Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
during the reign of
CATHERINE II
the Great. He
first began his government service in 1765 in
the chancellery of governor-general of the
Ukraine, P. A. Rumiantsev. Ten years later, he
was appointed secretary to Catherine and, as
such, prepared her manifestos and other docu-
ments until 1792. From the late 1780s to 1792,
he reported daily to Catherine. A member of the
College of Foreign Affairs since 1780, Bezbor-
odko was in charge of Russian foreign policy
from 1784 to 1796. During this time he partici-
pated in the preparation and negotiations of the
most important moments of late 18th-century
Russian foreign policy: Turkish recognition of
the Russian annexation of the Crimea (1783),
the favorable Jassy Treaty with Turkey (1791),
and the third partition of Poland (1795).
Although important by his rank, Bezborodko
was more of an executor of the course laid
down by Catherine, rather than an inventive
diplomat. He retained his position in the college
after Catherine's death and, in 1797, obtained
the rank of chancellor and the title of enlight-
ened prince. He was a major landowner in the
south and used his important position to obtain
huge latifundia in the southern Ukraine.
he was overthrown in November 1740 by his
enemy Burkhard Munnich, a German military
specialist who had come to Russia during the
reign of
PETER I
the Great and risen to a position
of great influence. Ivan's mother, Anna Leopold-
ovna, who herself would be overthrown a year
later by
ELIZABETH
, became regent. Biron was
charged with attempting to seize the throne and
sentenced to death, but the sentence was com-
muted to exile, which he first served in Pelyi and
then in Yaroslavl. Elizabeth's successor,
PETER III
,
allowed Biron to return to St. Petersburg in 1762,
and
CATHERINE II
subsequently restored him to
the duchy of Kurland, which he passed on to his
son in 1769, a few years before his death. Evalu-
ations of Biron have long been colored by the
pejorative term
Bironovshchina
(the time of
Biron), with its connotations of arbitrary, repres-
sive rule by a German clique. This interpretation
took shape fairly quickly during Elizabeth's reign
(1741-62), when it was used to consolidate her
power and was later propagated by nationalist
Russian and Soviet historians who highlighted
the issues of anti-German feeling. Recent Rus-
sian scholarship shows that although they were
perhaps in more visible positions, the proportion
of foreigners in institutions like the army actu-
ally fell during Anna's reign.
Biron, Ernst Johann
(1690-1772)
(Ernst Johann Buhren)
official
A favorite of Empress
ANNA
(1730-40), Biron
was born to a noble family in the province of
Kurland. As of 1718 he was attached to the court
of the future empress, traveling with her to St.
Petersburg in 1730 when she was chosen to suc-
ceed
PETER II
, who had died childless. Biron was
made a count in 1730, and although his official
duties were only those of high chamberlain, he
is generally considered to have been the true
power behind the throne during Anna's reign. In
1737 she arranged for him to be elected duke of
Kurland, and shortly before her death, in Octo-
ber 1740, named him regent to the infant
IVAN
VI
, her successor. Biron's fortunes changed soon
after Anna's death. Regent for only one month,
Black Hundreds
A generic and pejorative term applied to a num-
ber of ultrarightist populist organizations in the
first decade of the 20th century, of which the
most prominent was the Union of the Russian
People. Other organizations that fell within the
purview of the Black Hundreds are the Russian
Assembly, the Union of Russian Men, the Rus-
sian Monarchist Union, and the Union of the
Archangel Michael. Most of these organizations
appeared in the aftermath of the 1905 Revolu-
tion as a reaction of political forces that defined
themselves as patriotic to the events of that
year. Although their members came from vari-
ous social backgrounds, they were united by a
profound distaste for Jews and Poles and the
Search WWH ::
Custom Search