Peter the Great
Peter I (Russian: Пётр I Алексеевич, romanized: Pyotr I Alekseyevich,[note 1] IPA: [ˈpʲɵtr ɐlʲɪˈksʲejɪvʲɪtɕ]; 9 June [O.S. 30 May] 1672 – 8 February [O.S. 28 January] 1725), commonly known as Peter the Great,[note 2] was Tsar of all Russia from 1682, and the first Emperor of all Russia from 1721 until his death in 1725. He reigned jointly with his half-brother Ivan V until 1696. From this year, Peter was an absolute monarch, an autocrat who remained the ultimate authority.
In this name that follows Eastern Slavic naming customs, the patronymic is Alekseyevich and the family name is Romanov.Peter I
2 November 1721 – 8 February 1725
Himself as Tsar of Russia
7 May 1682 – 2 November 1721
25 June 1682
Himself as Emperor of Russia
Ivan V (1682–1696)
Sophia Alekseyevna (1682–1689)
9 June 1672
Moscow
8 February 1725 (aged 52)
Saint Petersburg
Most of Peter's reign was consumed by long wars against the Ottoman and Swedish Empires. Despite initial difficulties, the wars were ultimately successful and led to expansion to the Sea of Azov and the Baltic Sea, thus laying the groundwork for the Imperial Russian Navy. His victory in the Great Northern War ended Sweden's era as a great power and its domination of the Baltic region while elevating Russia's standing to the extent it came to be acknowledged as an empire. Peter led a cultural revolution that replaced some of the traditionalist and medieval social and political systems with ones that were modern, scientific, Westernized, and based on radical Enlightenment.[2][3]
In December 1699, he introduced the Julian calendar,[4] which replaced the Byzantine calendar that was long used in Russia,[5] but the Russian Orthodox Church was particularly resistant to this change.[6] In 1703, he introduced the first Russian newspaper, Sankt-Peterburgskie Vedomosti, and ordered the civil script, a reform of Russian orthography largely designed by himself. On the shores of the Neva River, he founded Saint Petersburg, a city famously dubbed by Alexander Pushkin as the "window to the West". In 1714, Peter relocated the capital from Moscow, a status it retained until 1918.
Peter had a great interest in plants, animals and minerals, in malformed creatures or exceptions to the law of nature for his cabinet of curiosities. He encouraged research of deformities, all along trying to debunk the superstitious fear of monsters.[7] He promoted industrialization in the Russian Empire and higher education. The Russian Academy of Sciences and the Saint Petersburg State University were founded in 1724, and invited Christian Wolff and Willem 's Gravesande.
Peter is primarily credited with the modernization of the country, quickly transforming it into a major European power. His administrative reforms, creating a Governing Senate in 1711, the Collegium in 1717 and the Table of Ranks in 1722 had a lasting impact on Russia, and many institutions of the Russian government trace their origins to his reign.
Peter has been featured in many histories, novels, plays, films, monuments and paintings.[121][122] They include the poems The Bronze Horseman, Poltava and the unfinished novel The Moor of Peter the Great, all by Alexander Pushkin. The former dealt with The Bronze Horseman, an equestrian statue raised in Peter's honour. Aleksey Nikolayevich Tolstoy wrote a biographical historical novel about him, named Peter I, in the 1930s.
Diamond order of Peter the Great
Dutch engraving, after Carel de Moor
Yale University Press]