Russia: Empire and Nation

Statue of Alexander III, St. PetersburgBy Pavel Trubetskoi (1909)

Alexander III (1881-1894)

• son of Alexander II

• became tsar after his father’s assassination in 1881

• reactionary and nationalist leader

• like Nicholas I (his grandfather), champion of the three pillars of Russian Tsardom: Autocracy, Orthodoxy, and Nationality

• pursued Russification policies to create national, linguistic, and religious unity

• embraced Russia’s Muscovite past (16th and 17th centuries) and history of strong, paternalistic tsars ruling over submissive people who love them

“Three Bogatyri” (1898) by Viktor Vasnetsov

Ethnographic map of Russia after the 1897 census. Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ethnographic_map_of_Russian_Empire.jpg.

Map of the Pale of Settlement in the Russian Empire (1905).

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map_showing_the_percentage_of_Jews_in_the_Pale_of_Settlement_and_Congress_Poland,_The_Jewish_Encyclopedia_(1905).jpg