Born Dec. 14, 1901, in Athens; died there Mar. 6, 1964. King of Greece from 1947 to 1964. A member of the Glücksburg dynasty.
After graduating from the Greek Naval Academy, Paul served as an officer in the Greek Navy and fought against Turkey in the Turkish War of Independence (1919–22). In December 1923, after the republican victory in the elections, he left for Great Britain; in 1925, 1934, and 1935 he traveled to the USA. In November 1935, after the restoration of the monarchy, Paul returned to Greece as crown prince. After the invasion of Greece by Nazi German troops in April 1941, he fled to Crete, and from there through Egypt to Great Britain. He returned to Greece in 1946, and after the death of his brother, King George II, he was proclaimed king on Apr. 1, 1947.
Born Sept. 20 (Oct. 1), 1754, in St. Petersburg; died there Mar. 12 (24), 1801. Russian emperor from 1796 to 1801. Son of Peter III and Catherine II (the Great). He had four sons —Alexander (the future emperor Alexander I), Konstantin, Nicholas (the future emperor Nicholas I), and Mikhail—and six daughters.
From 1783, because of his hostile attitude toward his mother, Paul lived apart from her in Gatchina, where he had a court and a small army. At the beginning of his reign he changed many of Catherine’s procedures, but in essence his domestic policy followed the course set by his mother. Frightened by the French Revolution and by unceasing peasant outbreaks in Russia, Paul promulgated a policy of extreme reaction. The strictest censorship was imposed, private presses were closed down (1797), the importation of foreign books was prohibited (1800), and extraordinary police measures were implemented to persecute progressive social thought.
Under conditions of a worsening crisis in the feudal system, Paul defended the interests of the proserfdom landowners, distributing among them more than 600,000 peasants. In an attempt to end peasant unrest, he utilized punitive expeditions and certain legislative acts that supposedly placed limitations on the exploitation of the peasantry, such as the 1797 ukase on the three-day barshchina (corvée). He introduced centralization and trifling regulations in all sections of the government apparatus. He carried out reforms in the army based on the Prussian Army, provoking dissatisfaction among many officers and generals. In everything he did he relied heavily on his favorites A. A. Arakcheev and I. P. Kutaisov.
Continuing Catherine’s foreign policy, Paul took part in the coalition wars against France. Under pressure from his allies— the Austrians and British—he placed A. V. Suvorov in command of the Russian Army. It was under Suvorov’s command that the heroic Italian and Swiss campaigns of 1799 were carried out. However, disagreements between Paul and his allies and Paul’s hope that Napoleon could nullify the gains of the French Revolution led to a rapprochement with France. Paul’s petty-minded captiousness and unbalanced character led to dissatisfaction among his courtiers. This dissatisfaction increased with the change in Russian foreign policy, which ruined trade with Britain. A plot arose among the officers of the guard, and on the night of Mar. 11, 1801, the conspirators murdered Paul I in Mikhailovskii Zamok.
A. N. TSAMUTALI