Holding Court
A new exhibit at the Historical Museum tracks two centuries of fashion and intrigue among the women standing closest to the throne.
Historical Museum
Nicholas I instituted a strict dress code of Russian-style gowns and headdresses at court.
They say that wars are made by men, but a painting by Georg
Caspar Prenner at the start of the Historical Museum's new exhibit "For
Love and the Fatherland" sets the record straight with a view of Catherine
the Great in full body armor, surveying a battlefield on horseback, flanked by
her ladies-in-waiting.
In fact, with five female rulers in the 18th century, women played a major role
in Russian policy during a period of imperial expansion. Like men, court ladies
moved within a complex maze of favoritism and power. Like men, their friendship
with the royal family was regarded as service, and rewarded with rank and
honorary medals. Even while men occupied the seat of power, as they did
throughout the 19th century, the women's court carried on a parallel existence.
Rather than make a case that court ladies had an equal hand in determining
Russian policy, however, the exhibit concentrates on the women's sphere. It's a
sphere that began rather abruptly in the early 18th century, when Peter the
Great made nobility contingent on service to the tsar. In addition to adopting
the latest European fashions -- foreign languages, low-cut necklines and all --
women were now to be awarded the Order of St. Catherine, a medal festooned with
the exhibit's title, "For Love and the Fatherland."
"The women's theme is one of a spouse's love," said
curator Natalia Perevezentseva about the motto. "It's about love for the
fatherland and love for the emperor, who is the incarnation of the fatherland.
Because Peter was called the father of the fatherland."
Indeed, familial love was initially the basis for the award, whether women
received it for their husbands' service or because they were related in some way
to the tsar. But family connections could also work against them, Perevezentseva
said, pointing to Peter the Great's practice of cutting out the tongues of women
whose husbands had been accused of conspiracy.
As time went on, court ladies became increasingly involved in charitable work,
for which they could also receive the coveted medal. "The 19th century was
a more civilized time in many ways," Perevezentseva said. "By the end
of the 19th century, the circle of court ladies was very close to the empress,
and court ladies sometimes became the empress' close friends."
Gathered from libraries and museums around the country, the exhibit tracks the
evolution of the women's court from its first stabs at Western fashion to the
all-out pomp of the mid-19th century. In classical portraits from Catherine the
Great's time, young Russian ladies from the Smolny Institute in St. Petersburg
hold placards with the sayings, "Do Not Lie," and, "Never Be
Capricious." An illustrated pamphlet painstakingly teaches girls how to
offer their hand when asked to dance. Other portraits show court ceremony at its
height under Nicholas I, who required women to wear Russian-style kokoshnik
headpieces encrusted with jewels and heavy pearls, and dresses with puffed
sleeves and constrictive bone corsets.
From behind the scenes at the imperial court, the exhibition presents porcelain
teacups etched with scenes from popular French romance novels and a box of
acrylic paints belonging to Paul I's wife, Maria Fyodorovna, inlaid with a
delicate miniature painted by the empress herself. Also on display are notes
from Paul I to his mistress, Yekaterina Nelidova, whose rosy-cheeked portrait
from 1796 hangs alongside.
All of which would lack context were it not for the diaries and letters that the
ladies-in-waiting left behind, recounting their daily cares, gossip and
intrigues. Among the most valuable of these, Perevezentseva said, are the
memoirs of Anna Tyutcheva, daughter of the 19th-century poet Fyodor Tyutchev and
governess to the younger children of Alexander II. With their careful
observations and the nearly unlimited access that Tyutcheva enjoyed to the royal
family, the memoirs attracted widespread interest when they were finally
published.
"The author was extremely gifted from the literary point of view,"
Perevezentseva said about Tyutcheva's recollections. "Her memoirs are the
most successful of all the women memoirists' work."
"For Love and the Fatherland" (Za Lyubov i Otechestvo) runs to Jan.
15 at the Historical Museum, located at 1/2 Red Square. Metro Ploshchad
Revolyutsii. Tel. 292-3731.
Copyright © 2004 The Moscow Times. All rights reserved.