Introduction
Almost three centuries after her birth, Catherine the Great continues to be memorialised and edified in modern media with anachronistic shows like Elle Fanning’s The Great. Her life remains an example to modern women in a patriarchal society taking power for themselves away from mediocre white men. At the age of 16, Catherine was shackled to perhaps the most incompetent emperor in Russian history, Peter III, but she wasn’t going to let that hold her back. Catherine made the Mojo Dojo Casa House of the Russian Empire her Barbie Dreamhouse. However, as a historical figure and not the icon Barbie, Catherine cannot be idolised as a feminist icon simply because she succeeded in what she did as a woman. As a globally known figure, Catherine is rightfully perceived from numerous perspectives and with varying degrees of sympathy, respect and admiration from her homelands and from those she oppressed and marginalised. Catherine’s reign was largely shaped by her Enlightenment ideals that motivated her lofty goals of a more equalised society. These goals of equality were implemented sparsely and, unsurprisingly for an absolute ruler, unequally.
Early life
Known as Catherine the Great, Empress of Russia, she was neither Catherine nor Russian. Born Sophie Friederike Auguste, Prinzessin von Anhalt-Zerbst, 21st April 1729 in Prussia, now Poland, she was chosen as wife to the future emperor as a teenager, marking the beginning of a terrible and miserable 18-year marriage. Upon her marriage she was forced to take the name Catherine Alekseyevna by Peter’s predecessor and aunt, Empress Elizabeth. Catherine’s mother was determined to raise her daughter to the heights of society, with the pinnacle aim of a royal marriage to fulfill the goals she herself did not achieve in life.
Catherine’s pro-enlightenment ideals displayed throughout her rule were hinted at in her childhood. Educated by French tutors, as befitting a child of noble birth, Catherine learned the language of the ruling 18th century elites as well as etiquette and Lutheran doctrine. She learned Russian upon her arrival into her new homeland and converted to the Russian Orthodox Church. Reportedly a dedicated student, Catherine demonstrated genuine devotion to her adopted country and its values, more so than her husband who openly preferred his native German lands. Her intelligence and attitude made her more popular than her inept husband, gaining her the support of the military for her coup d’état.
Coup d’état
Empress Elizabeth died in 1762 leaving Peter III to ascend to the Russian throne. His reign was to be embarrassingly short lived. In the winter he became Emperor and by summer he had lost his throne and his life. On the 28th June 1762 Catherine seized power with the support of the military and most significant sects of Russian court. The couple’s German roots were virtually all they had in common. Even Peter’s predecessor Elizabeth viewed him as an incompetent fool, and his fleeting reign as Emperor served to prove her right. Peter’s unpopularity was so great, in fact, that Catherine recognised a threat to his life and her own in the likelihood that someone would attempt to assassinate him for his pro-Prussian, anti-Russian military stratagem. Alienating his courtiers, the military and the public, Peter all but condemned himself.
Following his failure to rule, Catherine swiftly took control of the country with little bloodshed, emphasising her husband’s unpopularity and her argued legitimacy as ruler through her character. With the support of courtiers, politicians and military, Catherine felt confident to strike. Catherine was aided in overthrowing Peter by her lover Grigory Orlov, stationed at St Petersburg during the takeover. Although her lovers have been a footnote in the history of her reign, often aiding her in military and political strife, they have not come close to the glory of her time on the Russian throne as one of its most charismatic, intellectually progressive and triumphant rulers.
Legacy
Catherine is known to have numerous lovers throughout her marriage and reign, many of whom played significant roles in the politics and military conduct of her country. This has been used against her image as ruler as the idea of a woman sleeping her way to the top has been applied; this can be easily dismissed as a woman who is already ruler of a country does not have much farther to ascend.
Catherine’s ideals resonated particularly with the sects of Russian court sympathetic to the Enlightenment found in western Europe. As a friend and lifelong supporter of the French enlightenment philosopher, Voltaire, Catherine held much more progressive ideals than Russia was accustomed to. This included the education of girls, opening a number of schools to equalise the rate of education in the vast Slavic lands beginning with the Smolny Institute for Noble Maidens, reserved for daughters of the nobility. The schools Catherine established, later for children of all classes and sexes, barring serfs, were notably separate from the church in order to create a society loyal to her governmental system and not the Orthodox church which had historically controlled the education system.
This secularisation of society was motivated by Catherine’s Enlightenment ideals including the right to representation, education and self-determination. These ideals also allowed her to learn more about vaccinations, a scientific sin opposed by the church. Determined to abolish serfdom and reform Russian society, Catherine fell short of many of her lofty goals set out early in her reign. However, she achieved more than her critics ever expected. Catherine became the first person in Russia to undergo the procedure of inoculation against smallpox in 1768. By 1780 some 20,000 Russians had been inoculated. Catherine’s cultural influence on her people - and they were undoubtedly her people - is colossal and undeniable.
What should be remembered in respect to Catherine’s strength and unique style as a ruler, is that these qualities did not erase those she shared with rulers that came before and after her. Imperialism flourished under Catherine and, although a measure of success for many rulers in the past, the understanding of this form of oppression has altered with our understanding of human rights over time. Catherine claimed to be ruling for the benefit of the ‘common good’, another ideal of the Enlightenment advocated by a particular inspiration to this enlightened despot, Rousseau. In many ways she surpassed her contemporaries, motivated by these ideals, but in many arguably more important ways, she was just the same. Five million people remained in serfdom under Catherine, the partition of Poland in the latter 18th century between Austria, Russia and Prussia erased the country from the European map until the Second World War, to the benefit of Catherine as ruler and absolutism was reconfirmed as the powerhouse of Russia.
Bibliography
Clements, Barbara Evans. A History of Women in Russia: From Earliest Times to the Present. Indiana University Press, 2012.
Miate, L. "Catherine the Great." World History Encyclopedia, 22 Aug. 2023, https://www.worldhistory.org/Catherine_the_Great/. Accessed 19 March 2024.
Oldenbourg-Idalie, Z. "Catherine the Great." Encyclopedia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Catherine-the-Great. Accessed 19 Mar. 2024.
Raeff, Marc. Catherine the Great: A Profile. Macmillan, 1972.
Comments