House of Romanov

Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna was murdered by the Bolsheviks in a massacre of Romanovs in July 1918 at Yekaterinburg, Siberia. Her fate has been the subject of speculation and historical fiction.

The House of Romanov was the ruling family of Russia from 1613 to 1917. The first Romanov tsar was Michael I. His line ended with Empress Elizabeth, who died 1762. The succeeding Romanov-Holstein-Gottorp line was renamed as "Romanov" and is generally treated as a continuation of the dynasty. The last tsar was Nicholas II (1868-1918), who abdicated in 1917 at the start of the Russian Revolution.

Nicholas, his wife, and five children were killed at Ipatiev House in Yekaterinburg, Siberia in July 1918 as the Bolsheviks hunted down the former imperial family. Four princes were thrown down a mine shaft alive and then stoned to death. After years of concealment and lies, investigator Nikolai Sokolov revealed the fate of the family in 1924.

Tsars of Russia (1613-1917)

The tsars used the slogans "Orthodoxy, autocracy, and nationality" and "Moscow, third Rome." In this context, Orthodoxy refers to the eastern European branch of Christianity. These slogans suggested that the Romanovs were a successor to the Byzantine, or Greek, autocrats who ruled from Constantinople in medieval times.

House of Romanov (1613-1762)

• Michael (r. 1613 - 1645), son of the patriarch of Moscow. He was chosen tsar by a Zemsky Sobor (assembly of the land).
• Alexis (r. 1645 - 1676)
• Feodor III (r. 1676 - 1682)
• Ivan V (r. 1682 - 1696)
• Peter I (r. 1682 - 1725), byname "Peter the Great." First tsar to be proclaimed emperor (1721). The succession law of 1722 provides that a tsar name his successor.
• Catherine I (r. 1725 - 1727, co-reigned from 1724 - 1725)
• Anna of Russia (r. 1730 - 1740)
• Ivan VI (r. 1740 - 1741)
• Elizabeth (r. 1741 - 1762)

House of Romanov-Holstein-Gottorp (1762-1917)

• Peter III (r. 1762 - 1762), son of Anna, daughter of Peter I, and Charles Frederick, duke of Holstein-Gottorp.
• Catherine II (r. 1762 - 1796), wife of Peter III.
• Paul (r. 1796 - 1801). Issued the Pauline Law in 1797. This law provides for succession by primogeniture among "dynasts" recognized by the imperial court.
• Alexander I (r. 1801 - 1825) Victory over Napoleon in 1812 made Russia a European superpower.
• Nicholas I (r. 1825 - 1855) The Decemberist revolt in 1825 and the Crimean War of 1853-1856 created interest in reform.
• Alexander II (r. 1855 - 1881), the "tsar liberator" who emancipated the serfs in 1861.
• Alexander III (r. 1881 - 1894) Sergei Witte supervised railway construction and encouraged foreign investment, which led to an industrial revolution.
• Nicholas II (r. 1894 - 1917) The autocratic power of the tsar was limited by a parliament called the Duma, which was created in 1906. The country was defeated by Germany in World War I. The Russian Revolution ousted the tsar in 1917.

Pretenders and heads of the House (1917-present)

The succession has been the subject of various disputes. But the Legitimist line is the most widely accepted and has the support of the patriarch of Moscow:

The murder of Nicholas, his son Alexei Nikolaevich (1904 – 1918), and his brother Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovich (1878 – 1918) left Grand Duke Kirill Vladimirovich (1876 - 1938) as next in line. Many monarchists disliked Kirill or viewed him as a traitor. They refused to treat him as head of the house until Sokolov's report was published. When Kirill died in October 1938, the five most senior Romanovs signed a statement accepting his son Grand Duke Vladimir Kirillovich (1917 – 1992) as head of the house.

Equal marriage dispute

If a dynast marries a spouse of "unequal" rank, the marriage is morganatic, according to the succession law:

“

Children born of a marriage between a person of the Imperial Family and a person not of corresponding dignity, that is not belonging to any royal or sovereign house, have no right of succession to the Throne.

”

In 1948, Vladimir married Princess Leonida Bagration-Mukhransky in Lausanne. The House of Bagration is one of the world's oldest families, ruling Georgia from 813 to 1801. Russia and Georgia concluded a treaty affirming the royal status of the house in 1783.

In 1969, Vladimir issued a proclamation which stated that his daughter Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna (b. 23 Dec. 1953) would succeed when he died as all the male dynasts had contracted morganatic marriages. The other senior Romanovs protested, arguing that their marriages had equal standing with Vladimir's.

In 1979, those who felt slighted by Vladimir's proclamation formed the Romanov Family Association. This association included most of the surviving Romanovs, aside from Vladimir and Maria. As the Bagrations had been incorporated into the Russian nobility, Vladimir's own marriage was unequal, the association argued. The association called for the dynasty's rules on equal marriage to be revised.

By the time he died in 1992, Vladimir had outlived every other male dynast. Maria could claim the right to succeed as the only child of the last male dynast. Unlike the Romanovs of 1938, those of 1992 were sharply divided.

Alternative scenarios

If Vladimir's marriage is treated as morganatic, then he was succeeded by Princess Vera Konstantinovna (1906–2001) in 1992 and by Princess Catherine Ivanovna (1915-2007) in 2001. Catherine died in 2007, which, in this scenario, would leave the head of the house position vacant.

Since 2016, the Romanov Family Association has backed the claim of Andrew Andreevich Romanov (b. 21 Jan 1923), a great-great-grandson of Nicholas I. He is a naturalized American citizen and a children's author living in California.