|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Easter at the Court of Nicholas II Nicholas II's diaries make it possible to recreate episodes from the Easter celebrations at the court of the last Russian emperor. In the entries for 1894 we find Grand Duke Nikolai Alexandrovich celebrating one of his happiest Easter weeks, when the heir to the Russian throne came to Coburg with a brilliant retinue to ask for the hand of Princess Alix of Hesse: "On Holy Saturday, the eve of Easter, we set off the four of us, Aunt Ella [Grand Duchess Yelizaveta Fiodorovna], Alix, Sandro [Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich] and I to buy all sorts of trifles to hide in the eggs. Although the rain did not stop pouring, we had great fun and laughed... At 5 o'clock a courier arrived with dear letters from home, with an order and wonderful presents for Alix from Papa and Mama and little Easter eggs. They brought us both a lot of joy. " In the early years of his reign the young sovereign and his wife followed established tradition, leading the Easter midnight procession at the head of a grand cortege through the state rooms of the Winter Palace to the Great Church and performing all the appropriate rituals of the festive church service. The Tsar often personally took part in the Carrying of the Holy Shroud. At dawn, when the Liturgy was over, the imperial family gathered for an Easter meal of Easter cake, paskha (sweet cream-cheese dish) and coloured eggs in the magnificent Malachite Room that adjoined the Emperor's personal apartments. Nicholas wrote in his diary: "We went to bed around four in the morning, when dawn was already breaking... At 11.30 the Easter greeting with everyone began in the Malachite Room: almost 500 people were given eggs. " On the following days the exchange of felicitations and the ritual Easter greeting continued together with the distribution of gifts to relatives, court officials, members of the retinue and palace servants, who numbered up to a thousand people. The years went by... The imperial couple and their five children celebrated Easter 1913, the year of the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty, in the Alexander Palace at Tsarskoye Selo. The Tsar, who attended the night-time service with his children, recalled: "The procession accompanied by a marvellous sunrise puts me very much in mind of Moscow, the Dormition Cathedral and the same service. The children coloured eggs with the officers from the yacht... Alexis was at church for the first time and at the end of the Easter vigil went home with Anastasia [the youngest daughter]. The service was grand and remarkably beautiful in our charming church. " During the First World War the Emperor celebrated Easter away from his family at military headquarters in Mogilev, attending the church service with his staff officers. On the Easter eve he wrote in his diary: "Received Easter eggs from dear Alix and the children... By the regimental church in the birch grove I exchanged Easter greetings with the Cossacks and the lower ranks of all the units based in Mogilev - 860 men in all. " The egg - that symbolic gift painted in the colour of the Saviour's blood - was no longer a remote abstract image. It acquired particular significance at the war fronts where the blood of soldiers was being shed. And at the glorious feast of the Resurrection it became associated with the hope of salvation and the redemption of sins through a personal act of courage and self-sacrifice. Nicholas's family spent their last Easters at the front and in military hospitals, exchanging the traditional triple kiss with soldiers and giving presents to them. The austere Easter eggs of the war years are marked by simple and plain decoration. While in previous years 4,000 - 5,000 porcelain eggs had been made, for Easter 1915 at total of 10,131 eggs were presented, the majority bearing either the Empress's monogram or that of Tsesarevich Alexis. During the war eggs were also made with the monograms of the Tsar's daughters and the Empress's sister, Grand Duchess Yelizaveta Fiodorovna. They all were engaged in charitable activities, cared for the wounded and, of course, made them gifts at Easter. At this time a new instruction appeared in the papers of the porcelain factory: "delivery to the infirmary". During the war they began to make special white eggs marked with a red cross and the date below it for presentation to the wounded. In 1916, 2,000 eggs of this kind were made. That same year Dowager Empress Maria Fiodorovna commissioned her own personal series of eggs with a red cross and richer decoration. In 1916 Maria Fiodorovna made her Easter gift to a thousand wounded soldiers. On Easter day the men at the fronts were presented with red eggs bearing a printed depiction of the St George Cross fourth class, known as "the soldier's cross" because it was awarded to the lower ranks - privates, seamen and non-commissioned officers. They were made at M.S. Kuznetsov's factories. An Easter card was also published showing Emperor Nicholas II in field uniform handing a soldier a red Easter egg. Easter 1917 found the former Tsar, his wife and children under house arrest at the Alexander Palace in Tsarskoye Selo, where on Kerensky's orders even contact between members of the family was limited to mealtimes. The number of people who attended the service and shared the Easter repast with family was considerably reduced. On Easter Sunday Alexandra Fiodorovna "gave them porcelain eggs remaining from earlier stocks. There were 135 people altogether." Sadder still was the final Easter in the lives of the imperial family, celebrated in the Ipatyev House in Yekaterinburg where, on the night from 16 to 17 June 1918, they were all shot by the Bolsheviks. Nicholas wrote of that frosty, overcast Easter: "At the request of Botkin [the Romanovs' family doctor] a priest and deacon were allowed in to us at 8 o'clock. They performed Easter vigil quickly and well. It was a great comfort to pray even under such circumstances and to hear 'Christ is risen!'... In the morning we exchanged Easter greetings and ate Easter cake and red eggs with tea - we could not get a paskha." |
 The Emperor Nicholas II presenting an Easter egg to a soldier Larger view |
|||||
|
Copyright © 2011 State Hermitage Museum |
