Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor
Maximilian I was King of the Romans from 1486 and Holy Roman Emperor from 1493 until his death, though he was never crowned by the Pope, as the journey to Rome was always too risky. He was the son of Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor and he ruled jointly with his father for the last ten years of his fathers reign, from c.1483 to 1493. Charles father Philip died in 1506, so Charles succeeded Maximilian as Holy Roman Emperor in 1519, Maximilian was born at Wiener Neustadt on 22 March 1459. His father, Frederick III, Holy Roman Emperor, named him for an obscure saint whom Frederick believed had once warned him of imminent peril in a dream, in his infancy, he and his parents were besieged in Vienna by Albert of Austria. One source relates that, during the sieges bleakest days, the prince would wander about the castle garrison, begging the servants. The young prince was an excellent hunter, his hobby was the hunting for birds as a horse archer. The reigning duke of Burgundy, Charles the Bold, was the political opponent of Maximilians father Frederick III.
After the Siege of Neuss, he was successful, the wedding between Maximilian and Mary took place on the evening of 16 August 1477. Maximilians wife had inherited the large Burgundian domains in France and the Low Countries upon her fathers death in the Battle of Nancy on 5 January 1477. Already before his coronation as the King of the Romans in 1486, Maximilian decided to secure this distant and extensive Burgundian inheritance to his family, the House of Habsburg, at all costs. Maximilian undertook the defence of his wifes dominions from an attack by Louis XI and defeated the French forces at Guinegate, the wedding contract between Maximilian and Mary stipulated that only the children of bride and groom had a right to inherit from each, not the surviving parent. Mary tried to bypass this rule with a promise to transfer territories as a gift in case of her death, but her plans were confounded. After Marys death in an accident on 27 March 1482 near the Wijnendale Castle, Maximilians aim was now to secure the inheritance to one of his and Marys children.
Some of the Netherlander provinces were hostile to Maximilian, and they signed a treaty with Louis XI in 1482 that forced Maximilian to give up Franche-Comté and they openly rebelled twice in the period 1482–1492, attempting to regain the autonomy they had enjoined under Mary. Flemish rebels managed to capture Philip and even Maximilian himself, Maximilian continued to govern Marys remaining inheritance in the name of Philip the Handsome. After the regency ended and Charles VIII of France exchanged these two territories for Burgundy and Picardy in the Treaty of Senlis, thus a large part of the Netherlands stayed in the Habsburg patrimony. Maximilian was elected King of the Romans on 16 February 1486 in Frankfurt-am-Main at his fathers initiative and he became emperor of the Holy Roman Empire upon the death of his father in 1493. Much of Austria was under Hungarian rule when he took power, in 1490, Maximilian reconquered the territory and entered Vienna
Monomachus Crown
The Monomachus Crown is a piece of engraved Byzantine goldwork, decorated with cloisonné enamel, in the Hungarian National Museum in Budapest, Hungary. It consists of seven gold plates depicting Byzantine Emperor Constantine IX Monomachus, his wife Zoe, her sister Theodora, the piece has puzzling aspects that have long made it the subject of scholarly debate, it was probably made in Constantinople in 1042. It was unearthed in 1860 by a farmer in what is now called Ivanka pri Nitre in Slovakia, if it is a crown, it is, with the Holy Crown of Hungary of a few decades later, one of the only two Byzantine crowns to survive. In 1860 a farmer near Nyitraivánka discovered the treasure while plowing, sold were the two smaller cloisonee medallions found with the crown plaques, with busts of the apostles Peter and Andrew. These medallions lack holes for nails, unlike the gold plates, in the view of Magda von Bárány-Oberschall and most scholars they almost certainly do not belong to the Monomachus Crown.
The general assumption was for long that the crown seems almost certainly to be a crown and was presumably a gift to the wife of a Hungarian king. According to the account, Andrew or his queen would have received the crown from Constantine IX at this juncture. He was in need of a new crown, since Henry III had captured the crown from King Samuel Aba in 1045 after the Battle of Ménfő and had sent it back to Rome. According to popular legend this was the Holy Crown of Hungary, or some version of it, in 1057 the young King Solomon was crowned with this crown. Other, very different, possibilities have been suggested and are covered below, in 1057 Solomon was besieged by Geza I and escaped with the crown and treasure in the direction of Bratislava in order to seek the protection of his brother-in-law Emperor Henry IV. Soldiers of Geza apprehended him as he was fording the Váh near Ivanka pri Nitre, Solomon had the treasure and the crown buried and barricaded himself behind the walls of Bratislava.
Possibly this was an attempt to recover the buried crown near the ford of Ivanka pri Nitre. The seven gold plates are 3.5 cm wide and between 10 and 4.5 cm tall and they have asymmetrically cut holes whose size and arrangement suggests that the plates were originally connected by a fabric or leather band. It is possible remains of golden bands for connecting the plates were found. It is possible that the seven plates were fastened to a fabric cap, the coarse finish of the decoration, the low purity of the gold plates and the presence of errors in the depiction of the clothing and in the inscriptions are notable. The central and largest plate shows Emperor Constantine IX Monomachus, who was Byzantine Emperor from 1042 to 1055, a Greek inscription on the panel reads, Κῶνστάντινος Αυτοκράτο<ρ> Ρομεον ο Μονομαχο<ς>, Emperor of the Romans, the Monomachos. On the plate to his right is his wife and on the plate to the left, on the smaller panels to the right and left of the Empresses are two dancing female figures.
The smallest plates depict the personifications of two Virtues, the figures have halos on their heads and are surrounded by flowering vines and cypresses
Imperial Crown of Russia
The Imperial Crown of Russia, known as the Great Imperial Crown, was used by the Emperors of Russia until the monarchys abolition in 1917. The Great Imperial Crown was first used in a coronation by Catherine II and it survived the subsequent revolution and is currently on display in the Moscow Kremlin Armoury State Diamond Fund. By 1613, when Michael Romanov, the first Tsar of the Romanov Dynasty was crowned, the Russian regalia included a cross, a golden chain, a barmas, the Crown of Monomakh, sceptre. Over the centuries, various Tsars had fashioned their own private crowns, modeled for the most part after the Crown of Monomakh, in 1719, Tsar Peter I the Great founded the earliest version of what is now known as the Russian Federations State Diamond Fund. The Silk Imperial Crown of Russia was given as a coronation gift of the Russian Empire at the coronation of Nicholas II the last Emperor of the Romanov line. Nicholas II was the first and only monarch to be presented with such a coronation gift.
It was not intended as ceremonial regalia but as private Imperial property as a memento to his coronation event, the court jeweller Ekart and Jérémie Pauzié made the Great Imperial Crown for the coronation of Catherine the Great in 1762. The beautiful crown reflects Pauzies skilled workmanship and it is adorned with 4936 diamonds arranged in splendid patterns across the entire surface of the crown Bordering the edges of the mitre are a number of fine, large white pearls. It is believed to be the second largest spinel in the world, peter’s widow and successor, Catherine I, was the first Russian ruler to wear this form of imperial crown. It is believed to be the second largest spinel in the world, except for the two rows of large white pearls the entire surface of the crown is covered with 4936 diamonds and is quite heavy, weighing approximately nine pounds. At the coronation of Nicholas II in 1896, the crown was worn by Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna as was her right as a crowned Empress.
A second identical lesser Imperial Crown was made for the young Empress Alexandra Feodorovna to wear, Dowager Empresses outranked reigning Empress Consorts at the Russian Court. The work is now in the collection of the Hermitage Museum, following the tradition of the Byzantine Emperors, the Tsar of Russia placed the crown upon his own head. This left no doubt that, in the Russian system, the power came directly from God. The prayer of the Metropolitan, similar to that of the Patriarch of Constantinople for the Byzantine Emperor, a few days prior to the crowning service itself, the Tsar made a processional entry into Moscow, where coronations were always held. After the Tsar entered the cathedral, he and his spouse venerated the icons there and he took it and placed it on his head himself, while the Metropolitan recited, In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, Amen. Following this, the new Tsar crowned his consort, first briefly with his own crown, further prayers and litanies were read, the Emperor was anointed just prior to reception of Holy Communion during the Divine Liturgy.
He was invited to enter the area through the Royal Doors
Emperor
An emperor is a monarch, usually the sovereign ruler of an empire or another type of imperial realm. Empress, the equivalent, may indicate an emperors wife, mother. Emperors are generally recognized to be of an honour and rank than kings. The Emperor of Japan is the currently reigning monarch whose title is translated into English as Emperor. Both kings and emperors are monarchs, but emperor and empress are considered the higher monarchical titles. In as much as there is a definition of emperor, it is that an emperor has no relations implying the superiority of any other ruler. Thus a king might be obliged to pay tribute to another ruler, or be restrained in his actions in some unequal fashion, although initially ruling much of Central Europe and northern Italy, by the 19th century the Emperor exercised little power beyond the German speaking states. In Eastern Europe the rulers of the Russian Empire used translatio imperii to wield authority as successors to the Eastern Roman Empire. Their title of Emperor was officially recognised by the Holy Roman Emperor in 1514, in practice the Russian Emperors are often known by their Russian-language title Tsar, which may used to refer to rulers equivalent to a king.
Historians have liberally used emperor and empire anachronistically and out of its Roman and European context to any large state from the past or the present. Such pre-Roman titles as Great King or King of Kings, used by the Kings of Persia, however such empires did not need to be headed by an emperor. Empire became identified instead with vast territorial holdings rather than the title of its ruler by the mid-18th century, outside the European context, emperor was the translation given to holders of titles who were accorded the same precedence as European emperors in diplomatic terms. In reciprocity, these rulers might accredit equal titles in their languages to their European peers. Through centuries of international convention, this has become the dominant rule to identifying an emperor in the modern era, the name of the position split in several branches of Western tradition, see below. Later new symbols of worldly and/or spiritual power, like the orb, rules for indicating successors varied, there was a tendency towards male inheritance of the supreme office, but as well election by noblemen, as ruling empresses are known.
Ruling monarchs could additionally steer the succession by adoption, as occurred in the two first centuries of Imperial Rome. Of course, intrigue and military force could mingle in for appointing successors, probably the epoch best known for this part of the imperial tradition is Romes third century rule. When Republican Rome turned into a de facto monarchy in the half of the 1st century BC
George Vernadsky
George Vernadsky, Russian, Гео́ргий Влади́мирович Верна́дский) was a Russian-born American historian and an author of numerous books on Russian history. Born in Saint Petersburg on August 20,1887, Vernadsky stemmed from a family of the Russian intelligentsia. His father was Vladimir Vernadsky, famous Russian geologist, back in Russia, Vernadsky resumed his course at the Moscow University, graduating with honors in 1910. His instructors included the historians Vasily Klyuchevsky and Robert Vipper, politically close to the kadet party, Vernadsky began his career as a supporter of liberal ideas, authoring the biographies of Nikolai Novikov and Pavel Milyukov. During the years of the Russian Civil War, he lectured for a year in Perm and he taught in Kiev and followed the White Army to Simferopol, where he taught at the local university for two years. After the fall of Crimea to the Bolsheviks in 1920, Vernadsky left his country for Constantinople. At the suggestion of Nikodim Kondakov, he settled in Prague, there, in association with Nikolai Trubetzkoy and P. N.
Savitsky, he participated in formulating the Eurasian Theory of Russian history, after Kondakovs death, Vernadsky was in charge of the Seminarium Kondakovianum, which disseminated his view of Russian culture as the synthesis of Slavonic and nomadic influences. In 1927, Michael Rostovtzeff and Frank A. Golder offered Vernadsky a position at Yale University in the United States, at Yale, he first served as a research associate in history, and became a full professor of Russian history in 1946. He served in that position until his retirement in 1956 and he died in New Haven on June 12,1973. Vernadskys first book in English was a widely read textbook on Russian history, first published in 1929 and it was translated to numerous languages, including Hebrew and Japanese. In 1943, he embarked on his opus, A History of Russia, of which six volumes were eventually published, despite the death of his co-author, Professor Michael Karpovich. His views emphasized the importance of Eurasian nomadic cultures for the cultural and economic progress of Russia, Vernadsky became the leading American exponent of depicting Russia as much Asian and European, if not more so.
He pointed out many strong cultural differences between Russia and Europe, and praised the success of Russian development along an independent path that revealed his own unique character, Vernadsky was a geographical determinist like his Yale colleague Ellsworth Huntington. They assumed that the characteristics of a land defined the character of the people, for that reason Vernadsky was able to identify the roots of Russian culture in an ancient period long before the Slavic groups arrived. He thereby undercut the standard claim that modern Russia emerged from Kievan Rus and he emphasized the importance of the Mongol period, as the horde united the vast Eurasian plain under a single ruler. This gave tsarist Russia a strong centralized government as well as the deep distrust of Europe, Vernadsky was annoyed that Peter the Great tried to Westernize Russia, thereby distorting its natural character. He said Peter only succeeded in polarizing Russia into a Western oriented elite that stood in profound conflict with the Eurasian peasants
Golden Horde
The Golden Horde was a Mongol and Turkicized khanate established in the 13th century and originating as the northwestern sector of the Mongol Empire. With the fragmentation of the Mongol Empire after 1259 it became a functionally separate khanate and it is known as the Kipchak Khanate or as the Ulus of Jochi. After the death of Batu Khan in 1255, his dynasty flourished for a century, until 1359. The Hordes military power peaked during the reign of Uzbeg, who adopted Islam, the territory of the Golden Horde at its peak included most of Eastern Europe from the Urals to the Danube River, and extended east deep into Siberia. In the south, the Golden Hordes lands bordered on the Black Sea, the Caucasus Mountains, the khanate experienced violent internal political disorder beginning in 1359, before it briefly reunited under Tokhtamysh. However, soon after the 1396 invasion of Timur, the founder of the Timurid Empire, at the start of the 15th century the Horde began to fall apart. By 1466 it was being referred to simply as the Great Horde, within its territories there emerged numerous predominantly Turkic-speaking khanates.
These internal struggles allowed the northern state of Muscovy to rid itself of the Tatar Yoke at the Great stand on the Ugra river in 1480. The Crimean Khanate and the Kazakh Khanate, the last remnants of the Golden Horde, in any event, it was not until the 16th century that Russian chroniclers begin explicitly using the term Golden Horde to refer to this particular successor khanate of the Mongol Empire. The first known use of the term, in 1565, in the Russian chronicle History of Kazan, applied it to the Ulus of Batu and its left wing was referred to as the Blue Horde in Russian chronicles and as the White Horde in Timurid sources. Western scholars have tended to follow the Timurid sources nomenclature and call the left wing the White Horde, the khanate apparently used the term White Horde to refer to its right wing, which was situated in Batus home base in Sarai and controlled the ulus. However, the designations Golden Horde, Blue Horde, and White Horde have not been encountered in the sources of the Mongol period.
At his death in 1227, Genghis Khan divided the Mongol Empire amongst his four sons as appanages, Jochi was the eldest, but he died six months before Genghis. In 1235, Batu with the great general Subedei began an invasion westwards, first conquering the Bashkirs, from there he conquered some of the southern steppes of present-day Ukraine in 1237, forcing many of the local Cumans to retreat westward. The military campaign against the Kypchaks and Cumans had started under Jochi, by 1239 a large portion of Cumans were driven out of the Crimea peninsula, and it became one of the appanages of the Mongol Empire. The remnants of the Crimean Cumans survived in the Crimean mountains, moving north, Batu began the Mongol invasion of Rus and for three years subjugated the principalities of former Kievan Rus, whilst his cousins Möngke, and Güyük moved southwards into Alania. Using the migration of the Cumans as their casus belli, the Mongols continued west, raiding Poland and Hungary and culminating in the battles of Legnica, in 1241, however, Ögedei Khan died in the Mongolia homeland.
Batu turned back from his siege of Vienna to take part in disputing the succession, the Mongol armies would never again travel so far west
Romanization of Russian
Romanization of the Russian alphabet is the process of transliterating the Russian language from the Cyrillic script into the Latin alphabet. Scientific transliteration, known as the International Scholarly System, is a system that has used in linguistics since the 19th century. It is based on the Czech alphabet and formed the basis of the GOST, OST8483 was the first Soviet standard on romanization of Russian, introduced in 16 October 1935. This standard is an equivalent of GOST 16876-71 and was adopted as a standard of the COMECON. GOST7. 79-2000 System of Standards on Information, Librarianship and it is the official standard of both Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States. Machine readable passports is an adoption of an ICAO stadards for travel documents and it was used in Russian passports for a short period during 2010–2013. The standard was substituted in 2013 by GOST R ISO/IEC 7501-1-2013, which does not contain romanization, ISO/R9, established in 1954 and updated in 1968, was the adoption of the scientific transliteration by the International Organization for Standardization.
It covers Russian and seven other Slavic languages, ISO9,1995 is the current transliteration standard from ISO. It is based on its predecessor ISO/R9,1968, which it deprecates, for Russian, the UNGEGN, a Working Group of the United Nations, in 1987 recommended a romanization system for geographical names, which was based on the 1983 version of GOST 16876-71. It may be found in some international cartographic products, American Library Association and Library of Congress romanization tables for Slavic alphabets are used in North American libraries and in the British Library since 1975. The formal, unambiguous version of the system requires some diacritics and two-letter tie characters, British Standard 2979,1958 is the main system of the Oxford University Press, and a variation was used by the British Library to catalogue publications acquired up to 1975. The BGN/PCGN system is relatively intuitive for Anglophones to read and pronounce, the portion of the system pertaining to the Russian language was adopted by BGN in 1944 and by PCGN in 1947.
In Soviet international passports, transliteration was based on French rules, in 1997, with the introduction of new Russian passports, a diacritic-free English-oriented system was established by the Ministry of Internal Affairs, but this system was abandoned in 2010. In 2006, GOST52535. 1-2006 was adopted, which defines technical requirements and standards for Russian international passports, in 2010, the Federal Migratory Service of Russia approved Order No. 26, stating that all names in the passports issued after 2010 must be transliterated using GOST52535. 1-2006. The standard was abandoned in 2013, finally in 2013, Order No.320 of the Federal Migratory Service of Russia came into force. It states that all names in the passports must be transliterated using the ICAO system. This system differs from the GOST52535. 1-2006 system in two things, ц is transliterated into ts, ъ is transliterated into ie, Scholarly ¹ Some archaic letters are transcribed in different ways
Third Rome
Third Rome was the idea that some city, state, or country is the successor to the legacy of ancient Rome. Within decades after the capture of Constantinople by Mehmed II of the Ottoman Empire on 29 May 1453, some Eastern Orthodox people were nominating Moscow as the Third Rome, stirrings of this sentiment began during the reign of Ivan III of Russia who had married Sophia Paleologue. Sophia was a niece of Constantine XI, the last Byzantine emperor, a stronger claim was based on religion. The Orthodox faith was central to Byzantine notions of their identity, vladimir the Great had converted Kievan Rus to Orthodoxy in 988, in return for which he became the first barbarian to ever get an Imperial princess as a wife. And there will be no fourth, no one shall replace your Christian Tsardom. Somewhat notably, Moscow is placed on seven hills, as were Rome, after the fall of Constantinople in 1453 AD, Mehmed II declared himself Kayser-i Rum, literally Caesar of Rome. The claim was recognized by the Orthodox Patriarch of Constantinople, mehmeds claim rested with the concept that Constantinople was the seat of the Roman Empire, after the transfer of its capital to Constantinople in 330 AD and the fall of the Western Roman Empire.
Mehmed had a lineage to the Byzantine Imperial family, his predecessor, Sultan Orhan I had married a Byzantine princess. During that period the Ottoman Empire destroyed Otranto and its people, the title fell into disuse after his death, but the imperial bodies created by Mehmed II lived on for centuries to come. The Carolingian Empire has been claimed to have sought to revive the Roman Empire in the West. According to early German nationalism, the Carolingian Empire transformed into the Holy Roman Empire as a continuation of the Western Roman Empire, in 800, the title of Holy Roman Emperor was granted to Charlemagne by Pope Leo III. After the Holy Roman Empire was dismantled in 1806, the Austrian Empire sought to lay claim as the heir of the Holy Roman Empire as Austrias Habsburgs attempted to unite Germany under their rule. Later the German Empire in 1871 claimed to be the Third Rome, the title for emperors of the Holy Roman Empire, the Austrian Empire and the German Empire was Kaiser, the German word for Emperor.
In Italy, the concept of a Third Rome is related to the capital of the Kingdom of Italy, giuseppe Mazzini, Italian nationalist and patriot promoted the notion of the Third Rome. He said, After the Rome of the emperors, after the Rome of the Popes, there come the Rome of the people, addressing Italian unification. After the unification of Italy into the Kingdom of Italy, the state was referred to as the Third Rome by Italian figures, after the unification, Mazzini spoke of the need of Italy as a Third Rome to have imperial aspirations. In his speeches, Italian leader Benito Mussolini referred to his Fascist Italy as a Third Rome or as a New Roman Empire, terza Roma was a name for Mussolinis plan to expand Rome towards Ostia and the sea. The EUR neighbourhood was the first step in that direction, the concept of a Third Rome figures greatly in the second memoir of Whittaker Chambers
Kremlin Armoury
The Kremlin Armoury or Armoury Chamber is one of the oldest museums of Moscow, established in 1851 and located in the Moscow Kremlin. The name Armoury Chamber is officially used by the museum of the Moscow Kremlin. The Kremlin Armoury originated as the arsenal in 1508. Until the transfer of the court to St Petersburg, the Armoury was in charge of producing and storing weapons, the finest Muscovite gunsmiths and painters used to work there. In 1640 and 1683, they opened the iconography and pictorial studios, in 1700, the Armoury was enriched with the treasures of the Golden and Silver chambers of the Russian tsars. In 1711, Peter the Great had the majority of masters transferred to his new capital,15 years later, the Armoury was merged with the Fiscal Yard, Stables Treasury and the Master Chamber. After that, the Armoury was renamed into the Arms and Master Chamber, Alexander I of Russia nominated the Armoury as the first public museum in Moscow in 1806, but the collections were not opened to the public until seven years later.
The current Armoury building was erected in 1844-1851 by the imperial architect Konstantin Ton, the director of the museum from 1852 to 1870 was the writer Alexander Veltman. After the Bolshevik Revolution, the Armoury collection was enriched with treasures taken from the Patriarch sacristy, Kremlin cathedrals, some of these were sold abroad on behest of Joseph Stalin in the 1930s. In 1960, the Armoury became the museum of the Kremlin. Two years later, the Patriarch chambers and the Cathedral of the Twelve Apostles were assigned to the Armoury in order to house the Applied Arts Museum, the Kremlin Armoury is currently home to the Russian Diamond Fund. It boasts unique collections of the Russian, Western European and Eastern applied arts spanning the period from the 5th to the 20th centuries, the ten Fabergé eggs in the Armoury collection are the most Imperial eggs, and the second-most overall Fabergé eggs, owned by a single owner
Sceptre
A sceptre or scepter is a symbolic ornamental staff or wand held in the hand by a ruling monarch as an item of royal or imperial insignia. Figuratively, it means royal or imperial authority or sovereignty, either right or cruel, the ancient Indian work of Tirukkural dedicates a separate chapter each on the ethics of the right sceptre and the evils of the cruel sceptre. The Was and other types of staffs were signs of authority in Ancient Egypt, for this reason, they are often described as sceptres, even if they are full-length staffs. One of the earliest royal sceptres was discovered in the 2nd Dynasty tomb of Khasekhemwy in Abydos, kings were known to carry a staff, and Pharaoh Anedjib is shown on stone vessels carrying a so-called mks-staff. The staff with the longest history seems to be the heqa-sceptre, the Bronze Age rulers of Mesopotamia are not regularly depicted with sceptres. However, in instances, they are shown armed, with bow and arrow. Use of a rod or staff as representing authority can be traced to the beginning of Classical Antiquity.
Among the early Greeks, the sceptre was a staff, such as Agamemnon wielded or was used by respected elders, and came to be used by judges, military leaders, priests. It is represented on painted vases as a staff tipped with a metal ornament. When the sceptre is borne by Zeus or Hades, it is headed by a bird, when, in the Iliad, Agamemnon sends Odysseus to the leaders of the Achaeans, he lends him his sceptre. Among the Etruscans, sceptres of great magnificence were used by kings, many representations of such sceptres occur on the walls of the painted tombs of Etruria. The British Museum, the Vatican, and the Louvre possess Etruscan sceptres of gold, the Roman sceptre probably derived from the Etruscan. Under the Republic, a sceptre was a mark of consular rank. It was used by generals who received the title of imperator. In the First Persian Empire, the Biblical Book of Esther mentions the sceptre of the King of Persia. Esther 5,2 When the king saw Esther the queen standing in the court, she obtained favor in his sight, so Esther came near, and touched the top of the scepter.
Under the Roman Empire, the sceptrum Augusti was specially used by the emperors, the codes of the right and the cruel sceptre are found in the ancient Tamil work of Tirukkural, dating back to between the first and the third centuries BCE. With the advent of Christianity, the sceptre was tipped with a cross instead of with an eagle
Peter the Great
Peter the Great, Peter I or Peter Alexeyevich ruled the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire from 7 May 1682 until his death, jointly ruling before 1696 with his elder half-brother, Ivan V. Through a number of successful wars he expanded the Tsardom into a larger empire that became a major European power. He led a revolution that replaced some of the traditionalist and medieval social and political systems with ones that were modern, westernized. Peters reforms made an impact on Russia and many institutions of Russian government trace their origins to his reign. From an early age, Peters education was put in the hands of tutors, most notably Nikita Zotov, Patrick Gordon. On 29 January 1676, Tsar Alexis died, leaving the sovereignty to Peters elder half-brother and this position changed when Feodor died in 1682. As Feodor did not leave any children, a dispute arose between the Miloslavsky family and Naryshkin family over who should inherit the throne, Peters other half-brother, Ivan V, was next in line for the throne, but he was chronically ill and of infirm mind.
Consequently, the Boyar Duma chose the 10-year-old Peter to become Tsar with his mother as regent and this arrangement was brought before the people of Moscow, as ancient tradition demanded, and was ratified. Sophia Alekseyevna, one of Alexis daughters from his first marriage, in the subsequent conflict some of Peters relatives and friends were murdered, including Matveev, and Peter witnessed some of these acts of political violence. The Streltsy made it possible for Sophia, the Miloslavskys and their allies, to insist that Peter and Ivan be proclaimed joint Tsars, Sophia acted as regent during the minority of the sovereigns and exercised all power. For seven years, she ruled as an autocrat, a large hole was cut in the back of the dual-seated throne used by Ivan and Peter. Sophia would sit behind the throne and listen as Peter conversed with nobles, while feeding him information and giving him responses to questions and this throne can be seen in the Kremlin Armoury in Moscow. Peter was not particularly concerned that others ruled in his name and he engaged in such pastimes as shipbuilding and sailing, as well as mock battles with his toy army.
Peters mother sought to force him to adopt a conventional approach. The marriage was a failure, and ten years Peter forced his wife to become a nun, by the summer of 1689, Peter planned to take power from his half-sister Sophia, whose position had been weakened by two unsuccessful Crimean campaigns. When she learned of his designs, Sophia conspired with the leaders of the Streltsy, Sophia was eventually overthrown, with Peter I and Ivan V continuing to act as co-tsars. Peter forced Sophia to enter a convent, where she gave up her name, Peter could not acquire actual control over Russian affairs. Power was instead exercised by his mother, Natalya Naryshkina and it was only when Nataliya died in 1694 that Peter became an independent sovereign
Ivan V of Russia
Ivan V Alekseyevich was a joint Tsar of Russia who co-reigned between 1682 and 1696. He was the youngest son of Alexis I of Russia by his first wife Maria Miloslavskaya, Ivans reign was only formal, since he had serious physical and mental disabilities. He sat still for hours at a time and needed assistance in order to walk, Ivan V was the 12th child of Tsar Alexis, but he had only two older brothers who reached adulthood. His eldest brother, died aged 16 in 1670, Feodor suffered from a disfiguring disease, probably scurvy, and it was feared that he would not be able to sire an heir. This meant that Ivan could well succeed his brother as Tsar, Ivan had a younger half-brother, who was the son of his step-mother Natalia Naryshkina, and was healthy of mind and body. This did not happen, perhaps because Feodor III never gave up hope of producing a son, and this rumour fomented the Moscow Uprising of 1682, and major riots broke out in the city. These disturbances subsided only after Ivan appeared in person in the city and proved to everybody that he was alive, in fact, Ivan enjoyed a close relationship with his step-mother and young step-brother.
Natalia Naryshkina, who had married Tsar Alexei when Ivan was only four years old, had grown fond and protective of her simple-minded. In any case, the fact was that during this period, it was not Ivans step-mother but his elder sister, Sofia Alekseyevna. That court was now in a dilemma, on the one hand, Ivan was genuinely and clearly incapable of running the government of Russia, and was not even interested in doing that. The good news was that Ivan himself was a boy who did not wish to cause trouble. Ivan did not really want to become Tsar, but was persuaded to agree to this plan and his full elder sister, Sofia Alekseyevna, was made regent in order to balance various factions at court and ensure that the Naryshkin family would not become too powerful. On 25 June 1682, less than two months after the death of Feodor III, Ivan and Peter were both crowned in the Cathedral of the Dormition as dvoetsarstvenniki, a special throne with two seats was commissioned for the occasion. While Ivan was 16 years old at time, his co-ruler Peter I was only ten.
Although Ivan was considered the senior Tsar, actual power was wielded by his sister, Sophia Alekseyevna. It was she who ruled Russia for the seven years. Although Sophia was always considerate towards Ivan, he neither sought nor received any role in government, she was anxious that every outward sign of respect and deference be paid to Ivan, which was a subtle way of undermining the influence of Peters faction in court. Thus, every wish or opinion expressed by Ivan deferred to, as Peter the Great grew up, he and his faction, led by his mothers Naryshkin family, contended with Regent Sophia for influence and power
