Catherine the Great

Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst (1729–1796), born at Stettin to a minor German princely family, became Catherine the Great, empress of Russia for thirty-four years. In 1744 she converted to Orthodoxy, taking the name Catherine, and in 1745 married Peter, grandson of Peter the Great. In July 1762, with the guards and the Orlov brothers, she overthrew her husband after a reign of seven months and was crowned in Moscow that September.

The Russo-Turkish War of 1768–1774 opened the Black Sea and made Crimea a protectorate, which she annexed in 1783. She placed Stanisław Poniatowski on the Polish throne, and the partitions of 1793 and 1795 erased the Commonwealth from the map.

At home she issued charters to the nobility and towns in 1785, yet serfdom remained its basis, as Pugachev's rebellion of 1773–1775 showed. She died of a stroke in November 1796 and her son Paul succeeded.