Empress Anna I: The ** crown that fell from the sky
Let's recall the puppet Tsar Ivan V, the youngest son of the wife of the second Tsar Alexei of the Romanov dynasty, the half-brother of Peter, and the younger brother of the regent Sophia.
In order to give you a clearer understanding, I will post the genealogy chart of this dynasty again.
Pedigree of the Romanov dynasty) Ivan V was frail and sickly from an early age, and he also had intellectual disabilities. After the death of his elder brother Fedor III, he and his half-brother Peter jointly succeeded to the position of Tsar, which was regent by their eldest sister Sophia.
Ivan V ascended the throne at the age of 16, and for the first few years he was effectively controlled by his sister Sophia, until later his younger brother Peter staged a coup d'état and seized power, and Ivan V became his puppet again.
Although his reign was short-lived, at the age of 30, his fate was full of helplessness and tragedy.
Ivan V left five daughters, none of whom had children, the first two of whom died tragically, and the remaining three princesses lived marginalized lives in the palace. As adults, the three sisters were used by their uncle Peter for political marriages.
However, all three princesses had unhappy marriages, especially the second daughter, Anna, whose life was full of hardship. Anna was born in 1693, when her father died, when she was only three years old.
As an adult, she is close to 1.9 meters tall, which is unattainable for most men in modern times. According to historical records, Anna is not only tall, but also plump, with a frighteningly loud voice, completely like a country aunt.
According to the writer Thomas, her face resembles a "Westphalian ham", but I don't know what this ham looks like, I searched it up and it looks like this:
In October 1710, Aunt Ann married Duke Wilhelm of the Duchy of Courland, who was also the nephew of the King of Prussia. Why did Peter choose Courland?
Because the Duchy of Courland was located on the territory of present-day Latvia, on the edge of the Baltic Sea. The position on this map is clear at a glance, and for the ** people at that time, the search for an outlet to the sea has extremely high strategic value.
Acquiring this land through marriage is obviously a very cost-effective deal.
Located at the easternmost tip of the Northern Continent, the Duchy of Courland is surrounded by vast snowfields and lush forests, making it a mysterious and adventurous country.
The Principality of Courland is located in Latvia and has a superior geographical location, but because of the small and big Maozi who are addicted to alcohol, Courland is poor and backward and sparsely populated. Aunt An, a young widow, had the idea of going to St. Petersburg in the hope of a better life, but was opposed by her uncle Peter.
It turns out that if Aunt An leaves Courland, the position of the Duchy of Courland will be inherited by someone else, and if she has been the widow of Duke William, she can become a duchess and rule the entire Duchy of Courland.
At this time, ** is fighting with Sweden for territory, and the Duchy of Courland is located right between the two countries, and if it is absorbed by Sweden, ** will be in trouble. Therefore, Peter did not allow his niece to return to her mother's home, nor did he let her remarry, and demanded that she stick to the Duchy of Courland.
The Swedish Empire around 1700) Peter the Great could not prevent Aunt Koan from returning to her parents' home, nor could he prevent her from remarrying. So he sent his minister Bestuzhev to supervise Aunt Ann and ** the affairs of the Principality of Courland.
In addition to paying attention to Aunt An's daily life, Bestuzhev also had a relationship with her. However, by 1726, Bestuzhev may not be able to satisfy Aunt Ann, or she may have developed feelings for her new partner, Ernst John Billon.
In contrast, Billon was able to gain wealth and status through a relationship with the female tsar, demonstrating his abilities and ambitions.
In 1718, at the age of 28, Billund found a job in the Duke's palace of Courland, at first he was just an obscure ordinary servant, but he dreamed big and was not willing to settle for the ordinary.
His handsome appearance and brilliant mind were one of his great strengths, and he soon became famous in the Duke's Palace, attracting the attention of Aunt Ann. Soon after, Aunt An met the handsome young man, and the two fell in love at first sight, and Aunt An's enthusiasm for him made her lose interest in everyone else.
Billund's arrival is like dry wood meets fire, and the love between the two is like a raging flame, which cannot be contained.
Billund won the Duchess's affection with his ingenuity, and this was a rare opportunity. He did his best to take care of Anna I, making her very pleasant even under the bed.
It didn't take long for Billund to become an important administrator of the Duchy of Courland. Not only did he satisfy Anna I, but he was also her god of luck. With him, Anna I's luck has always been good.
At this time, news came from Moscow. Let's turn our gaze to Moscow. In January 1730, the younger Tsar Peter II died of smallpox, leaving no children, and the entire Romanov family of males was cut off.
What can I do?
There was a core authority in Moscow called the Privy Council, whose members consisted mainly of seven conservative nobles, the head of which was Peter II's Fat Duke Dolgoruky the Younger.
These aristocrats are all vested interests in the old order, so they have an incentive to maintain the status quo, which we call conservatives. They deliberated behind closed doors all day before finally reaching a decision.
In the case of the age of the former empress of Peter the Great, Lopukhina, the old comrades of the Privy Council found the ideal tsarist heir. Ivan V's daughter, Aunt An, the legitimate princess of the Romanov royal family, is completely legitimate for her to be the tsar by blood.
Moreover, she has not returned to her parents' home for 20 years since she married Courland, she knows nothing about the shortcomings of her parents in Russia, and she has no power behind it, so she is easy to control.
Conservatives consider her the most desirable tsarist heir. On 19 January 1730, Peter II was breathless, and the Privy Council quickly agreed that Aunt Ann, Duchess of Courland, would succeed him as Tsar.
At the same time, the Privy Council, in order to usurp power, demanded that she sign an agreement that limited her various powers, and the tsar was equal to a mascot. But this is also pie in the sky for Aunt An, and she signed this agreement without hesitation.
On February 15, 1730, at the age of 37, Aunt Ann arrived in Moscow with a grand welcome ceremony, and the Russian people welcomed the new Tsar of the Empire, Anna I.
The accession to the throne of Anna I upended the plans of the Seven Lords of the Privy Council, and she united with the opposition, led the Guard, and succeeded in forcing the Privy Council to annul the agreement. Faced with this situation, the Seven King Kongs could only choose to submit, and Anna I became the ** Tsar.
The ancients said: "With the gun in hand, I have it in the world!" This sentence was fully verified in Anna I. The first thing Anna I did when she took power was to dissolve the Privy Council, and she was not soft on anyone who tried to calculate her.
She re-established an agency called the Cabinet, which was responsible for handling the country's affairs. In addition to this, Anna I also set up a secret criminal investigation department, which was the Russian equivalent of the brocade guard, and specialized in purging the Moscow nobles who opposed her.
The head of this institution was Billund, the lover of Anna I. Anna I was more suspicious during menopause, and she would keep a close eye on their every move, and if she looked at them more, the ministers would be afraid.
The philosophy of this secret criminal investigation department is that "it is better to kill a thousand by mistake than to spare one". During the ten years of Anna I's reign, more than 20,000 people were exiled to Siberia and thousands more were killed.
Raising a harlequin with a lot of money, Aunt An turned out to be a ** maniac.
In Aunt An's later years, three nobles inadvertently angered her. In retaliation, Aunt An ordered a huge chicken coop to be made, covered with eggs, and the three nobles were covered with feathers, and stayed in the chicken coop for a week, imitating the rooster's crow every day.
Is this normal human behavior? This is nothing, what is even more outrageous is that at the end of 1739, Aunt An's pet "stewed pork" was called a "leftover girl" by the people at that time because she was over thirty years old, and no man liked her, she felt very troubled.
So Aunt Ann helped her find a noble husband, who was Sister Peter, the lover and grandson of the former regent Sophia, nicknamed "Kvass Jar".
I don't know what a "kvass can" is, but I took a look, and it turned out that it was available on **, **and it was very expensive, probably like this (I'm not advertising).
Either go to the guillotine or marry a "stewed pork". In desperation, the jar was forced to marry this "stewed pork". Aunt An carefully planned a grand "Ice Palace" wedding, inviting guests from various denominations to attend.
The singularity of this wedding is breathtaking, and it has been talked about by Europeans for more than two hundred years. In St. Petersburg in the early 1740's, the temperature was cold, with temperatures of minus 30 degrees Celsius making it possible to see ice sculptures after urinating outdoors.
At the behest of Aunt An, the wedding ceremony was held in the "Ice Palace" made of ice cubes. At this wedding, the clowns recite obscene poems, and the newlyweds dress up as clowns and walk the streets in a locked cage on the back of an elephant.
Aunt An also forced them to enter the cave room naked to make people, and locked the bedroom and all the doors to prevent them from escaping. If the servant hadn't secretly thrown two coats over, the two "frozen pork" would have frozen to death.
On October 5, 1740, in the "Ice Palace" in St. Petersburg, 47-year-old Aunt Ann and Billon suddenly fell ill while having dinner, and on October 16, Aunt Ann announced an edict designating the two-month-old baby as the Tsar's heir and Billon as regent.
The next night, Aunt Tsar Ann died, and in prison, a little boy who was blindfolded looked up at the stars every night and prayed to God to give him three days of light.
He waited quietly, quietly decayed, and finally died silently, he was Ivan VI, who was later known as the "Prisoner of the Empire". Next Notice: If there is an afterlife, never give birth to the Emperor's family - Ivan VI (Prisoner No. 1 of the Empire) If there is an afterlife, never give birth to the Emperor's family - Ivan VI (Prisoner of the Empire No. 1) (II).
In previous articles by Ivan VI, we have ** important figures in the history of the empire, including the story of the short-lived Tsar Peter II, Catherine I from maid to tsar, and the young son of heaven Peter the Great.
The stories of these historical figures are full of legends and twists and turns, so let's explore their lives and contributions together.