Question

Rasputin who and what is it but also when, what’s important and why it’s significant to European history

Answer 1

Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin was a Russian mystic and self-proclaimed holy man who befriended the family of Tsar Nicholas II, the last monarch of Russia, and gained considerable influence in late imperial Russia. His burning eyes and alleged ability to expand and contract his pupils at will brought him dozens of followers during his pilgrimages to Greece and the Middle East. He claimed to have powers allowing him to heal the sick and predict the future, while his lack of personal hygiene and his intimidating complexion were in line with the Russian tradition that viewed mujik (rural peasants) as potential saints. Among many other things, Rasputin was one of the Siberian shamans that healed in the name of Christ.

During that period Russia was entering a period of intense crisis and Rasputin enjoyed the total confidence of the Tsarina and therefore the kingdom’s political power. Furthermore, dozens of noble supplicants sought him out for his hypnotic charisma and his prophetic powers, among them several women of Russian high society whose ‘bedroom visits’ ended up being highly controversial. At that time he represented that sexual and mystical flight of those sacred and insane ones of ancient Russia, and soon his relationship with the royal family would become a scandal. The Orthodox Church, which had supported him, now tried to warn the Tsar of his behaviour. But Alexandra saw the warnings against Rasputin as direct attacks on her family.

In 1915, Tsar Nicholas II left the capital to fight on the Russian front in the First World War and left Alexandra in charge of domestic affairs. Rasputin was against the war and served as her counsellor, and during the following months, she ignored the lawmakers and ministers alike. Rumours that she and Rasputin were leaders of a pro-German group began to circulate and there were at least four attempts to kill him, one of them at the hands of a young woman who stabbed him in the stomach. The man survived, but the final onslaught came in 1916, carried out by a lawmaker of the Duma monarchy and two young aristocrats: Felix Yusupov (inheritor of the largest fortune in Russia), and Grand Duke Dimitri, the Tsar’s nephew.

Yusupov invited Rasputin to his house and offered him wine and poisoned cakes, but when those had no effect he shot him in the back. Rasputin, however, got up and ran. Duma shot him again. The conspirators then wrapped him in a curtain, tied his hands and threw him in a hole in the ice in the Neva River. Rasputin drowned.

Two weeks later crowds invaded the streets of Saint Petersburg and Nicholas was forced to abdicate the throne. Rasputin’s poisoned, bullet-ridden and drowned body was exhumed from the ice and burned. Not long afterwards, the Bolsheviks seized power.