In his 1647 book Beschreibung der muscowitischen und persischen Reise (Description of the Muscovite and Persian journey), German scholar Adam Olearius[136] Olearius's claims about a supposed Russian tendency towards bestiality with horses was often repeated in anti-Russian literature throughout the 17th and 18th centuries to illustrate the alleged barbarous "Asian" nature of Russia. In 1767, Catherine decreed that after seven years in one rank, civil servants automatically would be promoted regardless of office or merit. Russia was to stop any involvement in internal affairs of Sweden. Kamenskii A. She came from a very poor family and did not have a pleasant childhood. In 1768, she formally became the protector of political rights of dissidents and peasants of the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth, which provoked an anti-Russian uprising in Poland, the Confederation of Bar (17681772), supported by France. 12. pp. [79], Within a few months of her accession in 1762, having heard the French government threatened to stop the publication of the famous French Encyclopdie on account of its irreligious spirit, Catherine proposed to Diderot that he should complete his great work in Russia under her protection. [63] Her father did not travel to Russia for the wedding. Finally Catherine annexed the Crimea in 1783. The most famous of these rumors is that she died after having sex with her horse. In 1785, Catherine conferred on the nobility the Charter to the Nobility, increasing the power of the landed oligarchs. Paul I of Russia was the son and successor of Catherine the Great, who took the Romanov throne away from her feeble-minded husband, Tsar Peter III, and had him killed in 1762, an event which ever afterwards preyed on the mind of their son, then a boy of eight. Her coffee was brought in, she drank it and sat down to write. We will remember him forever. Assisted by highly successful generals such as Alexander Suvorov and Pyotr Rumyantsev, and admirals such as Samuel Greig and Fyodor Ushakov, she governed at a time when the Russian Empire was expanding rapidly by conquest and diplomacy. Peter supposedly was assassinated, but it is unknown how he died. [9] It was during this period that she first read Voltaire and the other philosophes of the French Enlightenment. In reality, those in power were beginning to fear the power that Russia was now wielding. [98] One system that particularly stood out was produced by a mathematician, Franz Aepinus. She trained herself, biographer Virginia Rounding told Times Olivia B. Waxman last October, learning and beginning to form the idea that she could do better than her husband., In Catherines own words, Had it been my fate to have a husband whom I could love, I would never have changed towards him. Peter, however, proved to be not only a poor life partner, but a threat to his wifes wellbeing, particularly following his ascension to the Russian throne upon his aunt Elizabeths death in January 1762. Her eyes were soft and sensitive, her nose quite Greek, her colour high and her features expressive. He later became the de facto absolute ruler of New Russia, governing its colonisation. Biography 27 (2004), 51734. On the morning of 5 November 1796 . One urban legend even claimed that Catherine had an erotic cabinet created for one of her palaces. Although Catherine did not descend from the Romanov dynasty, her ancestors included members of the Rurik dynasty, which preceded the Romanovs. Joanna Elisabeth of Holstein-Gottorp (24 October 1712 - 30 May 1760) was a member of the German House of Holstein-Gottorp, a princess consort of Anhalt-Zerbst by marriage, and the regent of Anhalt-Zerbst from 1747 to 1752 on behalf of her minor son, Frederick Augustus.She is best known as the mother of Empress Catherine the Great of Russia. [73] In 1779, she hired the Scottish architect Charles Cameron to build the Chinese Village at Tsarskoye Selo (modern Pushkin, Saint Petersburg). There was every chance he was going to be assassinated. Catherine created the Orenburg Muslim Spiritual Assembly to help regulate Muslim-populated regions as well as regulate the instruction and ideals of mullahs. And so she used her lovers as a means to cement her power. She called Potemkin for help mostly military and he became devoted to her. The crown was produced in a record two months and weighed 2.3kg (5.1 lbs). The emergence of these assignation roubles was necessary due to large government spending on military needs, which led to a shortage of silver in the treasury (transactions, especially in foreign trade, were conducted almost exclusively in silver and gold coins). A new Hulu series titled The Great takes its cue from the little-known beginnings of Catherines reign. [94] The girls who attended the Smolny Institute, Smolyanki, were often accused of being ignorant of anything that went on in the world outside the walls of the Smolny buildings, within which they acquired a proficiency in French, music, and dancing, along with a complete awe of the monarch. [103] Nevertheless, Catherine's Russia provided an asylum and a base for regrouping to the Jesuits following the suppression of the Jesuits in most of Europe in 1773. She disliked his pale complexion and his fondness for alcohol at such a young age. The Corps then began to take children from a very young age and educate them until the age of 21, with a broadened curriculum that included the sciences, philosophy, ethics, history, and international law. In reality, Catherine the Great died of a stroke and she was discovered collapsed on the floor in her washroom. While this was considered a controversial method at the time, she succeeded. Some claimed Catherine failed to supply enough money to support her educational program. [105][additional citation(s) needed], In 1785, Catherine approved the subsidising of new mosques and new town settlements for Muslims. Historians debate Catherine's technical status, whether as a regent or as a usurper, tolerable only during the minority of her son, Grand Duke Paul. Also, the townspeople tended to turn against the junior schools and their pedagogical[clarification needed] methods. She provided support to a Polish anti-reform group known as the Targowica Confederation. Catherine The Great's Infamous Death Vigilius Eriksen/Grand Peterhof Palace Equestrian portrait of Catherine the Great in uniform of the Preobrazhensky Regiment, one of the oldest Imperial Russian guard units, circa 1762. Always in search of romantic intimacy, she once admitted, The trouble is that my heart is loath to remain even one hour without love.. Two wings were devoted to her collections of "curiosities". Catherine gave away 66,000 serfs from 1762 to 1772, 202,000 from 1773 to 1793, and 100,000 in one day: 18 August 1795. The crown contains 75 pearls and 4,936 Indian diamonds forming laurel and oak leaves, the symbols of power and strength, and is surmounted by a 398.62-carat ruby spinel that previously belonged to the Empress Elizabeth, and a diamond cross. Catherine waged a new war against Persia in 1796 after they, under the new king Agha Mohammad Khan, had again invaded Georgia and established rule in 1795 and had expelled the newly established Russian garrisons in the Caucasus. Sophie recalled in her memoirs that as soon as she arrived in Russia, she fell ill with a pleuritis that almost killed her. [51], In 1768, the Assignation Bank was given the task of issuing the first government paper money. Catherine the Great Builds a New Russia Catherine the Great, who died on this day, dragged Russia into the modern era while leading a life filled with political drama, sexual intrigue - and murder. She worked with Voltaire, Diderot, and d'Alembert all French encyclopedists who later cemented her reputation in their writings. Catherine died quietly in her bed on Nov. 17, 1796, at the age of 67 after suffering a stroke. Ivan VI was assassinated during an attempt to free him as part of a failed coup. Sedgwick makes her argument . She did not allow dissenters to build chapels, and she suppressed religious dissent after the onset of the French Revolution. Catherine then left with the Ismailovsky Regiment to go to the Semenovsky Barracks, where the clergy was waiting to ordain her as the sole occupant of the Russian throne. Under her leadership, she completed what Peter III had started. Over this tunic she wore a red velvet dolman with very short sleeves. This reform never progressed beyond the planning stages. After this, Catherine carried on sexual liaisons over the years with many men, including Stanislaus Augustus Poniatowski, Grigory Grigoryevich Orlov (17341783), Alexander Vasilchikov, Grigory Potemkin, Ivan Rimsky-Korsakov, and others. Throughout Russia, the inspectors encountered a patchy response. She called together at Moscow a Grand Commission almost a consultative parliament composed of 652 members of all classes (officials, nobles, burghers, and peasants) and of various nationalities. Catherine recalled in her memoirs her optimistic and resolute mood before her accession to the throne: I used to say to myself that happiness and misery depend on ourselves. On 16 November 1796, Catherine woke up and followed her usual routine. After defeating Polish loyalist forces in the PolishRussian War of 1792 and in the Kociuszko Uprising (1794), Russia completed the partitioning of Poland, dividing all of the remaining Commonwealth territory with Prussia and Austria (1795). Her Swedish cousin (once removed), King Gustav IV Adolf, visited her in September 1796, the empress's intention being that her granddaughter Alexandra should become queen of Sweden by marriage. [52], Catherine made public health a priority. If you feel unhappy, raise yourself above unhappiness, and so act that your happiness may be independent of all eventualities.[21]. The cause of death was confirmed by autopsy. Her mother's opposition to this practice brought her the empress's disfavour. Money was needed for wars and necessitated the junking the old financial institutions. When Sophie arrived in Russia in 1744, she spared no effort to ingratiate herself not only with Empress Elizabeth but with her husband and with the Russian people as well. At first, the institute only admitted young girls of the noble elite, but eventually it began to admit girls of the petit-bourgeoisie as well. To put it bluntly, Catherine was a usurper. But there is no truth in that story. The formidable Catherine had little time for her heir. [1] The Manifesto on Freedom of the Nobility, issued during the short reign of Peter III and confirmed by Catherine, freed Russian nobles from compulsory military or state service. At the time of Peter III's overthrow, other potential rivals for the throne included Ivan VI (17401764), who had been confined at Schlsselburg in Lake Ladoga from the age of six months and who was thought to be insane. Her foreign policy lacked a long-term strategy and from the very start was characterised by a series of mistakes. [117] In later years, Catherine amended her thoughts. The Treaty of Kk Kaynarca, signed 10 July 1774, gave the Russians territories at Azov, Kerch, Yenikale, Kinburn, and the small strip of Black Sea coast between the rivers Dnieper and Bug. Mourning dress is to be worn for six months, and no longer: the shorter the better. A shrewd statesman, Panin dedicated much effort and millions of roubles to setting up a "Northern Accord" between Russia, Prussia, Poland and Sweden, to counter the power of the BourbonHabsburg League. Catherines contributions to Russias cultural landscape were far more successful than her failed socioeconomic reforms. Catherine was born in Stettin, Province of Pomerania, Kingdom of Prussia, Holy Roman Empire, as Princess Sophie Friederike Auguste von Anhalt-Zerbst-Dornburg. They indeed helped modernise the sector that totally dominated the Russian economy. The diplomatic intrigue failed, largely due to the intervention of Sophie's mother, Joanna Elisabeth of Holstein-Gottorp. She also promoted westernization and modernization for her country, though it was within the context of maintaining . [82], During Catherine's reign, Russians imported and studied the classical and European influences that inspired the Russian Enlightenment. [citation needed] She bore him a daughter named Anna Petrovna in December 1757 (not to be confused with Grand Duchess Anna Petrovna of Russia, the daughter of Peter I's second marriage), although she was legally regarded as Grand Duke Peter's.[129]. the official cause of death was given as haemorrhoids and Catherine never . Derided both in her day and in modern times as a hypocritical warmonger with an unnatural sexual appetite, Catherine was a woman of contradictions whose brazen exploits have long overshadowed the accomplishments that won her the Great moniker in the first place. [139][140] According to lisabeth Vige Le Brun: "The empress's body lay in state for six weeks in a large and magnificently decorated room in the castle, which was kept lit day and night. [120] By separating the public interests from those of the church, Catherine began a secularisation of the day-to-day workings of Russia. Writing in The Romanovs, Montefiore characterizes Catherine as an obsessional serial monogamist who adored sharing card games in her cozy apartments and discussing her literary and artistic interests with her beloved. Many sordid tales of her sexuality can, in fact, be attributed to detractors who hoped to weaken her hold on power. She found that piecemeal reform worked poorly because there was no overall view of a comprehensive state budget. [44] Another source of tension was the wave of Dzungar Mongol fugitives from the Chinese state who took refuge with the Russians. [d] As a patron of the arts, she presided over the age of the Russian Enlightenment, including the establishment of the Smolny Institute of Noble Maidens, the first state-financed higher education institution for women in Europe. If a noble did not live up to his side of the deal, the serfs could file complaints against him by following the proper channels of law. Even before the rule of Catherine, serfs had very limited rights, but they were not exactly slaves. Given the frequency which this story was repeated together with Catherine's love of her adopted homeland and her love of horses, it is likely that these details were conflated into this rumor. Her genius seemed to rest on her forehead, which was both high and wide. Days earlier, she had found out about an uprising in the Volga region. The next day, she left the palace and departed for the Ismailovsky Regiment, where she delivered a speech asking the soldiers to protect her from her husband. She was a patron of the . Cause of Death: Stroke. The cabinet was said to have enormous penises for legs, whilst other erotic imagery adorned its sides. After the decisive defeat of the Russian fleet at the Battle of Svensksund in 1790, the parties signed the Treaty of Vrl (14 August 1790), returning all conquered territories to their respective owners and confirming the Treaty of bo. | Besides her native German, Sophie became fluent in French, the lingua franca of European elites in the 18th century. [76], Catherine read three sorts of books, namely those for pleasure, those for information, and those to provide her with a philosophy. It also stipulated in detail the subjects to be taught at every age and the method of teaching. Non-Russian opinion of Catherine is less favourable. A. Viazemski. Whilst she used sex as a tool to broaden and cement her political power, she was far from the nymphomaniac that she was made out to be. She recovered well enough to begin to plan a ceremony which would establish her favourite grandson Alexander as her heir, superseding her difficult son Paul, but she died before the announcement could be made, just over two months after the engagement ball. Catherine did initiate some changes to serfdom. In addition to the textbooks translated by the commission, teachers were provided with the "Guide to Teachers". She fell into a coma and died the next day whilst lying in her bed. [27] Her coronation marks the creation of one of the main treasures of the Romanov dynasty, the Imperial Crown of Russia, designed by Swiss-French court diamond jeweller Jrmie Pauzi. Rumour and degrading slander became the weapon by which they would take jabs at her legacy. Catherine The Great death: She was the victim of many slurs (Image: SKY/HBO) Trending There were a number of salacious tales surrounding the monarch and her court, which was something that . As Robert K. Massie writes in Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman, [F]rom the beginning of her husbands reign, her position was one of isolation and humiliation. Denmark declared war on Sweden in 1788 (the Theatre War). [78] For information about particular nations that interested her, she read Jean Baptiste Bourguignon d'Anville's Memoirs de Chine to learn about the vast and wealthy Chinese empire that bordered her empire; Franois Baron de Tott's Memoires de les Turcs et les Tartares for information about the Ottoman Empire and the Crimean khanate; the books of Frederick the Great praising himself to learn about Frederick just as much as to learn about Prussia; and the pamphlets of Benjamin Franklin denouncing the British Crown to understand the reasons behind the American Revolution. It was fighting and winning wars, modernising and revitalising. Peter III was extremely capricious, adds Hartley. On 25 November, the coffin, richly decorated in gold fabric, was placed atop an elevated platform at the Grand Gallery's chamber of mourning, designed and decorated by Antonio Rinaldi. Catherine II[a] (born Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst; 2 May 1729 17 November 1796),[b] most commonly known as Catherine the Great,[c] was the reigning empress of Russia from 1762 to 1796. document.write(new Date().getFullYear()) When the frail Grand Duchess died on 8 March 1759, she was buried in the Alexander Nevsky Monastery with Catherine and Elizabeth present. Catherine began issuing codes to address some of the modernisation trends suggested in her Nakaz. The belief at the time was that women were inferior to men, whose role was to be subordinate to their husbands. This reversal aroused the frustration and enmity of the powerful Zubovs and other officers who took part in the campaign: many of them would be among the conspirators who arranged Paul's murder five years later.[39]. He warned of uprisings in Russia because of the deplorable social conditions of the serfs. Those in a position to smear her reputation were men. [56] The understanding of law in Imperial Russia by all sections of society was often weak, confused, or nonexistent, particularly in the provinces where most serfs lived. Several bank branches were afterwards established in other towns, called government towns. In her accession to power and her rule of the empire, Catherine often relied on her noble favourites, most notably Count Grigory Orlov and Grigory Potemkin. To the general public, Catherine is perhaps best known for conducting a string of salacious love affairs. Though the young Prussian princess had been imported to . Her son Pavel later was inoculated as well. In the Treaty of Georgievsk (1783), Russia agreed to protect Georgia against any new invasion and further political aspirations of their Persian suzerains. United by a shared appreciation of learning and larger-than-life theatrics, they were human furnaces who demanded an endless supply of praise, love and attention in private, and glory and power in public, according to Montefiore. Running and games were forbidden, and the building was kept particularly cold because too much warmth was believed to be harmful to the developing body, as was excessive play. The Hermitage Museum, which now[update] occupies the whole Winter Palace, began as Catherine's personal collection. While the deeply entrenched system of Russian serfdomin which peasants were enslaved by and freely traded among feudal lordswas at odds with her philosophical values, Catherine recognized that her main base of support was the nobility, which derived its wealth from feudalism and was therefore unlikely to take kindly to these laborers emancipation. According to her memoirs, Sophie was regarded as a tomboy, and trained herself to master a sword. [43], In the Far East, Russians became active in fur trapping in Kamchatka and the Kuril Islands. Larry was not just a beloved family member, but also a husband, friend, mentor, peer, inventor, advisor, and audio enthusiast. The attitude of the serfs toward their autocrat had historically been a positive one. Potemkin also convinced Catherine to expand the universities in Russia to increase the number of scientists. Briefwechsel mit der Kaiserin Katharina", "Alexander the Great vs Ivan the Terrible", "The Ambiguous Legal Status of Russian Jewry in the Reign of Catherine II", "Catherine II and the Serfs: A Reconsideration of Some Problems", Bibliography of Russian history (16131917), Some of the code of laws mentioned above, along with other information, Manifesto of the Empress Catherine II, inviting foreign immigration, Biography of Catherine the Great, Empress of Russia, Family tree of the ancestors of Catherine the Great, Diaries and Letters: Catherine II German Princess Who Came to Rule Russia, Charlotte Christine of Brunswick-Lneburg, Catherine Alexeievna (Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst), Natalia Alexeievna (Wilhelmina Louisa of Hesse-Darmstadt), Maria Feodorovna (Sophie Dorothea of Wrttemberg), Anna Feodorovna (Juliane of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld), Alexandra Feodorovna (Charlotte of Prussia), Elena Pavlovna (Charlotte of Wrttemberg), Alexandra Iosifovna (Alexandra of Saxe-Altenburg), Maria Pavlovna (Marie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin), Elizabeth Feodorovna (Elisabeth of Hesse and by Rhine), Alexandra Georgievna (Alexandra of Greece and Denmark), Elizaveta Mavrikievna (Elisabeth of Saxe-Altenburg), Anastasia Nikolaevna (Anastasia of Montenegro), Militza Nikolaevna of Montenegro (Milica of Montenegro), Maria Georgievna (Maria of Greece and Denmark), Viktoria Feodorovna (Victoria Melita of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Catherine_the_Great&oldid=1142635143, 18th-century people from the Russian Empire, 18th-century women from the Russian Empire, Burials at Saints Peter and Paul Cathedral, Saint Petersburg, Converts to Eastern Orthodoxy from Lutheranism, Members of the Prussian Academy of Sciences, Mistresses of Stanisaw August Poniatowski, People of the War of the Bavarian Succession, Recipients of the Order of St. George of the First Degree, Recipients of the Order of the White Eagle (Poland), Articles containing Russian-language text, Wikipedia articles needing page number citations from May 2020, Articles lacking reliable references from November 2018, Short description is different from Wikidata, Wikipedia indefinitely move-protected pages, Articles lacking in-text citations from July 2022, Articles containing explicitly cited English-language text, Articles containing potentially dated statements from 2008, All articles containing potentially dated statements, Articles containing potentially dated statements from 2009, Wikipedia articles needing clarification from August 2019, Articles with unsourced statements from April 2022, All articles needing additional references, Articles needing additional references from April 2022, Articles needing additional references from December 2022, Articles with Russian-language sources (ru), Articles with self-published sources from November 2021, Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica with Wikisource reference, Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the New International Encyclopedia, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, According to court gossip, this lost pregnancy was attributed to. [70] By 1790, the Hermitage was home to 38,000 books, 10,000 gems and 10,000 drawings. The truth of the matter was Catherine couldnt trust the systematic bureaucracy in Russia nor the many noblemen installed by her husband before her. However, usually, if the serfs did not like the policies of the empress, they saw the nobles as corrupt and evil, preventing the people of Russia from communicating with the well-intentioned empress and misinterpreting her decrees. Due to various rumours of Catherine's promiscuity, Peter was led to believe he was not the child's biological father and is known to have proclaimed, "Go to the devil!" Meilan Solly is Smithsonian magazine's associate digital editor, history. [114] Endowments from the government replaced income from privately held lands. This enormous collection ultimately formed the basis of the Hermitage Museum. [33][34], The Russian victories procured access to the Black Sea and allowed Catherine's government to incorporate present-day southern Ukraine, where the Russians founded the new cities of Odessa, Nikolayev, Yekaterinoslav (literally: "the Glory of Catherine"), and Kherson. 679 Words; 3 Pages; Open Document. [113] This re-established the separate identity that Judaism maintained in Russia throughout the Jewish Haskalah. Born in 1729, and known as Catherine the Great because she served as Russia's longest-reigning female ruler, she was empress from 1762 until her death in 1796. However, the Legislative Commission of 1767 offered several seats to people professing the Islamic faith. Historians consider her efforts to be a success. Whereas the premium cable series traced the trajectory of Catherines rule from 1764 to her death, The Great centers on her 1762 coup and the sequence of events leading up to it. Later, several rumours circulated regarding the cause and manner of her death. For all her achievements, Catherine is often remembered for the multitude of salacious and slanderous rumours attached to her name, none more famous than the one surrounding her death. Rumours of Catherine's private life had a small basis in the fact that she took many young lovers, even in old age. The future Peter III was born Karl Peter Ulrich in 1728, in Kiel, Germany. The pair met on the day of Catherines 1762 coup but only became lovers in 1774. [89] In 1764, she sent for Dumaresq to come to Russia and then appointed him to the educational commission. [99], Despite these efforts, later historians of the 19th century were generally critical. In 1772, Catherine wrote to Potemkin. Awaking from her delirium, however, Sophie said, "I don't want any Lutheran; I want my Orthodox father [clergyman]". 2023 Smithsonian Magazine Her mother was Joanna Elisabeth of Holstein-Gottorp. [124], After her affair with her lover and adviser Grigory Potemkin ended in 1776, he allegedly selected a candidate-lover for her who had the physical beauty and mental faculties to hold her interest (such as Alexander Dmitriev-Mamonov and Nicholas Alexander Suk). Catherine and Peter were ill-matched, and their marriage was notoriously unhappy. She fell into a coma and died the next day whilst lying in her bed. Another theory argues that he died through injuries sustained from . He was strongly in favour of the adoption of the Austrian three-tier model of trivial, real, and normal schools at the village, town, and provincial capital levels. Historian Franois Cruzet writes that Russia under Catherine: had neither a free peasantry, nor a significant middle class, nor legal norms hospitable to private enterprise. [133] The court physician diagnosed a stroke[133][134] and despite attempts to revive her, she fell into a coma. Catherine named ahin Giray, a Crimean Tatar leader, to head the Crimean state and maintain friendly relations with Russia. The church's lands were expropriated, and the budget of both monasteries and bishoprics were controlled by the Collegium of Accounting. In the second partition, in 1793, Russia received the most land, from west of Minsk almost to Kiev and down the river Dnieper, leaving some spaces of steppe down south in front of Ochakov, on the Black Sea. This commission promised to protect their religious rights, but did not do so. Catherine led a successful bloodless coup and put herself on the throne in his stead. Elizabeth therefore allowed Catherine to have sexual lovers only after a new legal heir, Catherine and Peter's son, survived and appeared to be strong.[16]. She was the second wife of Peter the Great. Upon Potemkins death in 1791, Catherine reportedly spent days overwhelmed by tears and despair., In her later years, Catherine became involved with a number of significantly younger loversa fact her critics were quick to latch onto despite the countless male monarchs who did the same without attracting their subjects ire. Look at the mirror, however, and an entirely different ruler appears: Her reflection is this private, determined, ambitious Catherine, says Jaques. [74][75], Catherine enlisted Voltaire to her cause, and corresponded with him for 15 years, from her accession to his death in 1778. In 1780, Emperor Joseph II, the son of Holy Roman Empress Maria Theresa, toyed with the idea of determining whether or not to enter an alliance with Russia, and asked to meet Catherine. She believed in the . [73] The Chinese Palace was designed by the Italian architect Antonio Rinaldi who specialised in the chinoiserie style. The nobles were imposing a stricter rule than ever, reducing the land of each serf and restricting their freedoms further beginning around 1767. Yet shed done an enormous amount of amazing things, had been a kid whod come to a country that wasnt her own and taken it over.. In the first partition, 1772, the three powers split 52,000km2 (20,000sqmi) among them. 2. She levied additional taxes on the followers of Judaism; if a family converted to the Orthodox faith, that additional tax was lifted. Because the Moscow Foundling Home was not established as a state-funded institution, it represented an opportunity to experiment with new educational theories.