Russian Empire

For other places with a similar name, see Russia (disambiguation).

Russian Empire
Россійская Имперія (Russian)
Rossíyskaya Impériya
1721–1917
Coat of arms (1882–1917) of Imperial Russia
Coat of arms
(1882–1917)
Motto: С нами Бог!
('God is with us!')
Anthem: Боже, Царя храни!» (1833–1917)
("God Save the Tsar!")
Гром победы, раздавайся!» (1791–1816)
("Let the Thunder of Victory Rumble!") (unofficial)
Коль славен наш Господь в Сионе» (1794–1816)
("How Glorious Is Our Lord in Zion") (unofficial)
Молитва русских» (1816–1833)
("The Prayer of Russians")
     Russia in 1914      Lost in 1856–1914
     Spheres of influence      Protectorates[a]
The Russian Empire on the eve of the First World War
CapitalSaint Petersburg[b]
(1721–1728; 1730–1917)
Moscow
(1728–1730)[2]
Largest citySaint Petersburg
Official languagesRussian
Recognized languagesPolish, German (in Baltic provinces), Finnish, Swedish, Chinese (in Dalian)
Religion
(1897)
  • 11.1% Islam
  • 4.2% Judaism
  • 0.3% Buddhism
  • 0.2% Others
Demonym(s)Russian
GovernmentUnitary absolute monarchy
(1721–1906)
Unitary parliamentary semi-constitutional monarchy[4]
(1906–1917)
Emperor 
• 1721–1725 (first)
Peter I
• 1894–1917 (last)
Nicholas II
 
• 1810–1812 (first)
Nikolai Rumyantsev[c]
• 1917 (last)
Nikolai Golitsyn[d]
LegislatureGoverning Senate[5]
• Upper house
State Council
(1810–1917)
• Lower house
State Duma
(1905–1917)
History 
10 September 1721
• Proclaimed
2 November 1721
4 February 1722
26 December 1825
3 March 1861
• Selling of Alaska
18 October 1867
Jan 1905 – Jul 1907
30 October 1905
• Constitution adopted
6 May 1906
8–16 March 1917
• Proclamation of the Republic
14 September 1917
Area
1895[6]22,800,000 km2 (8,800,000 sq mi)
Population
• 1897
125,640,021
• 1910[7][8][9]
161,000,000
CurrencyRussian ruble
Preceded by		 Succeeded by
Tsardom of
Russia
Provisional Government
Russian Republic

The Russian Empire[e][f] was a vast empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its proclamation in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about 22,800,000 km2 (8,800,000 sq mi), roughly one-sixth of the world's landmass, making it the third-largest empire in history, behind only the British and Mongol empires. It also colonized North America between 1799 and 1867. The empire's 1897 census, the only one it conducted, found a population of 125.6 million with considerable ethnic, linguistic, religious, and socioeconomic diversity.

The rise of the Russian Empire coincided with the decline of its rivals: the Swedish Empire, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, Qajar Iran, the Ottoman Empire, and Qing China. From the 10th to 17th centuries, the Russians had been ruled by a noble class known as the boyars, above whom was an absolute monarch titled the tsar. The groundwork of the Russian Empire was laid by Ivan III (r. 1462–1505), who greatly expanded his domain, established a centralized Russian national state, and secured independence against the Tatars. His grandson, Ivan IV (r. 1533–1584), became in 1547 the first Russian monarch to be crowned "tsar of all Russia". Between 1550 and 1700, the Russian state grew by an average of 35,000 km2 (14,000 sq mi) per year. Major events during this period include the transition from the Rurik to the Romanov dynasties, the conquest of Siberia, and the reign of Peter the Great (r. 1682–1725).[10]

Peter transformed the tsardom into an empire, and fought numerous wars that turned a vast realm into a major European power. He moved the Russian capital from Moscow to the new model city of Saint Petersburg, which marked the birth of the imperial era, and led a cultural revolution that introduced a modern, scientific, rationalist, and Western-oriented system. Catherine the Great (r. 1762–1796) presided over further expansion of the Russian state by conquest, colonization, and diplomacy, while continuing Peter's policy of modernization towards a Western model. Alexander I (r. 1801–1825) helped defeat the militaristic ambitions of Napoleon and subsequently constituted the Holy Alliance, which aimed to restrain the rise of secularism and liberalism across Europe. Russia further expanded to the west, south, and east, strengthening its position as a European power. Its victories in the Russo-Turkish Wars were later checked by defeat in the Crimean War (1853–1856), leading to a period of reform and intensified expansion into Central Asia.[11] Alexander II (r. 1855–1881) initiated numerous reforms, most notably the 1861 emancipation of all 23 million serfs.

From 1721 until 1762, the Russian Empire was ruled by the House of Romanov; its matrilineal branch of patrilineal German descent, the House of Holstein-Gottorp-Romanov, ruled from 1762 until 1917. By the start of the 19th century, Russian territory extended from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Black Sea in the south, and from the Baltic Sea in the west to Alaska, Hawaii, and California in the east. By the end of the 19th century, Russia had expanded its control over the Caucasus, most of Central Asia and parts of Northeast Asia. Notwithstanding its extensive territorial gains and great power status, the empire entered the 20th century in a perilous state. A devastating famine in 1891–1892 killed hundreds of thousands and led to popular discontent. As the last remaining absolute monarchy in Europe, the empire saw rapid political radicalization and the growing popularity of revolutionary ideas such as communism.[12] After the 1905 revolution, Nicholas II authorized the creation of a national parliament, the State Duma, although he still retained absolute political power.

When Russia entered the First World War on the side of the Allies, it suffered a series of defeats that further galvanized the population against the emperor. In 1917, mass unrest among the population and mutinies in the army culminated in the February Revolution, which led to the abdication of Nicholas II, the formation of the Russian Provisional Government, and the proclamation of the first Russian Republic. Political dysfunction, continued involvement in the widely unpopular war, and widespread food shortages resulted in mass demonstrations against the government in July. The republic was overthrown in the October Revolution by the Bolsheviks, who proclaimed the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and whose Treaty of Brest-Litovsk ended Russia's involvement in the war, but who nevertheless were opposed by various factions known collectively as the Whites.[13][14] During the resulting Russian Civil War, the Bolsheviks conducted the Red Terror. After emerging victorious, they established the Soviet Union across most of the Russian territory; it would be one of four continental empires to collapse as a result of World War I, along with Germany, Austria–Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire.[15]


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  1. ^ "St. Petersburg through the Ages". St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. Archived from the original on 6 August 2022. Retrieved 6 August 2022.
  2. ^ "18th Century in the Russian History", Rusmania. Archived 19 March 2022 at the Wayback Machine.
  3. ^ Coleman, Heather J. (2014). Orthodox Christianity in Imperial Russia: A Source Book on Lived Religion. Indiana University Press. p. 4. ISBN 978-0-2530-1318-7. After all, Orthodoxy was both the majority faith in the Russian Empire – approximately 70 percent subscribed to this faith in the 1897 census–and the state religion.
  4. ^ Williams, Beryl (1 December 1994). "The concept of the first Duma: Russia 1905–1906". Parliaments, Estates and Representation. 14 (2): 149–158. doi:10.1080/02606755.1994.9525857.
  5. ^ "The Sovereign Emperor exercises legislative power in conjunction with the State Council and State Duma". Fundamental Laws, "Chapter One On the Essence of Supreme Sovereign Power Article 7." Archived 8 June 2019 at the Wayback Machine
  6. ^ Taagepera, Rein (September 1997). "Expansion and Contraction Patterns of Large Polities: Context for Russia". International Studies Quarterly. 41 (3): 475–504. doi:10.1111/0020-8833.00053. JSTOR 2600793. Archived from the original on 19 November 2018. Retrieved 28 June 2019.; Turchin, Peter; Adams, Jonathan M.; Hall, Thomas D. (December 2006). "East-West Orientation of Historical Empires". Journal of World-Systems Research. 12 (2): 223. ISSN 1076-156X. Archived from the original on 17 September 2016. Retrieved 11 September 2016.
  7. ^ "The Price of Expansion: The Nationality Problem in Russia of the Eighteenth-Early Twentieth Centuries". Slavic Research Center. Archived from the original on 8 March 2023. Retrieved 20 July 2024.
  8. ^ "Population of the Major European Countries in the 19th Century". Wesleyan University. Archived from the original on 28 February 2024. Retrieved 20 July 2024.
  9. ^ "Population of Russia and the USSR, 1913 to 1928". Research Gate. Retrieved 20 July 2024.
  10. ^ Pipes 1974, p. 83.
  11. ^ "The Great Game, 1856–1907: Russo-British Relations in Central and East Asia | Reviews in History". reviews.history.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 10 April 2022. Retrieved 8 October 2021.
  12. ^ "Russian Empire". Encyclopædia Britannica. Archived from the original on 25 December 2022. Retrieved 14 August 2022.
  13. ^ Swain, Geoffrey (2014). Trotsky and the Russian Revolution. Routledge. p. 15. ISBN 978-1-3178-1278-4. OL 37192398M. Archived from the original on 19 September 2015. Retrieved 20 June 2015. The first government to be formed after the February Revolution of 1917 had, with one exception, been composed of liberals.
  14. ^ Rabinowitch, Alexander (2008). The Bolsheviks in Power: The First Year of Soviet Rule in Petrograd. Indiana UP. p. 1. ISBN 978-0-2532-2042-4. Archived from the original on 10 September 2015. Retrieved 20 June 2015.
  15. ^ Planert, Ute; Retallack, James, eds. (2017). Decades of Reconstruction. Cambridge University Press. p. 331. ISBN 978-1-1071-6574-8. Archived from the original on 11 February 2023. Retrieved 5 January 2023.