Ekaterina Romanovna Vorontsova-Dashkova

Portrait of Ekaterina Dashkova by Dmitri Levitsky

Princess Yekaterina Romanovna Vorontsova-Dashkova ( Russian Екатерина Романовна Воронцова-Дашкова ;. Scientific transliteration Ekaterina Romanovna Voroncova-Daškova; born March 17 ^{. Jul} / 28. March  1743 ^greg. In Saint Petersburg , † January 4 ^jul. / January 16  1810 ^greg. In Moscow ) was a close confidante of the Russian Empress Catherine the Great and an important figure of the Enlightenment in Russia, among other things as head of the Russian Academy of Sciences . Her memoirs of Princess Daschkaw or Dachkoff were published in Paris ( Mon Histoire ) in 1804 , and published in two volumes in London in 1840 .

Early biography and Coup d'Etat

Born as Countess Ekaterina Voronzowa, she was the third daughter of Count Roman Voronzow (1707–1783), a member of the Senate. Her mother, Marfa Ivanovna Surmina, died of typhus when she was twenty-six . She left three daughters and two sons. Her uncle Michail Voronzow and her brother Alexander Romanowitsch Voronzow both served as Imperial Chancellor, her other brother Semjon Romanowitsch Voronzow was a well-known Anglophile. She received an extraordinarily good education and from childhood showed the skills and views that made her entire later career so unique. She was well versed in mathematics, which she studied at Moscow University , as well as literature . Her favorite authors were Bayle , Montesquieu , Boileau , Voltaire and Helvétius .

Mikhail Ivanovich Daschkow (1736–1764)

Already as a young girl she was connected to the Russian court and over time she became one of the leading personalities who supported the Grand Duchess and later Empress Katharina Alexejewna. Before she was sixteen, she married Prince Mikhail Daschkow (1736–1764), a prominent Russian nobleman from the Rurikid dynasty , and moved with him to Moscow . In 1762 she was in Saint Petersburg and played a leading role in the coup in which Catherine the Great ascended the throne and her husband Peter III. discontinued. A different outcome of this event would probably have led to the rise of Daschkova's older sister, who was previously the mistress of Peter III. and with whom he had previously openly wanted to replace his wife Katharina.

Trips abroad

Her relations with the new Empress were not cordial, but she remained loyal to her. Often she disliked the men Katharina took as lovers and disapproved of the privileges and attentions Katharina bestowed on them. This led to a certain estrangement between her and the Tsarina, so that she finally asked for permission to travel abroad, as her husband was already dying at that point. From 1769 to 1771 she undertook her first extensive journey through Europe . She was received with great respect at court in many countries, while her scientific and literary reputation enabled her to meet the most distinguished scholars of the time. She made friends in Paris and was admired by Denis Diderot and Voltaire . From 1775 to 1782 they went on the second trip to Europe, it also served to enable their son to study at the University of Edinburgh . She also showed a strong affection for England and all things English. In 1782 she made the acquaintance of Benjamin Franklin at the Hôtel de la Chine .

Administration of the academy

Dashkova returned to the Russian capital in 1782 and became a close confidante of Catherine the Great. Both had a lot in common in literary taste and had the desire to make the Russian language the respected literary language of Europe. On January 24, 1783 Dashkova became the director of the Russian Academy of Sciences . This made her the first woman in the world to head a national academy of science (the president of the academy at that time was Kirill Razumovsky , but in fact the academy was headed by the directors specially appointed for this purpose). She helped the problem-ridden academy with reforms to its former size and prestige. She was also the editor of a monthly magazine and wrote at least two dramatic works, The Marriage of Fabian and a comedy called Toissiokoff . In 1789 she was elected to the German Leopoldina and the American Philosophical Society .

Shortly before the death of Catherine the Great, the two fell out over a piece of literature that Daschkowa made it possible to publish in the academy and that, in the view of the Tsarina, contained revolutionary ideas. The two women soon reconciled, but Daschkowa left the farm soon after.

exile

With Paul I's accession to the throne in 1796, Dashkova was relieved of all her posts, including the director's post at the Academy, and was instructed to retire to a poor estate near Novgorod . The reason for this was the old coup of 1762, which led to the death of Peter III. led what his son Paul would not forgive. After a while, Paul's judgment was softened and Daschkowa was allowed to spend her retirement years in the Troitskoye family estate not far from today's city of Kremjonki, south of Moscow. She died on January 4, 1810 and was buried in the Trinity Church in Troitskoye.

Exhibitions

The exhibition The Princess and the Patriot: Ekaterina Dashkova, Benjamin Franklin and the Age of Enlightenment was organized in Philadelphia in 2006 . Daschkowa and Benjamin Franklin met only once in Paris in 1782, when Franklin was 75 and Daschkowa was 37. Both were impressed with each other. Franklin was the first woman to invite Dashkova to join the American Philosophical Society , and she remained the only woman to be a member for another 80 years. Dashkova later reciprocated by making Franklin the first American member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The correspondence between the two of them was the highlight of the exhibition.

Other

Princess Daschkowa is considered to be the initiator of the introduction of the Cyrillic letter Ё , which she proposed at one of the first meetings of the Academy of Sciences in the presence of numerous writers.

literature

• Alina Chernova: Mémoires and Mon Histoire: Tsarina Katharina the Great and Princess Katharina R. Daschkowa in their autobiographies. Frank & Timme, 2007, ISBN 3-86596-121-5
• Dashkov, Catherina Romanovna Vorontsov, Princess . In: Encyclopædia Britannica . 11th edition. tape 7 : Constantine Pavlovich - Demidov . London 1910, p. 844 (English, full text [ Wikisource ]).

Web links

Commons : Ekaterina Romanovna Vorontsova-Dashkova  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Russian Princess Stands With Franklin as Comrade of the Enlightenment . nytimes.com (English)
• Literature by and about Ekaterina Romanovna Voronzowa-Daschkowa in the catalog of the German National Library

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Alina Chernova: Memoires and Mon Histoire. Frank & Timme, 2007, ISBN 3-86596-121-5 , p. 15
2. ^ Member History: Princess Catherine Ekaterina Dashkova. American Philosophical Society, accessed July 6, 2018 (incorrect year of birth).