated and exiled to Siberia.
In September of that year, she was confined to the Novodivechy convent. As prisons go, it was a fitting and elegant one. She’d spent a lot of her rule embellishing the convent with new buildings, towers, icons, cathedrals, and now she’d never leave it alive.She didn’t take the veil, and hardly seems to have taken the vow of poverty, taking much of her possessions with her, and financing further constructions in the convent.
I recorded a small bit while walking through the convent, and here it is.
In 1697, a plot against Peter was discovered. The conspirators admitted under torture that their ultimate goal was to put Sophia on the throne. Peter came in to question her, and though evidence was discovered that she’d been being passed secret messages by her sisters, no evidence was found that she had a hand in the attempted coup. If they wanted to put her on the throne, she maintained, it wasn’t on her request.
Still in October of 1697, she took the veil, to try to place herself on more blameless ground. Maybe she felt that she’d made the right decision when hundreds were executed. Three of the ringleaders were hung in view of her window, one of them had the petition inviting Sophia to take the helm of the state clasped in his hand "perhaps in order that remorse for the past may gnaw Sophia with perpetual grief."
She died in 1704, still within the convent walls, and despite having taken the veil, still found a way to pay for handsome renovations to the various churches and towers within in the years leading up to her death.
Not making any argument here that she would have been a better ruler than Peter, seemed like she was more an old-school, hang onto power by its' short and curlies as long as possible type ruler than any kind of reformer. But it’s interesting that for the rest of the 18th century after Peter's death, the country was ruled predominantly by women. Is this because of Sophia's legacy, or in spite of it?
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