Russia Quotes

“Gargantuan figure. Almost seven feet tall, he had great physical strength and remarkable manual dexterity, and his interests were astonishingly broad. He claimed to have mastered fourteen trades as well as surgery and dentistry. When courtiers and servants took sick they tried to conceal it from Peter, for if he thought that medical attention was needed he would gather his instruments and offer his services. Among his personal belongings Peter left a sackful of teeth, testimony to his thriving dental practice. Peter was also a man with a strong sadistic streak. He delighted, for example, in forcing all his guests, including the ladies, to drink vodka straight – the way he liked it – and in large quantities. Johann Korb, the secretary of the Austrian embassy in Moscow from 1698 to 1699, described a particularly gruesome incident at one of these festive occasions: ‘Boyar Golowin has, from his cradle, a natural horror of salad and vinegar; so the Czar directing Colonel Chambers to hold him tight, forced salad and vinegar into his mouth and nostrils, until the blood flowing from his nose succeeded his violent coughing.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“1832 as the first article of the Fundamental Laws of the Russian Empire (the first volume of the Digest that listed all laws still in effect): ‘The Emperor of all the Russians is a sovereign with autocratic and unlimited powers. To obey the commands not merely from fear but according to the dictates of one’s conscience is ordained by God himself.’ In short, the emperor’s powers were boundless and in theory the tsar could do as he wished because he alone was answerable to God. The tsar set policy, he established the laws of the land, and he was responsible for their enactment. By”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“Russia as a Great Power, 1801–55 During the first half of the nineteenth century, the status of the Russian empire in the international arena changed dramatically. After 1812 it reached the pinnacle of prestige and influence, but in the mid 1850s Russia endured a military defeat that exposed the internal weaknesses of the country, throwing into doubt its viability as a great power. Tsars Alexander I (1801–25) and Nicholas I (1825–55) reveled in Russia’s enhanced status, but both seemed to sense that political and social changes would be necessary to retain that status. From time to time, they actually contemplated a wide range of reforms and they even implemented a”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“PAUL I The forty-two-year-old Paul who ascended the throne was neither unintelligent nor uneducated, but he lacked the temperament to serve as a ruler. Filled with hatred for his mother, he often pursued policies simply because they differed from hers. But in addition his personality made him unsuitable for leadership. He was impetuous, highly irascible, vindictive, and utterly inconsistent. To be sure, he subscribed to some lofty ideals and did, in fact, introduce some significant reforms, but at the same time he believed”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“Yet despite her time-consuming preoccupations with sensual pleasure, Catherine was a dedicated and hard-working sovereign. Not since Peter the Great had Russia been governed by a ruler as energetic, devoted, and successful as she. She wielded decisive power in formulating and executing state policies in both domestic and foreign affairs.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“THE REIGN OF CATHERINE II In the public mind outside of Russia, Catherine’s long reign, from 1762 to 1796, has gained notoriety because of her phenomenal love life. Her amorous adventures were unquestionably remarkable, but it would be a mistake to dismiss her as a sovereign whose only interest was private pleasure. Nor would it be accurate to regard her as a self-centered woman who merely used men to satisfy her carnal needs. To be sure, from 1752 until her death she had no fewer than twenty-one lovers, generally men in the prime of life with impressive physiques. It is also true that the older she grew, the younger were the men she chose. When she was in her early sixties, for example, she took a twenty-two-year-old lover. She was”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“The Pugachev rebellion,’ the historian Nicholas Riasanovsky has noted, ‘served to point out again, forcefully and tragically, the chasm between French philosophy and Russian reality.’ The Pugachev rebellion has become enshrined in Russian history and folklore, revered by many peasants and radicals and deplored by the rest of society.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“official capital of Russia in 1718 and remains to this day one of the world’s most beautiful cities.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“These festivities took place not in the Kremlin, but in Peter’s new capital, St Petersburg, which he called his ‘paradise’ and ‘darling’. Three considerations prompted him to build a city in the swamps at the head of the Gulf of Finland near the mouth of the Neva river: his love for the sea, a desire to perpetuate his memory, and hatred for the Kremlin. For twenty years beginning in 1703 the royal coffers were ransacked to create this ‘great window”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“possession of the provinces of Livonia, Estonia, Ingria, and a part of Karelia. Thus consolidated, Russia’s position as a major European power has survived to the present day.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“decided to massacre subjects indiscriminately in Red Square. According to some accounts, the tsar himself participated in the executions. On one occasion, he is said to have cut off eighty-four rebel heads with a sword. In all, over twelve hundred streltsy were exterminated, and many of their heads were left in the streets of Moscow over winter in order to terrorize the population.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“Terrible (whom he greatly admired), was molded largely by traumatic childhood”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“the reign of a person who was in many ways the most impressive and innovative tsar in Russian history. Peter the Great, as he came to be known, contended that if Russia was to develop into a powerful and enlightened nation many ancient customs and traditions would have to be abandoned and extensive reforms of the country’s institutions on the Western European model would have to be implemented. It was a worthy and even noble vision of modernization and Westernization, but unfortunately for Russia, Peter had little understanding of human nature, and it never occurred to him that he might be able to persuade his people, many of them, to be sure, ignorant and superstitious, of the desirability of rapid change by means other than raw compulsion. In the end, his attempt to ‘civilize Russia with the Knout’ failed and he did not succeed in ‘binding together a nation lacking in cohesion’. Nonetheless, it must be said that hardly an institution of national significance remained unaffected by his initiatives. He laid the foundations of modern Russia.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“Moscow. Between 1238 and 1368 the city was sacked only once, in 1293; no other city in northern Russia escaped enemy attack for as long a time. It was during this period, in 1263, that Daniel, the youngest son of the highly effective ruler of Vladimir, Alexander Nevsky, became the ruler of Moscow, which was now the capital of a permanent principality. Daniel is considered the founder of the princely house of Moscow.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“Although the Mongols dominated Russia for close to two and a half centuries, from 1240 to roughly 1480, there is still no consensus among scholars about the extent to which they influenced the course of Russian”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“Kalka the Mongols scored a great victory, but for some reason they withdrew, only to return with a larger force in 1237. THE EMERGENCE OF THE MONGOL EMPIRE In several respects, the Mongol empire, one of the greatest in world history, remains an enigma to historians. It is hard to explain how one million people succeeded in imposing their rule over one hundred million in a huge area stretching from the Pacific Ocean to the Adriatic coast, from China to Hungary.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“three major cities, Kiev, Novgorod, and Smolensk. The land in the southern regions of the principality was very fertile; so rich, in fact, that after one ploughing it produced excellent harvests for a number of years without any further tilling. The ax was the main agricultural tool, but ploughs were also widely used for the production of spelt, wheat, buckwheat, oats, and barley. Apple and cherry orchards were widespread in what is today Ukraine. Kievans also engaged in horse and cattle breeding.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“How and why Kiev came to adopt Christianity remains unclear. Legend has it that Prince Vladimir sent an emissary to the leaders of the main faiths to examine the beliefs of each. In the end, he allegedly rejected Islam because it forbade alcohol, which ‘is the joy of the Russian’, and Judaism, because it was the religion of a dispersed people without a state. More likely, political considerations prompted Vladimir to opt for Christianity.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“modern science and technology that, beginning in the seventeenth century, steadily enriched and transformed Western societies. By the nineteenth century Russia lagged far behind much of Europe in economic development, national literacy, and the standard of living of its people. To understand this backwardness it is necessary to study history, but one should not assume that all students of history will agree on why Russia developed as it did. The question touches on the highly sensitive issue of national identity and is often discussed by even the most learned scholars in charged language that tends to foster disagreement rather than consensus on the nature of Russia’s past and destiny.”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“On the other hand, Russia’s natural resources are enormous. No other country can boast of so large a variety of minerals, and only the United States is richer in resources. The empire had about twenty percent of the world’s coal supplies, located primarily in the Donets (Ukraine) and Kuznets (in mid Siberia) basins. Its huge oil and gas reserves may have exceeded half the world’s total supply. And there were vast supplies of iron, manganese, copper (of relatively low quality), lead, zinc, aluminum, nickel, gold, platinum, asbestos, and potash. Well endowed by nature, Russia seemed destined for a long period of leadership on the world scene. But because it failed to discard its archaic social and political system, Russia could not take advantage of the advances”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History

“The industrial revolution, which beginning in the mid eighteenth century produced vast economic and social changes in the West, did not take hold in Russia until late in the nineteenth century. Moreover, serfdom, an institution that had largely disappeared in Central and Western Europe by the sixteenth century, became firmly entrenched in Russia in 1649 when a new Code of Law reaffirmed the subservient condition of peasants. Serfdom was not abolished until 1861. Moreover, the principle of autocracy, long challenged in the West and seriously undermined by the French Revolution of 1789, remained the guiding principle of government in Russia until 1917. Initially, the word ‘autocrat’ in the Russian lands referred to a ruler who was independent”
― Abraham Ascher, Russia: A Short History