Russian identity can be traced to the Middle Ages with its religion rooted in Byzantine Christianity adopted from Constantinople.
Peter The Great established the Russian Empire in 1721. One of Russia’s most charismatic and forceful leaders, Peter built the foundations of empire on a centralized political culture and promoted “westernization” of the nation. As part of this effort he moved the capital from the history rich city of Moscow to Saint Petersburg, a city built at a great expense and by a great effort of the Russian people. Best architects from France and Italy were involved designing the city. Saint Petersburg became known as Russia’s “Window on the West” and adopted the manners and style of the royal courts of western Europe, even to the point of adopting French as its preferred language.
The Russian Empire reached its peak during the late 18th and early 19th centuries, producing many colourful and enlightened figures such as Catherine the Great, Dostoevsky, Pushkin and Tolstoy. By the late 19th century political crises followed in rapid succession, with rebellion and its repression. The occasional attempts by the Romanovs and the privileged classes to reform society and ameliorate the condition of the underclasses invariably ended in failure. Russia entered World War 1 in the union of the Triple Entente; like other European Empires with catastrophic results for itself. Tsar Nicholas II and his wife, a granddaughter of Queen Victoria, proved to be feckless, weak, and distracted by personal tragedies and the burdens of the war. The government proved unable to hold back the Russian Revolutions of 1917. Deposed and held under house arrest, Nicholas, Alexandra, and their children — and with them the Romanov dynasty — were exterminated by gunfire in the basement of a Yekaterinburg manor house and buried in unmarked graves which were found later and reburied in the Saint Paul and Peter Cathedral in Saint Petersburg.
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