The wedding of Princess Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst

After becoming Catherine the Great, she remembers to help the land of her birth

Born in Stettin in 1729 to a Prussian general and a Swedish noblewoman, Princess Sophie Auguste Friederike von Anhalt-Zerbst was chosen to be the wife of the Russian heir to the throne. Travelling to Moscow at the age of 14, she quickly learnt Russian, converted to Russian Orthodoxy, and was given the new name Catherine. Married to Prince Peter on 21 August 1745, Catherine’s wedding night foreshadowed her unhappy marriage. Whilst Catherine waited in her bedroom, her bridegroom continued to enjoy himself at the celebration and made it to bed late and very drunk. Years later, her husband ascended the throne as Tsar Peter III. He immediately concluded a peace treaty with Prussia, saving Frederick the Great from a very difficult situation in the Seven Years’ War. Frederick himself called this the “miracle of the House of Brandenburg”.

Tsar Peter had made many enemies through his domestic policies, and the peace with Prussia proved to be the last straw. Catherine seized power in a military coup. Deposing her husband, she proclaimed herself Tsarina and was crowned as Catherine II of Russia. She ratified the treaty with Prussia, for which Frederick the Great rewarded her with the highest Prussian order. Catherine introduced many domestic reforms in the spirit of the Enlightenment. She attracted settlers from Germany and expanded Russia’s sphere of influence abroad. The only female monarch ever to be given the epithet “the Great”, the German-born Catherine also inherited the East Frisian Jeverland.