Catherine the Great & Potemkin: The Imperial Love Affair

Alexei Orlov, Portraits Russes by Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich picture courtesy of the British Library

Catherine and Potemkin in her boudoir, author’s collection

Alexander Lanskoy, by D. G. Levitsky, Portraits Russes by Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, picture courtesy of the British Library

Count Alexander Dmitriyev-Mamonov, by Mikhail Shibanov, Portraits Russes by Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, picture courtesy of the British Library

Princess Varvara Golitsyna, Portraits Russes by Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, picture courtesy of the British Library

Countess Ekaterina Skavronskaya with her daughter, by Angelica Kauffman, Portraits Russes by Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, picture courtesy of the British Library

Princess Tatiana Yusupova, by E. Vigée Lebrun, Portraits Russes by Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, picture courtesy of the British Library

Portrait of Ekaterina Samoilova by Johann Baptist von Lampi (1751–1830), Portraits Russes by Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, picture courtesy of the British Library

Elizabeth Chudleigh, Duchess of Kingston, photo author’s collection

Joseph II and Catherine meeting 1787, Weidenfeld & Nicolson picture collection

Charles-Joseph, Prince de Ligne, photo author’s collection

Catherine walking in the park at Tsarskoe Selo, by V. L. Borovikovsky, Weidenfeld & Nicolson picture collection

The storming of the Turkish fortress of Ochakov in 1788, Odessa State Local History Museum, photo by Sergei Bereninich, photo author’s collection

Count Alexander Suvorov, Portraits Russes by Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, picture courtesy of the British Library

The invitation to Potemkin’s ball in the Taurida Palace, 1791, Odessa State Local History Museum, photo by Sergei Bereninich, photo author’s collection

Princess Ekaterina Dolgorukaya by Johann Baptist von Lampi (1751–1830), Portraits Russes by Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, picture courtesy of the British Library

Countess Sophia Potocka by Johann Baptist von Lampi (1751–1830), Portraits Russes by Grand Duke Nikolai Mikhailovich, picture courtesy of the British Library

Prince Platon Zubov by Johann Baptist von Lampi (1751–1830), Weidenfeld & Nicolson picture collection

Potemkin’s death, 1791, Odessa State Local History Museum, photo by Sergei Bereninich, photo author’s collection

Potemkin’s funeral, Weidenfeld & Nicolson picture collection

*Potemkin’s Palaces: Taurida, photo by author; Anichkov, author’s collection; Ostrovky, author’s collection; Bablovo, photo by author; Ekaterinoslav, photo by author; Nikolaev, Nikolaev State History Museum, photo by author; Kherson, Kherson State History Museum, photo by author

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

 

Over several years and thousands of miles, I have been helped by many people, from the peasant couple who keep bees on the site of Potemkin’s birthplace near Smolensk to professors, archivists and curators from Petersburg, Moscow and Paris to Warsaw, Odessa and Iasi in Rumania.

I owe my greatest debts to three remarkable scholars. The inspiration for this book came from Isabel de Madariaga, Professor Emeritus of Slavonic Studies at the University of London and the doyen of Catherinian history in the West. Her seminal work Russia in the Age of Catherine the Great changed the study of Catherine. She also appreciated the remarkable character of Potemkin and his relationship with the Empress, and declared that he needed a biographer. She has helped with ideas, suggestions and advice throughout the project. Above all, I must thank her for editing and correcting this book during sessions which she conducted with the amused authority and intellectual rigour of the Empress herself, whom she resembles in many ways. It was always I who was exhausted at the end of these sessions, not she. I lay any wisdom in this work at her feet; the follies are mine alone. I am glad that I was able to lay a wreath on her behalf on Potemkin’s neglected grave in Kherson.

I must also thank Alexander B. Kamenskii, Professor of Early & Early-Modern Russian History at Moscow’s Russian State University for the Humanities, and respected authority on Catherine, without whose wisdom, charm and practical help, this could not have been written. I am deeply grateful to V. S. Lopatin, whose knowledge of the archives is without parallel and who was so generous with that knowledge: Lopatin and his wife Natasha have been so hospitable during Muscovite stays. He too has read the book and given me the benefit of his comments.