"Drank, played trombone, but Europe was afraid of him!" What kind of emperor was Alexander III

As Novye Izvestia has already reported, on June 5, Putin unveiled in Gatchina a monument to Emperor Alexander III, made in honor of the 175th anniversary of his birth. It was in the Gatchina Palace that the Tsar's residence was located in the 19th century.

This seemingly ordinary event immediately caused a scandalous reaction on social networks.

The creator of the monument, a graduate of the St. Petersburg Academy of Arts named after I. Repin, Vladimir Brodarsky, made it according to the sketches of the famous Russian sculptor Paolo Trubetskoy. At the same time, the sculptor sculpted the Order of the Holy Apostle Andrew the First-Called on the emperor's chest, making it not eight, but a six-rayed star, that is, the so-called Star of David. Despite the fact that Alexander III, as you know, was an ardent anti-Semite... Brodarsky corrected this mistake, and so quickly that the popular blogger Rustem Adagamov joked:

“It is high time to erect monuments with unscrewing heads. In the meantime - removable awards".

The star of the order on the chest of Tsar Alexander III was promptly changed to an eight-pointed one.

True, the sculptor Brodarsky, "shocked by the gratitude of the president", - lied a little, writing that "everything was correct on the model".

Alas, maestro, there was a six-pointed star on the layout..."

But something else is much more interesting - the attitude towards this tsar in modern Russia. For example, at the opening of the monument, Putin noted that it is a symbol of the restoration of the continuity of times and generations. "Because you can go forward, confidently develop, reach new heights only by relying on respect for your past, for your outstanding ancestors who faithfully served our people and Russia..." And regarding the activities of Alexander III he said:

“He loved Russia. He lived by it, tried to do everything for its progressive and confident development, to protect the interests and strengthen the Russian state in Europe and in the world. Contemporaries treated him differently, his activities. It has been and will always be so, because it is very difficult, sometimes impossible to assess the scale of such work in real time. But today we can say for sure that the era of Alexander III gives us an example of a natural, harmonious combination of large-scale technological, industrial, state transformations and loyalty to national traditions and culture, their original origins..."

And of course, this position found support in society. So, TV presenter Felix Razumovsky wrote in his blog:

“STILL KICKING... A monument to Emperor Alexander III was unveiled in Gatchina near St. Petersburg. The event is remarkable in many ways. Firstly, this is a visible rejection of the progressive world outlook, which has labeled Alexander Alexandrovich as a counter-reformer and almost obscurantist. And secondly, this is a really beautiful sculpture. After numerous failures in this area (and even failures), after all these Tseretelian Moscow idols (and not only Tseretelian ones), a wonderful, full-blooded image has been created. The work of the young St. Petersburg sculptor Vladimir Brodarsky is beyond praise. This event also revitalizes the public atmosphere that has been completely defiled by several recent "sculptural" stories. A provocation with a monument on Lubyanka and Sevastopol thoughtlessness..."

Journalist Kirill Shulika recalled a very important detail of the emperor's reign:

“I am generally surprised at how people discuss the monument to Alexander III. They say that it is a bad monument. And, excuse me, was the tsar himself with Pobedonostsev and the Pale of Settlement good or what? That was how it was - heavy and clumsy, like a rock. But at the same time, not a single war was under him, which is generally unique for Russia. There was a rock. She took care of the world, but at the same time obscurantism and the Pale of Settlement. Conflicting Russian rulers. But they are emperors after all, not quitters and rogues. Someone is a rock, someone is something so pitiful falling from the wind, someone is a victorious emperor. But some of the rulers cannot be cast in bronze at all, and if someone draws, then only Shilov and Nikas Safronov..."

However, the opponents found their own arguments, most often of a historical nature. So in social networks, they recalled the words of Paolo Trubetskoy himself about his other famous creation dedicated to the same character - the equestrian monument to Alexander III on Znamenskaya Square in St. Petersburg. Trubetskoy assessed his own creation this way: “I am not involved in politics. I painted one animal on top of another..."

It was not for nothing that a folk riddle joke was immediately born about the equestrian emperor, who appeared in 1909:

" There is a chest of drawers,

There is a hippopotamus on the dresser

On a hippopotamus,

There is a hat on the wrap

There is a cross on the hat,

Who will guess

That one under arrest..."

And after the October Revolution on the pedestal in 1919, the poem "Scarecrow" by Demyan Bedny was knocked out.

“My son and my father were executed during their lifetime,

And I took the lot of posthumous disgrace:

I'm sticking here with a cast-iron scarecrow for the country,

Ever thrown off the yoke of autocracy..."

By the way, the poet and publicist Alexey Tsvetkov recalled one of the tsar's vices:

“Of the“ significant accomplishments ”of Alexander III. When the doctor forbade his favorite oral administration, he hid in a gazebo with his beloved general and, pulling out a flask from behind his bootleg, said: "The need for inventions is cunning." With an accent, of course..."

And the oppositionist Ilya Yashin quoted the famous expression of Alexander III himself:

"Constitution? So that the Russian tsar swear allegiance to some cattle?"

And he added:

“And, of course, it is important to say that Alexander III was no “lump”. Extremely reactionary emperor, hostile to society.

What did he leave in history? Manifesto on the inviolability of autocracy. Circular about cook's children. Militant conservatism of Pobedonostsev.

Dark pages of history, which certainly should not be a reference point for the future of Russia..."

But even more curious is the comparison of two Russian emperors made in his "Memoirs" the famous Russian businessman, father of General Pyotr Wrangel, Nikolay Yegorovich Wrangel:

“Neither in character, nor in appearance between Alexander III and his idol Nicholas I there was nothing in common. Nikolai Pavlovich was strikingly handsome and always looked regal. He had the supreme gift of captivating the crowd. He had the ability to charm and charmed, when he needed it, everyone he wanted to charm. To reign was, as he liked to say, his occupation, and he performed it flawlessly. All his intentions and actions had one goal - to be a ruler and to look like that.

Alexander III also struck with his appearance, but not at all with his regal posture and beauty. It amazed the imagination with its enormity. He did not know how to charm and did not even try, and he did not want to develop this quality necessary for the monarch. He perceived power not as a sacred duty with responsibility ensuing from it, but as a privilege given to him personally, which allowed him to follow his whims without thinking. He did not like to disturb his peace, just as he did not like to communicate with people in general. To represent, to appear in public, he found an unpleasant duty and locked himself behind ten castles in Gatchina, like a prince in a fairytale palace. He spent his life with idle people, playing the trombone, chopping wood like a despot-prince in the good old days, interrupting his idleness only when it was necessary to give orders to subordinates, people who lived with him and, like him, nothing did. Despite all this, descendants will repeat that Europe has never been so afraid of Russia as it was under Alexander III. I will add to this that before him Europe had never so despised Russia. They feared Alexander III not as they feared a rational force that posed a threat, but as a porcelain merchant feared an elephant that looked into his shop. Who knows, what if it occurs to him to step on the china.

Even in the most conservative circles, the nature of the reign of Alexander III and his government was shaken by the belief in the rationality and necessity of autocracy. If respect for the autocracy had already disappeared before the revolution (even if in principle many still believed in it and continue to believe), Alexander III is to blame most of all for this. Before him, the power of the Emperor, despite all the mistakes made by the Emperor, was surrounded by a halo.

There are people who arouse interest in themselves; there are people who in themselves do not deserve interest, but arouse it due to their position. The late Alexander III belonged to the latter category of people. It was so colorless that, despite the interest of the Russian people in everything connected with the tsarist power, there was not even a subject for jokes in it. Even those close to him could not, when asked, tell anything interesting about him..."