May 2: Catherine the Great

Born on this date in 1729 was Catherine the Great, Empress of Russia from 1762 until 1796, the country's longest-ruling female leader.

1. That said, she wasn't Russian and her name at birth wasn't Catherine. She was Princess Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst, in Prussia. Her birthplace is in present day Poland. She took the name Catherine, or Ekaterina when she converted to Orthodox Christianity just before her marriage.
2. Even though she was the eldest child, Catherine's mother, Johanna, took little interest in her, so she was closer to her governess than to her mother. It was only as she grew up and her bloodlines made her a desirable bride that the ambitious Johanna began to see her as useful. At 15, Princess Sophie was invited to Russia by Czarina Elizabeth, a daughter of Peter the Great who had assumed the Russian throne in a coup just three years earlier. Elizabeth was looking for a wife for her heir, her nephew Peter. Elizabeth decided that Sophie would do nicely.
3. Peter, however, wasn't impressed. He was 17 when the wedding took place, and more interested in his toy soldiers than in his wife. He spent his wedding night drinking and things didn't get much better. It was nine years before Catherine produced an heir - historians speculate that Peter was either impotent or infertile. He didn't treat his wife well - he insulted her at every opportunity and took mistresses. Most of the time, they didn't even live together. Peter was in one palace hosting all night drinking parties while Catherine was in another, spending her time riding her Horse and reading. She refused to ride side-saddle, and wrote “The more violent the exercise, the more I enjoyed it.”
4. In due course, the lonely and miserable Catherine began to take lovers herself. One of them was Sergei Saltykov, a Russian military officer. When Catherine finally gave birth to a son in 1754, he was officially acknowledged as Peter's son, but there were rumours that Sergei Saltykov was actually his father. None of Catherine's other three children were fathered by Peter.
5. When Peter succeeded to the throne, he immediately set about making reforms to help the poor and ending the war with Prussia. The military classes and the gentry didn't like it. Unrest grew, with Peter's opponents turning to Catherine for help. Just six months after taking the throne, Catherine and her supporters forced him to abdicate, leaving her as the sole ruler. Soon after, Peter was murdered by Alexei Orlov, the brother of Catherine’s lover at the time. There is no proof she played any part in it.
6. Catherine was an intelligent and well-educated woman. As a child she'd studied religion and history and learned three languages: German, French and Russian. She collected art, corresponded with great scholars of the time, such as Voltaire, and wrote numerous books, pamphlets and educational materials aimed at improving Russia’s education system. She even tried writing operas. Although she was frequently the most intelligent person in the room, she would play it down for political reasons, telling people she knew "less than a child about art". She didn't travel much, though. Probably afraid someone would usurp her throne if she went anywhere, she never left Russia after arriving there as a teenager.
7. Catherine was just five feet tall, and described by some as friendly and approachable with "a great desire to please". Yet at the same time, she could be quite intimidating. One court spy described her as "romantic, ardent and passionate. She has a bright glassy hypnotic look like that of a wild animal...She is thoughtful and friendly and yet, when she approached me I automatically back away. She frightens me." She worked tirelessly and planned her daily timetable meticulously.
8. Her lovers were generally more than mere amusement. She'd have genuine feelings for them, and when circumstances forced them to part, she would be lavish with favours. She would shower them with titles, land, palaces and servants. She even helped one of them, Stanislaw Poniatowski, become king of Poland, although she was dismayed that when he did become king, he worked at strengthening Poland's independence rather than being a puppet to Russia. She ended up forcing him to abdicate.
9. Although she claimed to be enlightened and opposed to serfdom, political expediency proved more important in practice. She knew the nobility she depended upon to support her wouldn't tolerate emancipation of serfs. In the end, their conditions actually got worse during her reign.
10. Needless to say, she wasn't popular with everyone and rumours spread to discredit her. There is no historic proof that she kept her hairdresser in a cage so no-one would find out she wore a wig, that she advocated having sex six times a day as a cure for insomnia, or that she died on the Toilet or while having sex with her horse. She died in bed, the day after suffering a stroke, at the age of 67.

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