Grigori Potemkine

Prince Grigori Alexandrovitch Potemkine or Potiomkine (Russian with stressing: Григо́рийАлекса́ндровичПотёмкин) (September 13rd 1739 - October 5th 1791) was a soldier and Russian statesman . Beautiful and very intelligent, he became the lover and the favorite of Catherine II until her death. It was one of the colonizers of the under-populated steppes of the south of the Ukraine, which became Russian with the Traité of Küçük Kaynarca (1774). It founded the towns of Kherson, Nikolaïev, Sébastopol and Iekaterinoslav.

One knows especially his name maintaining for the setting in scene of frontage of prosperous villages on a miserable reality (villages potemkine) as for the battleship which bore its name lasting the Russian Révolution, which was drawn celebrates it film the Battleship Potemkine .

Origins

It was born in the village from Tchijovo, close to Smolensk in a family of small officers. After studies with the University of Moscow, it engages in the horse Guard. It takes part in the coup d'etat of 1762 which détrône Pierre III and crowns Catherine II. It Receives the rank of second lieutenant of the Guards. Catherine asked for assistants worthy of confidence and appreciated the energy of Potemkine and her capacities of organization. The recent biographical anecdotes like that of its implication in the murder of Pierre III, are obscure and often apocryphal books.

Lover of Catherine II

In 1774, its relations take a more intimate character. It becomes the favorite of the Tsarina, it receives many rewards as well as important stations. During the seventeen years which follow, he is the most powerful character of Russia. Potemkine found pleasure in the ostentatious luxury and the personal richness. As Catherine it falls into temptation from the Absolutisme, however, in many actions it is guided by the spirit of the Lumières. It is tolerant vis-a-vis the various religions, and protects the minorities. As a Commander-in-chief Russian army (named in 1784), he preaches a more human concept of the discipline, demanding that the officers take care of the soldiers in a paternal way.

In 1776, at the request of Catherine, the Emperor Joseph II raises Potemkine with the rank of Prince of the Saint Germanic Roman Empire. In 1775 it is replaced in the good graces of Catherine by Zavadovsky; but the relations between Catherine and her former lover continue to be friendly, and its influence replaced forever per any of his/her other lovers. Very many facts attest the gigantic one and extraordinary influence of Potemkine during the ten following years. The most important documents of State passed between its hands.

Evaluation

Very different are opinons them in connection with Potemkine. Neither during its life nor after its death two people succeeded in agreeing about it. The Lampoon German , published in 1794, is a right specimen of the opinions of those which regarded it as a brilliant devil of Catherine and Russia. But there was much of it, the emperor him even, which regarded it as a multiple man and a genious commander. It was undoubtedly most extraordinary of all the lovers of Catherine. He was an endowed administrator, but requiring coolness. Immorality, extravagance and a total negligence of the human life were its weak points, but it was honest, generous and magnanime. Almost all the anecdotes of Helbig about it, in the biography for the newspaper Minerva , and freely used by the biographers according to, are false.

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This article contains texts coming from Encyclopædia Britannica of 1911, a publication in the public domain.

References

Simon Sebag Montefiore, Catherine the Great' S Imperial Partner, 2005, Page 688, Vintage Books, ISBN 1400077176
Biography

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