Museum of Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (Dzhugashvili) - located in the city of Gori. The iconic landmark of Georgia and the most famous museum among the many dozens of Georgian museums. Similar museums exist in Moscow, Makhachkala, Vologda, Sochi, Novy Afon, Ufa, Solvychegodsk, Volgograd, Irkutsk, Vladikavkaz and even in Bucharest, but only Gori has created a commercial brand on a global scale.
It was this cult museum brand that I decided to visit the Armavir local branch of the Russian Geographical Society (RGS) on the way to the cave city of Uplistsikhe, which is located 12 kilometers from Gori, on a trip to Georgia.
The idea to create a museum in the house where I.V. Stalin was born, arose back in the turbulent 1937. Apparently, this was an order from above, because a similar one appeared in Vologda in the same year. L.P. Beria was directly in charge of Georgia that year, so everything was agreed with him. That first museum was modest and existed on the scale of the house itself. If Stalin visited Georgia in those years, he would have had a unique opportunity to live in a museum named after himself. By a strange coincidence, the museum appeared exactly in the year of the death of Stalin's mother (Ekaterina Geladze), but this seems to be only a coincidence.
But Stalin did not visit Gori. He went there only once by car from Borjomi, but in the village of Osiauri he stopped, thought, and turned back.
Ten years passed, and in 1949 - on the anniversary of Stalin, it was decided to add pathos. The project was entrusted to the main Stalinist of architecture - Archil Kurdiani, who developed the project in the style of the Georgian Stalinist Empire style. In 1949, construction began, but ended already in 1955, after the death of Stalin.
In 1951, the museum (then on the scale of a house) was visited by Stalin's children, Vasily and Svetlana.
Nowadays, it is still a functioning museum, the most expensive in the country, but also the most visited.
The museum has three departments, all of them are located in the central area of the city. The main building is a large palazzo in the Stalinist Gothic style, the construction of which began in 1951 as a local history museum, but later turned into the Stalin House Museum.
The exposition contains many things that actually or supposedly belong to Stalin, including some of the furniture from his offices, and gifts. Also presented are a large number of illustrations, paintings, documents, photographs and newspaper articles. The display ends with one of eight copies of Stalin's death mask. According to the guide, this is the death mask number six.
In front of the main museum is the house where Stalin was born and spent the first four years of his unconscious life from 1879-1883.
The museum presents Stalin's personal railway carriage. The car has been used by him since 1941, including for trips to the Tehran and Yalta conferences. It was transferred to the museum by the North Caucasian Railway in 1985.
The cost of visiting the museum is 15 lari (local Georgian currency). The museum is open daily seven days a week from 10:00-18:00 local time. Video filming is prohibited in the museum, but you will be allowed to take only a few photographs. There is security at the entrance to the museum, and a police station operates in the building itself.
Another story told to us by one of the employees of this museum is also interesting. The essence of this story is that there are certain grounds for believing that the great Russian emperor, Peter the Great, was a Georgian by his father. According to this version, which later finds some confirmation, Peter is the illegitimate son of the Georgian prince Erekle. From childhood, the Georgian prince was close to the Russian royal court, and in particular to Natalya Naryshkina. At the royal court of Alexei Mikhailovich, the Georgian prince Erekle was known as Nikolai Davidovich, later he became the king of Kakheti, Heraclius the First. Thus, the state achievements of Russia during the time of Peter the Great belong to the Georgians.
A year before the birth of Peter, the sovereign Alexei Mikhailovich was really seriously ill and was not able to conceive children. A representative of the royal blood, Erekle the First (Irakli I Bagrationi), was allowed to approach the princess. Soviet history throughout its reign concealed information about the Georgian origin of Peter I, there are the words of Stalin, who said: "Let's leave them at least one "Russian" that they can be proud of."
There is also some information that when A.N. Tolstoy was working on the novel Peter I, he came across some documents with which the writer immediately acquainted Stalin, but the Soviet leader gave the order to keep quiet and not dwell on this topic. Thus, there was a certain letter that indicated the Georgian origin of Peter, but it disappeared under Stalin.
Such actions of Joseph Vissarionovich are, in principle, understandable, the reluctance to reveal the truth was also caused by the fact that he himself had already ranked himself among the Russians. It is known that Stalin considered himself Russian. Whether it was from the heart or it was a forced course of history is not known. But arguing logically, you can’t be the leader of the Russian people and not be, as it were, a Russian soul at the same time? Therefore, to recognize Peter as a Georgian would be extremely illogical and inconsistent on his part, after the leader had already ranked himself among the Russians. Thus, Peter was not Ivan, apparently, therefore he was great, although, apparently, Russian blood also played an important role, it is known that “mixtures” of different bloodlines usually give healthy and talented descendants. Although the most effective factor is the very appearance of Emperor Peter I, which leaves no doubt about this. Peter was a spitting image of a Georgian, very much like his father Erekle the First. There are many other documentary data that speak about the origin of this Russian emperor.
There is documentary evidence that Peter's mother Natalya Naryshkina herself at first did not want to give her son power over the country, “He cannot be a king ...”, she said. Peter seized power by rebellion. The same proof of the non-Russian origin of Peter the Great are the words of Princess Sophia, who wrote to Prince Golitsyn - "You must not give power to the infidel." One of the meanings of the word "basurman" is a foreigner. It seems that Princess Natalya Naryshkina shared Peter's relatively non-Russian roots with her daughter.
There is also a letter from the Georgian king Archil II, who wrote to Princess Naryshkina, in which there were such words: “And how is our little rascal doing?” To top it off, when one day Peter was offered to marry a Georgian princess, he refused with the words: “I won’t marry namesakes.” Which indicates that he himself was well aware of his origin.
There is a rather interesting story that when the writer Alexei Nikolayevich Tolstoy was working on his novel "Peter the Great", he was faced with the rather unusual fact that the greatest of Russian monarchs, the pride of the Romanov family, has nothing to do with either the family name or Russian nationality in general!
This fact excited the writer extremely, and he, taking advantage of his acquaintance with another great dictator, and remembering the fate of other, careless writers, decided to turn to him for advice, especially since the information was in a sense quite close to the leader.
The information was provocative and ambiguous, Alexei Nikolaevich brought a document to Stalin, namely a certain letter, which clearly indicated that Peter I, in his origin, was not at all Russian, as was previously thought, but a Georgian!
Remarkably, Stalin was not at all surprised by such an unusual incident. Moreover, after reading the documents, he asked Tolstoy to hide this fact in order not to give him the opportunity to become public, arguing his desire quite simply: “Let us leave them at least one “Russian” that they can be proud of!”
And recommending that the document inherited by Tolstoy be destroyed. The act, it would seem, is strange, if you remember that Joseph Vissarionovich himself was a Georgian by birth. But if you look, it is absolutely logical from the point of view of the position of the leader of the peoples, since it is known that Stalin considered himself Russian! How else would he call himself the leader of the Russian people?
Information after this meeting, it would seem, should have been buried forever, but no offense to Alexei Nikolaevich, and he, like any writer, was an extremely sociable person, was told to a narrow circle of acquaintances, and there, according to the snowball principle, it was spread like a virus across to all the minds of the intelligentsia of that time.
What was the letter that was supposed to disappear? Most likely, we are talking about a letter from Darya Archilovna Bagration-Mukhranskaya, daughter of the King of Imereti Archil II, to her cousin, the daughter of the Mingrelian prince Dadiani.
The letter refers to a certain prophecy she heard from the Georgian queen: “My mother told me about a certain Matveev, who had a prophetic dream in which Saint George the Victorious appeared to him and said to him: You have been chosen to inform the king about what is in Muscovy a "KING OF KINGS" must be born who will make it a great empire. He was supposed to be born from the alien Orthodox Tsar of Iberian from that tribe of David, which is the Mother of God. And the daughters of Cyril Naryshkin, pure in heart. Disobeying this command - to be a great pestilence. The will of God is the will."
The prophecy unequivocally hinted at the urgent need for such an event, but another problem could really serve such a turn of events.
The beginning of the end of the Romanov family
To understand the reasons for such a written appeal, it is necessary to turn to history and remember that the Moscow kingdom at that time was a kingdom without a king, and the acting king, the monarch Alexei Mikhailovich, could not cope with the role assigned to him.
In fact, the country was ruled by Prince Miloslavsky, mired in palace intrigues, a swindler and adventurer.
Context
As bequeathed by Peter the Great
Rilsoa 19.05.2011As Peter I ruled
Die Welt 08/05/2013Day: why Mazepa turned away from Peter I
Day 28.11.2008Vladimir Putin is a good king
La Nación Argentina 01/26/2016 Aleksey Mikhailovich was a weak and frail man, he was surrounded by people mostly church people, to whose opinion he listened. One of these was Artamon Sergeevich Matveev, who, being a difficult person, knew how to exert the necessary pressure on the tsar in order to induce him to do things that the tsar was not ready for. In fact, Matveev led the tsar with his tips, being a kind of prototype of "Rasputin" at court.Matveev's plan was simple: it was necessary to help the tsar get rid of his kinship with the Miloslavskys and put "his" heir on the throne...
So in March 1669, after giving birth, the wife of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, Maria Ilyinichna Miloslavskaya, died.
After that, it was Matveev who betrothed Alexei Mikhailovich the Crimean Tatar princess Natalya Kirillovna Naryshkina, the daughter of the Crimean Tatar murza Ismail Narysh, who at that time lived in Moscow and for convenience wore the name Kirill, quite convenient for the pronunciation of the local nobility.
It remained to resolve the issue with the heir, since the children born from the first wife were as frail as the tsar himself, and, according to Matveev, they were unlikely to pose a threat.
In other words, as soon as the tsar was married to Princess Naryshkina, the question arose of an heir, and since at that time the tsar was seriously ill and physically weak, and his children turned out to be frail, it was decided to find a replacement for him, and that's when the Georgian prince fell into the hands of the conspirators ...
Who is Peter's father?
There are actually two theories, two great Georgian princes from the Bagration family are registered in Peter's fathers, these are:
Archil II (1647-1713) - king of Imereti (1661-1663, 1678-1679, 1690-1691, 1695-1696, 1698) and Kakheti (1664-1675), lyric poet, eldest son of King Vakhtang V of Kartli. One of founders of the Georgian colony in Moscow.
Heraclius I (Nazarali Khan; 1637 or 1642 - 1709) - king of Kartli (1688-1703), king of Kakheti (1703-1709). Son of Prince David (1612-1648) and Elena Diasamidze (d. 1695), grandson of King Teimuraz I of Kartli and Kakheti.
And in fact, after a little investigation, I am forced to bow that it was Heraclius who could become the father, because it was Heraclius who stayed in Moscow at the time suitable for the conception of the king, and Archil moved to Moscow only in 1681.
Tsarevich Irakli was known in Russia under the name Nikolai, which was more convenient for the local people, and his patronymic was Davydovich. Heraclius was close to Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, and even at the wedding of the Tsar and the Tatar princess, he was appointed thousandth, that is, the main manager of the wedding celebrations.
It is fair to say that the duties of the thousandth also included becoming the godfather of the wedding couple. But by the will of fate, the Georgian prince helped the Tsar of Moscow not only with the choice of a name for the first-born, but also with the conception of it.
At the christening of the future emperor, in 1672, Heraclius fulfilled his duty and named the baby Peter, and in 1674 he left Russia, taking the throne of the principality of Kakheti, however, to receive this title, he had to accept Islam.
Version two, doubtful
According to the second version, the father of the future autocrat in 1671 was the king of Imereti Archil II, who had been visiting the court for several months and fled from the pressure of Persia, who was practically forced to visit the princess’s bedroom under pressure, convincing him that, according to divine providence, his participation was necessary in an extremely charitable deed, namely, the conception of "the one who was expected."
Perhaps it was the dream of the practically holy man Matveyev that made the most noble Orthodox tsar enter the young princess.
The fact that the official heir of the Georgian monarch, Prince Alexander, became the first general of the Russian army of Georgian origin, served with Peter in amusing regiments and died for the emperor in Swedish captivity can testify to the relationship of Peter with Archil.
And the other children of Archil: Matvey, David and sister Daria (Dargen) received from Peter such preferences as lands in Russia, and were kindly treated by him in every possible way. In particular, the fact is known that Peter went to celebrate his victory in the village of All Saints, the area of \u200b\u200bthe current Sokol, to his sister Daria!
The wave of mass migration of the Georgian elite to Moscow is also connected with this period in the life of the country. As proof of the relationship between the Georgian king Archil II and Peter I, they also cite the fact captured in the letter of the monarch to the Russian princess Naryshkina, in which he writes: “How is our rascal doing?”
Although "our rascal" can be said about Tsarevich Nikolai, and about Peter, as a representative of the Bagration family. The second version is also supported by the fact that Peter I was surprisingly similar to the Imeretian king Archil II. Both were truly gigantic for that time, with identical facial features and characters, although the same version can be used as proof of the first, since the Georgian princes were in direct relationship.
Everyone knew and everyone was silent
It seems that everyone knew about the relatives of the king at that time. So Princess Sophia wrote to Prince Golitsyn: “You can’t give power to a Basurman!”
Peter's mother, Natalya Naryshkina, was also terribly afraid of what she had done, and repeatedly stated: "He cannot be a king!"
And the tsar himself, at the moment when the Georgian princess was being married to him, declared publicly: “I won’t marry namesakes!”
Visual similarity, no other evidence needed
This must be seen. Remember from history: not a single Moscow tsar was distinguished by either height or Slavic appearance, but Peter is the most special of them.
According to historical documents, Peter I was quite tall even by today's standards, since his height reached two meters, but what is strange is that he wore shoes of size 38, and the size of his clothes was 48! But, nevertheless, it was these features that he inherited from his Georgian relatives, since this description fit the Bagration family with accuracy. Peter was a pure European!
But not even visually, but in character, Peter definitely did not belong to the Romanov family, in all his habits he was a real Caucasian.
Yes, he inherited the unthinkable cruelty of the Moscow tsars, but this feature could have come to him on the maternal side, since their whole family was more Tatar than Slavic, and it was this trait that gave him the opportunity to turn a fragment of the horde into a European state.
Conclusion
Peter I was not Russian, but he was a Russian, because despite his not entirely correct origin, he was still of royal blood, but he did not ascend to the Romanov family, much less to the Ruriks.
Perhaps it was not the Horde origin that made him a reformer and a real emperor, who turned the county Horde principality of Muscovy into the Russian Empire, even though he had to borrow the history of one of the occupied territories, but we will tell about this in the next story.
The materials of InoSMI contain only assessments of foreign media and do not reflect the position of the editors of InoSMI.
An article about the museum of Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (Dzhugashvili) in Transcaucasia, in Georgia in the city of Gori.
Museum of Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (Dzhugashvili) - located in the city of Gori. The iconic landmark of Georgia and the most famous museum among the many dozens of Georgian museums. Similar museums exist in Moscow, Makhachkala, Vologda, Sochi, Novy Afon, Ufa, Solvychegodsk, Volgograd, Irkutsk, Vladikavkaz and even in Bucharest, but only Gori has created a commercial brand on a global scale.
It was this cult museum brand that I decided to visit the Armavir local branch of the Russian Geographical Society (RGS) on the way to the cave city of Uplistsikhe, which is located 12 kilometers from Gori, on a trip to Georgia.
The idea to create a museum in the house where I.V. Stalin was born, arose back in the turbulent 1937. Apparently, this was an order from above, because a similar one appeared in Vologda in the same year. L.P. Beria was directly in charge of Georgia that year, so everything was agreed with him. That first museum was modest and existed on the scale of the house itself. If Stalin visited Georgia in those years, he would have had a unique opportunity to live in a museum named after himself. By a strange coincidence, the museum appeared exactly in the year of the death of Stalin's mother (Ekaterina Geladze), but this, it seems, is only a coincidence.
But Stalin did not visit Gori. He went there only once by car from Borjomi, but in the village of Osiauri he stopped, thought, and turned back.
Ten years passed, and in 1949 - on the anniversary of Stalin, it was decided to add pathos. The project was entrusted to the main Stalinist of architecture - Archil Kurdiani, who developed the project in the style of the Georgian Stalinist Empire style. In 1949, construction began, but ended already in 1955, after the death of Stalin.
In 1951, the museum (then on the scale of a house) was visited by Stalin's children, Vasily and Svelan.
Nowadays, it is still a functioning museum, the most expensive in the country, but also the most visited.
The museum has three departments, all of them are located in the central area of the city. The main building is a large palazzo in the Stalinist Gothic style, the construction of which began in 1951 as a local history museum, but later turned into the Stalin House Museum.
The exposition contains many things that actually or supposedly belong to Stalin, including some of the furniture from his offices, and gifts. Also presented are a large number of illustrations, paintings, documents, photographs and newspaper articles. The display ends with one of eight copies of Stalin's death mask. According to the guide, this is the death mask number six.
In front of the main museum is the house where Stalin was born and spent the first four years of his unconscious life from 1879-1883.
The museum presents Stalin's personal railway carriage. The car has been used by him since 1941, including for trips to the Tehran and Yalta conferences. It was transferred to the museum by the North Caucasian Railway in 1985.
The cost of visiting the museum is 15 lari (local Georgian currency). The museum is open daily seven days a week from 10:00-18:00 local time. Video filming is prohibited in the museum, but you will be allowed to take only a few photographs. There are guards at the entrance to the museum, and a police station operates in the building itself.
Another story told to us by one of the employees of this museum is also interesting. The essence of this story is that there are certain grounds for believing that the great Russian emperor, Peter the Great, was a Georgian by his father. According to this version, which later finds some confirmation, Peter is the illegitimate son of the Georgian prince Erekle. From childhood, the Georgian prince was close to the Russian royal court, and in particular to Natalya Naryshkina. At the royal court of Alexei Mikhailovich, the Georgian prince Erekle was known as Nikolai Davidovich, later he became the king of Kakheti, Heraclius the First. Thus, the state achievements of Russia during the time of Peter the Great belong to the Georgians.
A year before the birth of Peter, the sovereign Alexei Mikhailovich was really seriously ill and was not able to conceive children. A representative of the royal blood, Erekle the First (Irakli I Bagrationi), was allowed to approach the princess. Soviet history throughout its reign concealed information about the Georgian origin of Peter I, there are the words of Stalin, who said: "Let's leave them at least one "Russian" that they can be proud of."
There is also some information that when A.N. Tolstoy was working on the novel Peter I, he came across some documents with which the writer immediately acquainted Stalin, but the Soviet leader gave the order to keep quiet and not dwell on this topic. Thus, there was a certain letter that indicated the Georgian origin of Peter, but it disappeared under Stalin.
Such actions of Joseph Vissarionovich are, in principle, understandable, the reluctance to reveal the truth was also caused by the fact that he himself had already ranked himself among the Russians. It is known that Stalin considered himself Russian. Whether it was from the heart or it was a forced course of history is not known. But arguing logically, you can’t be the leader of the Russian people and not be, as it were, a Russian soul at the same time? Therefore, to recognize Peter as a Georgian would be extremely illogical and inconsistent on his part, after the leader had already ranked himself among the Russians. Thus, Peter was not Ivan, apparently, therefore he was great, although, apparently, Russian blood also played an important role, it is known that “mixtures” of different bloodlines usually give healthy and talented descendants. Although the most effective factor is the very appearance of Emperor Peter I, which leaves no doubt about this. Peter was a spitting image of a Georgian, very much like his father Erekle the First. There are many other documentary data that speak about the origin of this Russian emperor.
There is documentary evidence that Peter's mother Natalya Naryshkina herself at first did not want to give her son power over the country, “He cannot be a king ...”, she said. Peter seized power by rebellion. The same proof of the non-Russian origin of Peter the Great are the words of Princess Sophia, who wrote to Prince Golitsyn - "You must not give power to the infidel." One of the meanings of the word "basurman" is a foreigner. It seems that Princess Natalya Naryshkina shared Peter's relatively non-Russian roots with her daughter.
There is also a letter from the Georgian king Archil II, who wrote to Princess Naryshkina, in which there were such words: “And how is our little rascal doing?” To top it off, when one day Peter was offered to marry a Georgian princess, he refused with the words: “I won’t marry namesakes.” Which indicates that he himself was well aware of his origin.
Member of the Russian Geographical Society (RGS) of the city of Armavir Frolov Sergey 
It should be noted that this was one of the most noble and influential royal dynasties, descending from the Hebrew kings David and Solomon. For many centuries, from the 11th to the 18th centuries, representatives of this dynasty occupied the Iberian throne. However, having miraculously liberated the country from the power of the Mongol conquerors, the Bagrationi were unable to maintain the integrity of their state, which, until the conclusion of the Treaty of Georgievsk in 1783, remained fragmented, subjected to constant attacks by more powerful neighbors.
The young Georgian prince Irakli from childhood was close to the family of the Russian Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, in particular, to his second wife Natalia Kirillovna Naryshkina. It is worth noting that, according to the memoirs of some contemporaries, she could be unfaithful to her husband. So, Prince Kurakin, in his notes on the “History of Tsar Peter Alekseevich and those close to him,” casually gives the following characterization to the queen: “This princess of a good temperament, virtuous, only was not diligent and skillful in business, and a light mind.” In addition, the future tsarina was brought up in the house of the “near boyar” sovereign Artamon Matveev, a supporter of very progressive views (the first “Westernizer” in Russian culture), and therefore the “gallant” trends of the European courts of the 17th century could not be alien to his family.
Natalya Kirillovna Naryshkina. (wikipedia.org)
Prince Irakli was brought up in the royal family and was called Nikolai Davidovich at the Russian court, and later in 1674 he went to Kakheti to win back power from the Kartli ruler Shahnavaz and his heir Archil. In 1688, the newly-minted king Heraclius, with the support of the military detachments of the Iranian Shah Soleyman Sefi, entered Tbilisi - thus began a long history of struggle for power between various contenders for the Georgian throne, supported by various groups of local nobility.
The version about the possible Georgian origin of Peter is confirmed by assumptions about the illness of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, which began shortly before the birth of the future Russian emperor. Contemporaries describe the king as a very stout person, and therefore suffered greatly from hypertension, which at that time was treated in the newfangled English way - bloodletting, invented by Samuel Collins. There is some evidence that by 1672 the emperor’s illness had reached its peak, and, knowing about the poor health of his main heirs from his first marriage to Maria Ilinichnaya Miloslavskaya, the king allegedly decides to allow the wife of the young and healthy Georgian prince Heraclius to the bed.
Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. (wikipedia.org)
By the way, it is believed that he was a close friend of the king, and at the time of the alleged "pimping" was in the prime of his life - at the age of 30 years. It is curious that it was the Georgian prince who received the position of a thousand during the wedding of Alexei Mikhailovich and Naryshkina, and his duties included not only the direct organization of the wedding, but he was also supposed to become the godfather of the newlyweds, as well as a possible guardian of their future first-born. Already 4 years after the birth of Peter, Alexei Mikhailovich suddenly dies of a heart attack at the age of 47.
Irakli I Bagrationi. (wikipedia.org)
Supporters of the version about the Georgian roots of Peter also cite as evidence some statements by Natalia Naryshkina herself, who allegedly did not want to allow her son to govern the state. Another proof of the supporters of the Georgian origin of Peter is the famous, ambiguously interpreted statement of Princess Sophia, who dropped in a letter to Prince Golitsyn: "You can not give power to the infidel."
Under the infidel was then understood not only a foreigner, but also a person of a different, non-Orthodox religion. Despite the fact that Georgia has always been a country of the same faith with Russia, it is known that Heraclius, having entered into a military alliance with the Persian Shah, also converted to Islam. And the final argument was the statement of Peter himself, when, in response to an offer to marry a Georgian princess, he refused with the words: "I will not marry namesakes."
O.BULANOVA
There are individuals in world history who, even centuries after their death, attract attention. One of these people is the Russian Tsar Peter I. Recently, many minds have been concerned about the question of his origin.
Many researchers and historians argue that there are certain reasons to believe that the Russian Emperor Peter I was a Georgian by his father. According to this version, some confirmation of which was later found, Peter is the illegitimate son of the Georgian prince Erekle.
From childhood, the prince was close to the Russian court and, in particular, to Natalya Naryshkina. At the royal court of Alexei Mikhailovich, Erekle was known as Nikolai Davidovich, later he became the king of Kakheti, Erekle I.
A year before the birth of Peter, the sovereign Alexei Mikhailovich (Quiet) was seriously ill and was not able to conceive more children. Yes, he had heirs (in total, 13 children were born from Maria Miloslavskaya), but they were all weak and frail. Except Sophia. There is an opinion that a representative of the royal family Erekle was allowed to go to Naryshkina - so that she would give birth to a healthy heir. From this approved relationship, Peter was born, and then two more children.
The author of this plan is Artamon Matveev, a certain prototype of Rasputin under the then tsar. Matveev's plan was simple: it was necessary to help the Quietest get rid of his kinship with the Miloslavskys, who ruled everything, and put “his” heir on the throne.
In March 1669, after giving birth, the first wife of the Quietest tsar died, after which it was Matveev who betrothed the tsar to Princess Natalya Kirillovna Naryshkina, the daughter of the Crimean Tatar murza Ismail Narysh, who lived at that time in Moscow and, for convenience, bore the name “Kirill”, quite convenient for pronunciation . It turns out that the “Russian” emperor was by no means Russian…
Soviet historians concealed information about Peter's non-Russian origin, even Stalin's words are known: "Let's leave them at least one" Russian "who they can be proud of." There is also evidence that when A. Tolstoy was working on the novel “Peter I”, he came across some papers, with which the writer immediately acquainted Stalin, but the leader gave the order to keep quiet and not expand on this topic. Those. there was a certain document that indicated the Georgian origin of Peter.
The unwillingness of the "leader of all peoples" to reveal the truth was caused by the fact that he already considered himself Russian. Whether it was from the heart or it was a forced political move is unknown.
But, arguing logically, one can also admit such a postulate: after all, it is impossible to be the leader of the Russian people and at the same time not feel like a Russian soul? Consequently, it would be extremely illogical and inconsistent on Stalin's part to recognize Peter as a Georgian - after the leader had already ranked himself among the Russians.
In addition, Stalin knew perfectly well that he was by no means loved by all the people. And if the most famous reformer tsar (the only autocrat about whom Soviet historical science spoke in a positive way) is declared half-Georgian, it is not known what political unrest this can lead to. Like, not only is Stalin a Georgian, but also Peter?!
What was this document? Most likely, it was about a letter from Darya Archilovna Bagration-Mukhranskaya, daughter of the Tsar of Imereti Archil II, to her cousin, daughter of the Mingrelian prince Dadiani, which spoke of a prophecy, according to which the King of Kings should be born in Muscovy, who will make it a great empire. He was supposed to be born from the alien Orthodox Tsar of Iberian from ... the tribe of David ... ”
The fact that Peter was possibly a half-breed explains both his many talents and non-standard appearance, because it is known that, as a rule, healthy and talented offspring are born from parents of different bloodlines.
By the way, about appearance. It is in assessing his appearance that many historians believe that Peter was a half-breed. “Peter was a spitting image of a Georgian, very much like his father Erekle I,” writes one of the historians.
In addition, Peter was quite tall, even by today's standards - his height reached two meters. At the same time, he wore shoes in size 38, and clothes in size 48. According to the type of figure, this is an almost exact description of his possible Georgian relatives. Yes, and in character, in all his habits, Peter was a real Caucasian.
The researchers found almost all the portraits of Peter, as well as his official father, Alexei Mikhailovich, and the alleged one, Erekle. One of them writes: “... I saw a portrait of Peter, shown under N1 ... I looked for other non-ceremonial portraits of the emperor and found that on them, painted mainly by the court artist Ivan Nikitin, Peter has exactly the same facial features as in drawing N1. Thus, the true appearance of Peter could be considered established.
Admirers of the version about the Georgian origin of Peter also cite many other documents confirming this version. Although they are, of course, mostly indirect, they are very bright. For example, there is documentary evidence that at first Peter's mother Natalya Naryshkina herself did not want to give her son power over the country, “He cannot be a king ...,” she said. Why, if he is the son of a king and queen?
As a result, it is well known that Peter seized power by force. The words of Tsarevna Sofya, who wrote to Prince Golitsyn, serve as proof of Peter's non-Russian origin for fans of the "Georgian" version: "You must not give power to the infidel."
It is worth recalling that one of the old meanings of the word “infidel” is not only “Muslim”, but also “foreigner”. However, in order to become the king of Kakheti, Heraclius converted to Islam.
It seems that Sophia learned this unpleasant secret about her family from someone. By the way, Erekle left Moscow in 1674, and the last child of Naryshkina was born in September 1674.
There is also a letter from the Georgian king Archil II Naryshkina, in which there were such words: “And how is our rascal doing?”. The key word here is "our". Who can be called "ours"? Only related to you by blood.
On top of everything, there is such a fact: when one day Peter was offered to marry a Georgian princess, he refused with the words: “I won’t marry namesakes.” Which indicates that he himself was well aware of his origin. From whom the secret information came - from the mother or from someone else, or whether it was not a secret at court at all - is unknown. Yes, it is, in principle, and it does not matter.
It is clear that not everyone likes the “Georgian” version of the origin of Peter. The Russian Internet was torn apart at one time by fierce disputes that this version was supposedly invented by the enemies of Russia, they were looking for a trace of these enemies in Georgia and Ukraine (in the latter case, referring to one Ukrainian historian who supported it).
At the same time, the main arguments of the opponents of this version are not documentary, but mainly emotional or art criticism.
“It is well known,” writes one of the supporters of the Russian origin of Peter, “that the artists of the 18th-19th centuries. in accordance with fashion, they often idealized or stylized portraits of their customers, giving them the so-called. "classic" forms. Those. they deliberately distorted the images, making everyone look like an ancient Greek or Roman. The underestimation of this circumstance leads to errors in assessments of how the first Russian emperor actually looked.”
This historian and similar supporters of the version of the Russian origin of Peter dismiss the arguments regarding the non-Slavic appearance under the pretext that the “lack of dress” of the portrait is not at all a guarantee of authenticity. “And who will certify that this portrait was really undressed?” they write. - Nikitin clearly did not write the king for himself or such descendants as modern researchers. Most likely, the portrait was simply unsuccessful, and therefore did not become front.”
“Peter,” continues this historian, “as, apparently, every normal person liked similar portraits. One of them was made in 1717 by Karl Moor, who wrote the king during his stay in The Hague, where he arrived for treatment. From the correspondence of Peter and his wife Catherine, it is known that the Tsar liked the portrait of Moor very much. It was bought by Prince B. Kurakin and sent from France to St. Petersburg.”
Peter on it is very similar to the image N4 on the collage illustrating this material. And even from him it is noticeable that Peter's appearance is still non-Slavic ...
And then follows the “lethal” argument of this historian, who defends the Russian origin of Peter: “In the portrait of Moor, Peter has a normal straight Russian nose. The fact that this was exactly the true appearance of Peter is evidenced by his death mask made by Rastrelli. As you can see, her nose is also straight. Later, Rastrelli used this mask to create a statue of Peter, which, obviously, is the most reliable three-dimensional image of him.
One would like to ask this historian: what, there are no Georgians with straight noses?! Are they all hawk-nosed?! But even if they are all nosed without exception, the participation of a mother with a straight nose in the birth process should not be discounted either!
The fact that Peter is not at all like his “official” father, Alexei Mikhailovich, is also not taken into account by such historians. They excuse themselves by saying that in all the portraits the Quietest is depicted with a bushy beard, and this makes it difficult to identify similarities. But which, as they claim, nevertheless, is. For example, in "overweight and puffiness of features." Based on this opinion, all those who have become overweight and puffy in old age are relatives ?!
The opponents of the “Georgian” version comment on the phrase of Peter’s mother “He cannot be a king” as follows: “In Russia, since ancient times it has not been customary to immediately agree to invitations to sit in a red corner or on the royal throne. Godunov several times, in front of all the people, ritually refused the crown offered to him. The mother of the first Romanov, Mikhail, also said that her boy could not be a king. Nevertheless, Michael did become king.”
Why the mother of the first Romanov said so is understandable. She understood that the Romanovs had usurped power. Why Godunov refused is also clear: he is not of royal blood. So that's not an argument either.
As for Archil II’s letter regarding “our rascal”, one of the opponents of the “Georgian” version believes that “the letter may well be talking about some puppy of Caucasian breeds, presented by the impoverished Archil to the Queen of Russia. A cheerful puppy can also be called a naughty one.”
Well, here, as they say, there is nothing to even say! First give the queen a puppy, and then write about him?!
Then there are arguments that Peter, knowing about his shaky origin, would hardly have left the country and went to Holland to practice at the local shipyards. And Sophia, if she knew the truth and at the same time passionately desiring power, would immediately expose both Naryshkina and Peter.
Of all the arguments of the opponents of the “Georgian” version, only the last one is more or less weighty. But who knows what reasons Sophia was guided by? It is possible that she simply did not have any evidence.
