Betcha the dude’s arms are tired.
Nothing like Peter the Grewt when he showed his weak son how it’s done with the Streltsy he was personally purging after a number of uprisings against his mom and himself for the Tsars movement towards Europeanization of Russia ....ironic considering no?
He allegedly did a fair number of the 1200 or so ...and made his boy lop off a few as well as insisted his nobles partake in the fun and if they refused he hanged them for months in summer next to the window his sister Sophia had been exiled to in a monastery she’d been forced to vows in after she allied with the Streltsy and was tsarina for a few years till Peter took control
She tried again with the Streltsy and failed and that was it
Monastery for her
Chopping bloc for the Streltsy foolish enough to have aided her
It was a bloodbath
Peters son was not up to it and eventually allegedly turned on dad....and was himself executed after yet another Streltsy missstep....they were like a praetorian guard sorta
Catherine the Great...a Prussian and Fredrick the greats niece ....was part of political hardball that killed two more tsars
Russia is complicated and brutal and vast and cold
It respects a firm hand ...like Arabs and Latino campesinos and African tribals
Seems like an unlikely spot for nation building and Republic incubating