Word: tsar
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Russia's Empress Elizabeth summoned 14-year-old Sophia to Moscow to marry Grand Duke Peter (later Tsar Peter III), Elizabeth's nephew and heir. Peter, a German-born second cousin of his bride-to-be, at 16 was a pockmarked, childish lad who prattled only of soldiers and toys, and in the next 18 years expanded his interests to include mistresses, hounds and drinking. Catherine, as Sophia was rechristened when she entered the Russian Orthodox Church, soon sized him up: "I believe that the Crown of Russia attracted me more than his person...
...first lover. Courtier Serge Saltikov, was "handsome as the dawn; there was no one to compete with him in that." But as soon as the required heir, the future Tsar Paul II, was born, Saltikov was snatched away by Empress Elizabeth and discreetly dispatched to Sweden...