anastasia's sisters: tatiana nicholaevna

Tatiana Nicholaevna was the second child of Alexandra and Nicholas. She was only 18 months younger than her older sister Olga, and was considered the most beautiful of the four grand duchesses. Tatiana was also the leader of OTMA, mostly because she got along the best with Alexandra. She most resembled her mother and often was sent to Alexandra by her sisters when they wanted something. She was assigned a regiment of soldiers - and her uniform that she is wearing, below, survived to this day (I saw it in Cincinnati a few years ago!).

In 1913 Russia celebrated the Tercentenary - 300 years of Romanov rule. Formal pictures were taken of the imperial family. These photos are perhaps the most famous and well-known pictures of the Romanovs. But poor Tatiana had just recovered from typhoid and had lost all her hair - so she wore a wig for the photos.

During World War I, Tatiana worked as a Red Cross nurse with Olga and Alexandra. She was the most social of her sisters, and both Anna Vyrubova and Lili Dehn, beloved friends of Alexandra, wrote after the revolution how Tatiana wished to have friends outside their small social circle, but Alexandra would never allow it.

When the family was held captive in Tobolsk, it was Tatiana whom Alexandra chose to remain in charge of Alexei, Olga and Anastasia, while she and Marie accompanied Nicholas to Ekaterinburg. The final entry in Tatiana's diary, copied from a Russian holy man read ominously: "Your grief is indescribable, the Savior's grief in the Gardens of Gethsemane the world's sins is immeasurable, join your grief to his, in it you will find consolation."

Olga and Tatiana, taken in 1913 as part of the Tercentenary celebrations. Tatiana is wearing a wig!

OTMA

From left, Tatiana, Anastasia, Olga and Marie around 1902. Notice how the "big pair" and "little pair" are each dressed alike!

I've mentioned the acronym OTMA a few times and wanted to explain what it means. OTMA stood for the grand duchesses - Olga, Tatiana, Marie and Anastasia. The grand duchesses were dressed alike, either all together or in their pairs, so it makes sense that they developed an acronym for themselves. In an age when even parents of identical twins are discouraged from letting their children identify too much as part of a twosome, it's interesting to consider what being OTMA, rather than Olga, Tatiana, Marie and Anastasia, did to the grand duchesses. But the evidence that survives suggests the girls saw no problems with it; they were devoted to their family, with the older girls refusing to even consider marrying outside of Russia later in their lives.

what's a grand duchess anyway?

Nicholas and his children in order of birth, 1910

The daughters of the ruler of All the Russias couldn't be called princesses. There were princesses all over Europe. For those priviledged women who could call the tsar their daddy, the only title that would do was Великая Княжна, "Grand Princess." Today it is most accepted as Grand Duchess. Children of emporers, rather than mere kings and queens, were often called by a loftier title. In Austria the children of the Emporer were archdukes and archduchesses. In Russia, they were grand dukes and grand duchesses, indicating that they were "imperial highnesses," instead of "royal highnesses."

As the family continued to multiply at a very quick rate, Alexander III (Anastasia's grandfather) decided in 1885 that only children and grandchildren of the tsar would be grand dukes and grand duchesses. The remainder were referred to as princesses. Only in Russia would being called a princess be a downgrade.

And despite the grandiose titles, the Romanov children were still commonly referred to by their first names and patronyms, going so far as to rebuke the servants for calling them anything else.

anastasia's family: maria nicholaevna

Anastasia had four siblings, but the sister she was brought up closest to was her third-eldest sister, Maria Nicholaevna.

Often called Marie or Masha, she was born on June 26, 1899. She was named for her grandmother, the former Empress, Maria Feodorovna. Margaret Eagar stated the other girls called Marie their stepsister, because she never got into trouble. She and Anastasia made up the "Little Pair" (Olga and Tatiana were the "Big Pair")

Marie was very flirtatious - she once wrote she wanted to marry a soldier and have 20 children.

When her family was in captivity, she was chosen by Nicholas to accompany her parents to Ekaterinburg. It was there that a curious incident happened on Marie's 19th birthday. A soldier named Ivan Skorokhodov snuck a birthday cake in for Marie, and she disappeared into a different room with him. When other soldiers arrived for a surprise inspection of the house, Marie and Ivan were discovered. No one knows what happened between the two, but other soldiers reported that after this incident, Marie's family seemed upset with her. Olga refused to speak to her.

Though this blog is named for Anastasia, I don't have a favorite Romanov daughter - but I do think Marie was the most beautiful! I've included my two favorite pictures of Marie in this entry. What do you think?

Thanks to livadia*org for photos

anastasia's quirks

Marie, top, and Anastasia making faces during their captivity at Tsarskoe Selo

Anastasia Nicholaevna was a jokester. One of her family's nicknames for her was shvibzik, "imp" in Russian.

She was not the best student. Her French tutor Pierre Gilliard described her as "... almost a wag. She had a very strong sense of humour, and the darts of her wit often found sensitive spots. She was rather an enfant terrible, though this fault tended to correct itself with age. She was also extremely idle, though with the idleness of a gifted child."

Like all her family, Anastasia loved taking pictures - and she often used to color her hats or clothes after the photographs were printed.

She also enjoyed painting, though she admitted she was not as talented as older sister Olga.

Despite stories, rumors, accounts and movies all pointing to the contrary, Anastasia did not survive the shooting in the cellar in 1918. That story, which has persisted nearly 100 years after the family's deaths, was finally put to rest in 2008. More about this soon - though I doubt one blog entry will be enough!

Thanks to Pierre Gilliard's wonderful memoirs, "Thirteen Years at the Russian Court." You can read Pierre's memoirs here.

anastasia's world: the alexander palace

The Alexander Palace

The world Anastasia was born into was a world of glamor, but also a world of extreme poverty. Russian peasants had difficult lives, to say the least, and the tsar and his family lived an incredibly sheltered life behind the palace gate.

Likewise, the Romanov children were also raised in a controlled environment. They did not socialize very much beyond their immediate family; even the extensive Romanov cousins were hardly around the grand duchesses and tsarevich. Besides their native Russian and French, which was the official language of the court, the children were taught German and English, though they spoke these languages badly. The girls were dressed alike even through adulthood, and life usually revolved around the tsarevich's precarious health.

The family traveled around to various countries - royal European houses being what they were, Nicholas and Alexandra could claim relation to almost every royal family - but when they were in St. Petersburg, they lived at Tsarskoye Selo, the Tsar's Village. The grounds at Tsarskoye Selo included two palaces - the blue Catherine Palace and the yellow Alexander Palace. The Alexander Palace was favored by the family, and it was here they spent most of their time.

The palace was modernized during Nicholas's reign and included electricity and even a screening booth to show motion pictures. It was to the Alexander Palace Nicholas returned in 1917 as Colonel Romanov, rather than the Tsar of All the Russias, after his abdication. This would also be the first of three places the imperial family was held under arrest during the revolution.

thanks to Wikipedia for information and a picture!

about the romanov names

Unlike some of the western countries, where royal children often had four or five (or more!) names, the Russians simply had two: one was the first name, while the other was the patronym. The patronym combines a child's father's name with the ending vich for a son or evna/ovna for a daughter. Thus Anastasia's middle name was Nicholaevna - daughter of Nicholas. In keeping with the simplicity and informality in which they were raised, Nicholas and Alexandra insisted on their children being called by their first name and patronym, rather than "Grand Duchess Anastasia" or "Her Imperial Highness." In fact, the children would rebuke servants for calling them anything but their informal names - which were still a mouthful! It's little wonder they ended up shortening these even further: Olishka, Tatianochka, Masha, Nastyusha and Baby for Alexei Nicholaevich the tsarevich.

Shorter still was the acronym the sisters would often use when referring to themselves as a group: OTMA.

picture courtesy of livadia*org