of 1812 and friend of A. S. Pushkin
When Potemkin swept into Petersburg on 28 February 1791 - his way emblazoned with hundreds of torches1 - the Empress hurried to meet him. She presented him with the Taurida Palace once again - she had only just bought it from him. The Anglo-Prussian coalition's threat of war was Russia's gravest crisis since the days of Pugachev and the two old partners met anxiously every day, while the nobility and diplomats outdid each other to celebrate Serenissimus' return.
'In spite of the great expectation I had had of this event, and all I had heard of the importance and power of this man, the train, the fracas, the excitement, that accompanied him, amazed me, and I still have its effects before my eyes,' wrote Jean-Jacob Jennings, a Swedish diplomat. 'Since this Prince arrived, there is no other subject of conversation in all society, in all high houses or lower, than of him - what he does or will do, whether he dines or will dine or has dined. The interest... of the public is on him alone - all the tributes, respects, offerings of all classes of citizens - lords, artisans, merchants, writers - all sit at his door and fill his anterooms.'2
The Prince of Taurida appeared all-conquering: 'His credit and authority have never been greater,' noticed the Swedish envoy Stedingk. 'All that shone before his arrival is eclipsed and all Russia is at his feet.'3 There was an outpouring of admiration - and envy from some of the magnates.4 The Russian 'public', so far as it existed, meaning the lower nobility and the merchants, hero-worshipped him. Ladies wore his picture on medallions - 'Her pearl-like bosom heaving sighs,' wrote Derzhavin, 'A hero's image animates.'5 The specially written 'Ode to Potemkin' was recited at receptions.6 Every grandee had to give a ball in what was called 'The Carnival of Prince Potemkin'.7
Catherine herself seemed relieved and delighted to see Serenissimus after so long. 'Victory has embellished him,' she told Grimm. Potemkin was now 'handsome as the day, gay as a lark, brilliant as a star, more spiritual than ever, no longer biting his nails, giving parties every day. Everyone is enchanted, despite the envious.'8 The Prince had never been more charming. Even Augustyn Deboli, the hostile envoy of Revolutionary Poland, reported that Potemkin was so polite that he mischievously asked everyone if they noticed how his behaviour was altered.9
This is how Potemkin appeared at his apogee in March 1791. 'I saw for the first time this extraordinary man last Sunday in the circle of the Grand Duke,' gushed Jennings. 'He had been described as very ugly. I did not find him so. On the contrary, he has an imposing presence and that eye defect does not influence his face as badly as you would expect.' Potemkin wore the white uniform of the Grand Admiral of the Black Sea Fleet, covered in diamonds and medals. As soon as this Grand Admiral appeared, the 'circle around the Grand Duke disappeared and it formed around Prince Potemkin exactly as if we saw in him the person of our Master'. Even princes of Wiirttemberg stood upright and immobile 'like statues, eyes fixed on the great man, waiting for him to deign to gratify them with a look'.10
'The Potemkin Carnival' meant a fete every night. The courtiers - Nikolai Saltykov, Zavadovsky, Ivan Chernyshev, Bezborodko, Osterman, Stroganov and Bruce - competed to hold the most extravagant ball. Some almost ruined themselves, trying to keep up with the Stroganovs. But they were confused about the identity of the Prince's latest mistress. The courtiers prepared to give balls in honour of his 'sultana', Princess Dolgorukaya, until they noticed that he never visited her. She claimed to be ill - yet he still did not visit, not even once, at which point the cowardly courtiers cancelled their balls and the crestfallen Princess had to retire to Moscow.11 On 18 March, the Prince de Nassau-Siegen gave one of the most expensive parties, with plates piled with sturgeon and sterlet, Potemkin's favourite delicacy. There, Serenissimus, wearing his superb jewel-encrusted grand hetman's uniform that Deboli claimed cost 900,000 roubles,12 unveiled his other favourite dish: Madame de Witte, the most intriguing adventuress of all.
The appearance at Nassau's ball of 'this beauty of renown' was 'the greatest sensation', according to a goggle-eyed Jennings. When Potemkin had finished his card game, he rushed over to her and talked only to her, while everyone else stared: 'all the women were agitated, men too - the former with despair, irritation and a lot of curiosity, the latter with desire and expectation'.13
Sophie de Witte, now twenty-five years old, with blonde curls, a noble Grecian face and violet eyes, was 'the prettiest woman in Europe in that era'. She rose from teenage courtesan in Constantinople to one of the richest countesses of Poland: for forty years, she astonished and scandalized Europe with her 'beauty, vice and crimes'. Born in a Greek village on the outskirts of 'the city of the world's desire', she was nicknamed the 'Beautiful Greek' or 'La Belle Phanariote' after the Greek Phanar district. Her mother, who traded vegetables, sold her at twelve to the Polish Ambassador, who procured girls for King Stanislas-Augustus, while her equally fine sister was sold to a senior Ottoman pasha. From then on, every time she was bought, another man fell in love with her and outbid the first. So, on her way with the ambassadorial baggage, Sophie de Tchelitche, as she then called herself, was spotted by Major de Witte, son of the Governor of the Polish fortress of Kamenets- Podolsk, who bought her for 1,000 ducats and married her in 1779 aged fourteen. Witte sent her off to Paris with Princess Nassau-Siegen to learn manners - and French.
La Belle Phanariote bewitched Paris. Langeron saw her there and praised 'the tenderest and most beautiful eyes that nature had ever formed', but he was under no illusion about her cunning manipulations and the 'coldness of her heart'.14 Some of her fascination was 'a sort of originality proceeding from either feigned naivety or ignorance'. In Paris, everyone praised her 'beaux yeux'. When someone asked about her health, she replied, 'My beaux yeux are sore,' which amused everyone enormously.15 Back in Poland, when Potemkin's War began, her husband, now himself governor of Kamenets, was the linchpin of the Prince's espionage network in southern Poland: it was he who smuggled spies into Khotin hidden with the butter. But it was probably his wife who provided the information: her sister was married to the Pasha of Khotin, while Sophie herself became the mistress of the besieging general, Nikolai Saltykov.16 But the sharp-eyed Ribas spotted her and introduced her to Potemkin at Ochakov. Visitors to Jassy and Bender noticed her Greek costume and how she posed melodramatically and 'flung herself around', to impress Serenissimus. She became the confidante of his affair with Dol- gorukaya, whom she then supplanted.17 Potemkin appointed the complaisant husband to be governor of Kherson.18 It is likely he used her as a secret agent among the Poles and Turks.19
The Empress, used to her consort's latest paramours, gave the 'Beautiful Greek' a pair of diamond earrings.20 This made Sophie's husband so proud that he boasted she would be remembered in history as the friend of royalty, adding: 'The Prince is not the lover of my wife but just a friend because, if he was her lover, I would break any connection with him.' This simple-minded wishful thinking must have provoked some sniggers. The courtesan-spy clearly fascinated Potemkin - she was an Oriental, an intriguer, a Venus and a Greek, any of which would have attracted him. 'You're the only woman', Potemkin told her, 'who surprises me' to which the minx replied, 'I know. If I'd been your mistress, you'd already have forgotten me. I am only your friend and always will be.' (Ladies are always bound to say this in public: no one close to them believed her.)21 Perhaps she broke her own rule, because two weeks later diplomats noticed Potemkin suddenly began to lose interest: had she succumbed against her better judgement?22