Editing History of Russia (section)

===Peter the Great===
[[File:Peter de Grote.jpg|thumb|Peter I, called "Peter the Great"]]

[[Peter the Great]] (Peter I, 1672–1725) brought centralized autocracy into Russia and played a major role in bringing his country into the European state system.<ref>James Cracraft, ''The Revolution of Peter the Great'' (2003)</ref> Russia was now the largest country in the world, stretching from the Baltic Sea to the Pacific Ocean. The vast majority of the land was unoccupied, and travel was slow. Much of its expansion had taken place in the 17th century, culminating in the first Russian settlement of the Pacific in the mid-17th century, the reconquest of Kiev, and the pacification of the Siberian tribes.<ref>Basil Dmytryshyn, "Russian expansion to the Pacific, 1580–1700: a historiographical review." ''Slavic Studies'' 25 (1980): 1–25. [https://eprints.lib.hokudai.ac.jp/dspace/bitstream/2115/5095/1/KJ00000113075.pdf online] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190925140056/https://eprints.lib.hokudai.ac.jp/dspace/bitstream/2115/5095/1/KJ00000113075.pdf |date=25 September 2019 }}.</ref> However, a population of only 14 million was stretched across this vast landscape. With a short growing season, grain yields trailed behind those in the West and potato farming was not yet widespread. As a result, the great majority of the population workforce was occupied with agriculture. Russia remained isolated from the sea trade and its internal trade, communication and manufacturing were seasonally dependent.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://bookz.ru/authors/milov-lv/milovlv01/1-milovlv01.html|title=Milov L.V. "Russian peasant and features of the Russian historical process", the research of Russian economic history of 15th–18th centuries.|access-date=6 August 2007|archive-date=18 April 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090418120252/http://bookz.ru/authors/milov-lv/milovlv01/1-milovlv01.html|url-status=dead}}</ref>

Peter reformed the [[Imperial Russian Army|Russian army]] and created the [[Imperial Russian Navy|Russian navy]]. Peter's first military efforts were directed against the [[Ottoman Empire|Ottoman Turks]]. His aim was to establish a Russian foothold on the Black Sea by [[Azov campaigns (1695–1696)|taking]] the town of [[Azov]].<ref>Lord Kinross, ''The Ottoman Centuries: The Rise and Fall of the Turkish Empire'' (1979) p. 353.</ref> His attention then turned to the north. Peter still lacked a secure northern seaport except at [[Arkhangelsk|Archangel]] on the [[White Sea]], whose harbor was frozen nine months a year. Access to the Baltic was blocked by Sweden, whose territory enclosed it on three sides. Peter's ambitions for a "window to the sea" led him in 1699 to make a secret alliance with the [[Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth]] and Denmark against Sweden resulting in the [[Great Northern War]].

The war ended in 1721 when an exhausted Sweden sued for peace with Russia. Peter acquired four provinces situated south and east of the Gulf of Finland, thus securing his coveted access to the sea. There, in 1703, he had already founded the city that was to become Russia's new capital, [[Saint Petersburg]]. Russian intervention in the Commonwealth marked, with the [[Silent Sejm]], the beginning of a 200-year domination of that region by the Russian Empire. In celebration of his conquests, Peter assumed the title of emperor, and the Russian Tsardom officially became the [[Russian Empire]] in 1721.

Peter re-organized his government based on the latest Western models, molding Russia into an [[Absolutism (European history)|absolutist]] state. He replaced the old ''boyar'' [[Duma]] (council of nobles) with a [[Governing Senate|Senate]], in effect a supreme council of state. The countryside was also divided into new [[Guberniya|provinces]] and districts. Peter told the senate that its mission was to collect taxes. In turn tax revenues tripled over the course of his reign.<ref>{{cite book|first = Lindsey |last = Hughes|title = Russia in the Age of Peter the Great|date = 2000|publisher = Yale University Press|isbn =9780300082661}}</ref>

Administrative [[Collegium (ministry)|Collegia]] (ministries) were established in St. Petersburg, to replace the old governmental departments. In 1722, Peter promulgated his famous [[Table of ranks]]. As part of the government reform, the Orthodox Church was partially incorporated into the country's administrative structure, in effect making it a tool of the state. Peter abolished the [[patriarchate]] and replaced it with a collective body, the [[Holy Synod]], led by a lay government official. Peter continued and intensified his predecessors' requirement of state service for all nobles.
[[File:'The Victory at Poltava' by Alexander Evstafyevich Kotzebue, 1862, Hermitage.JPG|left|thumb|Russian victory at [[Battle of Poltava]]]]
By then, the once powerful Persian [[Safavid Empire]] to the south was heavily declining. Taking advantage, Peter launched the [[Russo-Persian War (1722–1723)]], known as "The Persian Expedition of Peter the Great" by Russian histographers, in order to be the first Russian emperor to establish Russian influence in the [[Caucasus]] and Caspian Sea region. After considerable success and the capture of many provinces and cities in the Caucasus and northern mainland Persia, the Safavids were forced to hand over the territories to Russia. However, by 12 years later, all the territories were ceded back to Persia, which was now led by the charismatic military genius [[Nader Shah]], as part of the [[Treaty of Resht]] and [[Treaty of Ganja]] and the Russo-Persian alliance against the Ottoman Empire,<ref>{{cite book|author=Stephen J. Lee|title=Peter the Great|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CXl-02q1YwsC&pg=PA31|year=2013|publisher=Routledge|page=31|isbn=9781136453250|access-date=25 October 2015|archive-date=22 January 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230122071933/https://books.google.com/books?id=CXl-02q1YwsC&pg=PA31|url-status=live}}</ref> the common neighbouring rivalling enemy.

Peter the Great died in 1725, leaving an unsettled succession, but Russia had become a great power by the end of his reign. Peter I was succeeded by his second wife, [[Catherine I of Russia|Catherine I]] (1725–1727), who was merely a figurehead for a powerful group of high officials, then by his minor grandson, [[Peter II of Russia|Peter II]] (1727–1730), then by his niece, [[Anna of Russia|Anna]] (1730–1740), daughter of Tsar [[Ivan V]]. The [[Ivan VI of Russia|heir to Anna]] was soon deposed in a coup and [[Elizabeth of Russia|Elizabeth]], daughter of Peter I, ruled from 1741 to 1762. During her reign, Russia took part in the [[Seven Years' War]].