Dr. Vess's World Civilization Virtual Library

Peter the Great

(1682-1725)

And

THE WESTERNIZATION OF RUSSIA

objectives:
1. Be able to discuss Russia's eastern and western characteristics.
2. Be able to discuss the ways in which Russia lagged behind the west prior to Peter the Great.
3. Be able to discuss the motivations of Peter the Great for reaching the west and in for westernizing Russia.
4. Be able to discuss Peter the Great's western reforms and how they affected Russian society and social structures.
5. Be able to discuss the various views of Peter the Great and his significance in Russian history.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT:

Peter the Great, like Louis XIV, learned at an early age to be on guard against the Russian nobles and the army. While a youth, he had to fight off the power of his half-sister Sophia, while sharing power with his half-brother Ivan. As an adult, Peter the Great ruled as an absolute monarch, trusting no one, not even his own son Alexis. Peter was enchanted with western culture and ushered Russia into the modern age. His efforts to modernize russia met with stiff opposition from the church and the boyars, and his own son thought of him as the anti-christ. It has been said that Peter dragged Russia "kicking and screaming into the modern era."
He was undoubtedly a man of vision, whose sheer physical prowess and mental determination changed a backward state into a power to be reckoned with. For Russians, however, he has always been the man who departed from the ways of Russia, who created an aristocracy more foreign than Russian, and who died hated by a large percentage of his countrymen.
Wretched and abundant,
Oppressed and powerful,
Weak and mighty,
Mother Russia!
Nikolai Nekrasov, 1873
Homeland of patience, land of the Russian people.
Fedor Tiutchev, These Poor Villages, 1855
Rus! Rus! I see you from my lovely enchanted remoteness I see you: a country of dinginess, and bleakness and dispersal; no arrogant wonders of nature crowned by the arrogant wonders of art appear within you to delight or terrify the eyes . . . So what is the incomprehensible secret force driving me towards you? Why do I constantly hear the echo of your mournful song as it is carried from sea to sea through your entire expanse? . . . And since you are without end yourself, is it not within you that a boundless thought will be born?
Gogol, Dead Souls
Rus, are you not similar in your headlong motion to one of those troikas that none can overtake? The flying road turns to smoke under you, bridges thunder and pass, all falls back and is left behind! . . . And what does this awesome motion mean? . . . Rus, whither are you speeding so? . . . The middle bell trills out in a dream its liquid soliloquy; the roaring air is torn to pieces and becomes wind; all things on earth fly by and other nations and states gaze askance as they step aside and give her the right of way! Ibid.
OUTLINE

I. The Character of Russia -- Western or Asiatic Nation?
A. Western Influences Vikings Christianity Archangel
B. Geographical isolation of Russia and the east no sea ports
i. little communication with west Mongol Hordes Tartars
ii. Siberia -- 5,000 miles across Asia
iii. Volga River and the Caspian Sea: Russian Markets
iv. Asiatic dress
v. Asiatic architecture
vi. Asiatic music
vii. Christianity -- Russian Orthodoxy from Greek Orthodox tradition!
II. Russia behind the west
A. Superstitious
B. rejection of modern math
C. manners and customs
D. cruel punishments
E. unwillingness of people to change -- Old Believers
F. treatment of serfs -- Stephen Razin
III. Early Russian monarchs
A. Ivan the Great.
i. Marriage to Sophia Paleologus.
ii. Moscow as the Third Rome"
B. Michael Romanov.
C. Alexis.
III. Peter the Great
A. childhood and personal characteristics
i. the assault of the nobility on Peter's family ii. his half brothers Feodor and Ivan
iii. the regency of Sophia
iv. the overthrow of Sophia and her exile to a convent
v. Ivan abdicates
vi. Peter becomes Tsar
B. conquest of Azov and visit to the west
C. Revolt of the Streltsy
D. Great Northern War: The Swedish monarch Charles
i. The Battle of Narva 1700: the army is westernized
ii. acquisition of St. Petersburgh
E. The Battle of Poltava in 1709
D. The Treaty of Nystadt in 1721
F. westernization of all soceity
i. St. Petersburg
ii. western customs introduced:
*manners
*dress
*the calendar
*western newspapers
*western museums
*western music
G. Repression of Church
i. The Procurator and (Un)Holy Synod
H. Repression of Nobles
i. Table of Ranks
I. Taxes: the Soul Tax
J. Industry and peasants:
i. encouragement of production at home:
ii. Peter dressed in Russian-made garments iii. export of iron products by the end of Peter's Reign
K. aftermath of reform
i. The Aristocracy vs. the masses
ii. Peter's image in Russia: His son Alexis
iii. Slavophiles

Imperial Palace, Japan