Catherine the Great

Catherine was born Sophie, a princess of a small German state, and was brought to Russia at fourteen to marry the heir to the throne, the future Peter III. She learned Russian, joined the Orthodox Church, and read widely. The marriage was unhappy, and in 1762, months after Peter became emperor, she led a coup with the help of the guards regiments; Peter was killed days later. Catherine ruled for thirty-four years. She wrote to Voltaire and Diderot, bought great art collections that began the Hermitage museum, founded schools including one for girls, and drafted a long statement of legal principles. Yet she also extended serfdom, and after the huge Pugachev peasant revolt of 1773 to 1775 she strengthened the nobles' power over the serfs. Her wars against the Ottoman Empire won Crimea and the north coast of the Black Sea, and with Prussia and Austria she divided up Poland until it disappeared from the map. She died in 1796.

Faith: Raised a Protestant by a Lutheran father; she converted to Russian Orthodoxy. Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica (1911) (via Wikisource)