Peter the Great — "I have cut off the beards of my boyars, but I cannot cut off their stubbornness."
I have cut off the beards of my boyars, but I cannot cut off their stubbornness.
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More from Peter the Great
"He who is afraid of death will never do anything great."
"We are not in the habit of giving away cities."
"The more I see of other countries, the more I love my own."
"I do not desire to be a master, but a servant of my country."
"To educate the people, one must first educate the nobility."
About Peter the Great (1672-1725)
Russian tsar (1682-1725) who Westernized Russia, founded St. Petersburg, and built Russia into a European great power. Closely associated with Catherine the Great (later Westernizing Russian empress). For an intellectual contrast, see Old Believers, Russian Orthodox traditionalist movement that rejected Patriarch Nikon's reforms and Peter's modernization — Peter's beard-shaving decrees, Western dress laws, and calendar changes triggered a religious-cultural schism — the founding poles of Russia's eternal 'European modernity vs Slavic tradition' debate that runs through Slavophiles, Solzhenitsyn, and contemporary Putin-era ideology.