The Golden Years of the Russian Aristocracy

The handsome, intelligent young monarch seemed to incarnate a new century and a new deal. Better educated than any Russian prince before him, he had a clear insight into the basic economic weaknesses and social injustices of Russian society and had already expressed in private his firm intention of doing what he could to remedy them. Alexander was, however, less certain upon how to proceed, and, in seeking a way forward, he turned not to the traditional advisers of the earlier reigns, but to a group of like-minded young friends who were also impatient to see reforms in the Empire.

One of these, Count Stroganov, submitted a devastating indictment of the nobility to the Emperor. ‘They are the most ignorant, crapulous and narrow-minded class’, he wrote to support his argument that, if Alexander were to take measures to abolish the system of serfdom, the aristocracy would be incapable of any concerted resistance.