Remembering The Powerful Influence of Peter The Great

On February 8th, 1725 the great leader Peter the Great has died. In this article lets remember him and the great things he did for his country. One great thing about him even before his rule was his unlimited curiosity. Nikita Zotov his tutor could never satisfy his curiosity no matter how hard he tried and because of this Peter was a very smart leader that has much knowledge in many areas such as math, fortifications, navigation, military, carpentry, the work of a blacksmith, printing, and many other things. Also since he worked as a blacksmith’s work, carpentry, and printing, commoner jobs he understood commoners and he understood how to control us commoners to keep peace. The first of many great things he did during his rule was in 1689 when he was just 17 the streltsy revolted and Sophia tried to use this to her advantage for a coup d’état. Not only did Peter stop the revolt but he also completely removed Sophia from power and expelled her to the Novodevichy convent.

Peter made much progress in the development of the national economy, military, and trade. He did this by making many great and genius reforms. In the towns the townspeople were released from the rule of the military governors of the provinces and were allowed to elect their own leaders. Also all the townspeople were divided into regulars and commoners and the regulars were divided into two guilds based on profession and capital and the commoners were hired labourers, anyone involved in trade could settle in the city, and there was the right of “free commerce for people of every rank”. Because of these reforms the economic activity in the towns increased and the population of the towns increased. The reforms he made on the central government was he dissolved the boyar council and made the Senate the supreme organ of state, Martial discipline was extended to civil institutions, there was a procurator general that kept watch over the Senate very day, and he replaced the 80 offices that were the central departments of state with 13 boards. All of these reforms to the government made the government better and more efficient. The reforms he made to the armed forces was he established a normal army in place of the streltsy by enlisting peasants and townspeople and choosing officers from the nobility, he replaced outdated weapons with new and better weapons, he introduced regular drilling, and he made The Army Regulations of 1716 which made officers to teach their men “how to act in battle,” “to know the soldier’s business from first principles and not to cling blindly to rules,” and “to show initiative in the face of the enemy.” These things made his army become incredibly strong, possibly the strongest in the world at that time.

A great and smart thing he did was he divided Russia into eight governments, which was divided into 50 provinces, which was subdivided into districts and army regiments were distributed throughout. He did this so Russia would be easier to control.

Not only did he make all these great reforms and do these great things but he also did many great things to improve the industry. Peter used The Grand Embassy to get advanced industrial techniques and he invested large amounts of money into our industry. As a result of this our industry was improved and we led all of Europe in the metallurgical industry. His cultural and educational measures also made Peter great as he modernized the calendar and the alphabet and he sponsored education, permitted us to study abroad, and promoted the translation of books to Western European languages. This made us a more modern country and it made us a more educated country as a whole.

Something else that made Peter, Peter the Great was war. Peter greatly expanded Russia and won many wars. The first campaign he won was the Azov campaign in which he conquered Azov. The next war he fought which was the Northern war lasted 21 years. However it was in this war it showed Peter’s willpower, energy, statesmanship, generalship, and diplomacy. Four years into the war we captured Narva and five years later in the battle of Poltava we beat the Swedish army because of Peter’s geniusness and strategicness. Finally by the end of the war because of us but mainly because of Peter the eastern shores of the Baltic were ceded, Sweden became much less powerful, and the way was opened for us to dominate Poland. Also during this war there were revolts by some of the people the Peter quickly put down and there was a war with the Turks that we lost but Peter showed his amazing diplomacy to negotiate a good peace deal for us. After the war Peter decided to attack Persia and they gave us land for military aid because of how strong Peter made our army.

In conclusion, now that we know why Peter was so great may he rest in peace and be remembered as Peter the Great forever. It is highly important to remember such influential person as Peter the Great!