Alexander Svanidze

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Alexander Swanidze (1915)

Alexander Semjonowitsch "Aljoscha" Swanidze ( Georgian ალექსანდრე სვანიძე , Alek'sandre Svanidze ; Russian Александр Семёнович Сванидзе ; * 1886 ; † August 20, 1941 ) was an old Georgian Bolshevik and historian . He was a personal friend of Josef Stalin and the brother of Stalin's first wife Kato . Still, Stalin had him incarcerated during the Great Terror of 1937. He was shot in prison in 1941 .

Svanidze belonged to the lower (Georgian) nobility ( Aznauri ) and was born in the village of Baji in western Georgia, then part of the Russian Empire . He received his training in Tbilisi and later in Jena , where he learned German and English and conducted historical studies on ancient cultures. He joined the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (RSDLP) in 1901 and worked in the Bolshevik underground until he was forced to leave the Democratic Republic of Georgia in 1919 . Then he worked for the foreign office of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (1920-1921) and was People's Commissar ( Narcom ) for the finances of the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic and the Transcaucasian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (1921-1922). In 1924 he was sent to Germany as the envoy for Soviet foreign trade and, on his return to the Soviet Union in 1935, became deputy chairman of Gosbank . Despite these tasks, Svanidze continued his studies. He founded the Journal of Ancient History ( Вестник древней истории ), studied the Alarodic language ( see Fritz Hommel ) and translated the medieval Georgian poet Schota Rustaveli into Russian .

In the hot phase of the Great Terror in 1937, Stalin ordered Swanidse's arrest. Svanidze did not allow himself to be forced to admit that he was a German spy , as the NKVD demanded in exchange for his life. “Such aristocratic pride,” Stalin is reported to have commented. Svanidze, his wife Maria (née Corona; 1889-1942) - a singer at the State Opera Tbilisi , and his sister Mariko were 1,941 at the approach of the Germans executed . The Supreme Court of the USSR rehabilitated him on January 19, 1956.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Сванидзе, Александр Семенович . Hrono.ru . October 2017. (Russian)
  2. ↑ Simon Sebag Montefiore : Young Stalin. McArthur & Company 2007: 311-312. ISBN 978-1-55278-646-8 .
  3. ^ Alfred J. Rieber: Stalin, Man of the Borderlands ( Memento from August 1, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ). The American Historical Review . December 2001, vol. 106, no.5.
  4. ↑ Biography in the Sakharov Center
personal data
SURNAME Svanidze, Alexander
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Swanidze, Alexander Semjonowitsch (full name); Swanidze, Alyosha (nickname); Svanidze, Alek'sandre; ალექსანდრე სვანიძე (Georgian); Сванидзе, Александр Семёнович (Russian)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Georgian old Bolshevik and historian
DATE OF BIRTH 1886
PLACE OF BIRTH Baji, West Georgia, Russian Empire
DATE OF DEATH August 20, 1941
Place of death Soviet Union