The book includes fascinating stories
of the life and tragic end of one of the most powerful and wealthy dynasties of the
Romanovs (1613-1917) with more than 500 photographs collected from the main archives
of Russia and European countries.
The vanished world of the Russian Imperial
Family is still attractive in many of its aspects. Magnificent residences of the Romanovs,
which were built by the best architects, and the extraordinary collections of fine arts they
contained continue to attract authors and readers. For 80 years Russian archives, which
could be compared with undiscovered treasure mines, were closed to a wide range of
specialists around the world. Foreign archives in turn were not available to Russian
researchers. The Russian and European authors worked in archives in Russia, Denmark,
Germany, England, and the USA, identified previously unrecognized photographs contained
in Russian resources and introduced them to the reader with extensive commentary
on their origins.
The “language” of original photographs is
sometimes able to tell more about the special world of royalty and the circle of nobility
than pages of texts about the special world of royalty and
the circle of nobility. The authors also used information from Russian and foreign periodicals,
memoirs and special literature. Readers will find new and well-structured materials about
the main events in the lives of the Romanovs and their relatives in Europe, the masters in
all kinds of art who worked on commission of the sovereigns, the state and family visits
of members of European dynasties and the prominent companies that started their businesses
thanks to the support of rulers.
Two chapters are devoted to Germany and Denmark and their princesses who became Russian Empresses
during this period. A few chapters are devoted to the descriptions of the two-way
influences between Russia and Greece, Wuerttemberg, and Mecklenburg-Schwerin, countries
where Russian Grand Duchesses lived as spouses of sovereigns. See also
Russian edition of the book.
In 2013 the book was republished by Eurohistory Publishing House (CA,
USA) and is available in Amazon.com by the name
"Russia and Europe - Dynastic Ties"
.
New version of the book includes a lot of new illustrations.
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