While Peter was visiting England during his extended European tour, the diarist John Evelyn’s elegantly appointed home was made available to him and his traveling companions for three months. It ended up in shambles, laid waste by a horde of drunken Russians led by their monarch. Windows were smashed, floors so stained with ink and grease that they had to be replaced, portraits used as target practice, feather mattresses and pillows shredded, furniture reduced to firewood. And that was just inside. Evelyn had spent years cultivating beautiful lawns and gardens, only to find them trampled into mud and dust, “as if a regiment of soldiers in iron shoes had drilled on [them].” Neighbors even reported seeing the drunken tsar pushed along in a wheelbarrow – a then-unknown contraption in Russia – right into he estate’s carefully cultivated hedges.
Source:
Farquhar, Michael. “Chapter 2 – Peter I (1696-1725): The Eccentricities of an Emperor.” Secret Lives of the Tsars: Three Centuries of Autocracy, Debauchery, Betrayal, Murder, and Madness from Romanov Russia. Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2014. 36. Print.
Further Reading:
Peter the Great (Russian: Пётр Вели́кий); Peter the Great
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