Russian Scaevola and the number of the beast. Learning mystical interpretation of the War of 1812

There are so many stories about the Patriotic War of 1812 that it is sometimes difficult to tell true from fake ones. For example, there is a legend about the Russian Scaevola — a peasant who cut off his hand to avoid serving Napoleon. We do not know whether it was a real person or just an image generated by propaganda.

The Battle of Borodino Panorama Museum has a number of exhibits related to this story. Read in the collaborative article by mos.ru and Mosgortur Agency about how it became one of the main symbols of the era.

A Russian peasant with ancient Roman nature

The story about the Russian Scaevola was popular not only in the Russian Empire, but abroad, too. It likely originated in the historical, political and literary magazine 'Son of the Fatherland', which was published in St. Petersburg by the Secretary of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and literature teacher Nikolai Grech since October 1812. The following article appeared in the fourth issue of the weekly.

'In the army of Napoleon, they brand soldiers who enter his service (the same as in our horse factories). Following this custom, the French put a brand on the hand of a peasant. He asked in surprise: why was he branded? They replied that this was a sign that he took service with Napoleon. The peasant snatched an axe out from his belt and cut off his branded hand. Needless to say that this new Scaevola was Russian. The very idea of serving as an instrument of Napoleon or being one of the executors of the tyrant's will made him do this heroic deed. What would this Russian do if Providence gave him a chance to be Curtius of Russia?'

The patriotic article referred to two examples of self-sacrifice of mythical heroes of Ancient Rome — Gaius Mucius Scaevola and Marcus Curtius. According to the legend, Gaius Mucius sneaked into the enemy camp to kill the Etruscan leader Porsena during the Etruscan siege of Rome in 509 BC, but was captured. When he was threatened with torture, he put his right hand into the fire and did not take it away until it got charred. The Etruscans were impressed by the Roman's steadfastness, and Porsena immediately made peace with his native city. The young man, now forced to use only his left hand, was called Scaevola (in Latin, scaevola means left-handed).

According to another myth, in the mid-6th century BC, Marcus Curtius sacrificed himself to the underground gods to save Rome. In the middle of the Eternal City, in the forum, there was a giant hole that could not be filled with anything. Desperate Romans went to the Oracle, and the Oracle gave a vague answer: the fact was that the gods wanted to get the most valuable thing in the city. The young Curtius interrupted the arguments of his fellow citizens by declaring that the most valuable thing in Rome was the weapons and courage of the Romans. Astride his trusty steed in full kit, Curtius plunged into the dreadful pit, and it closed over him at once.

The brand of Napoleon or the mark of the beast?

'Son of the Fatherland' did not provide any details of the story about the peasant, but they appeared very soon. After the publication, the Military Governor of Moscow, count Fyodor Rostopchin casually referred to it in his 'True Facts about the Fire of Moscow' as follows: 'Everyone knows the story of a Smolensk peasant with a brand on his hand, who cut it off with a single blow of his axe.'

Smolensk was also mentioned in the English engraving of John Augustus Atkinson's 'Russian Loyalty and Heroism' (1816), which had the following inscription in English: 'A story of a Russian peasant from Smolensk who, being forced by the French, cut off his hand rather than accompany Bonaparte on his way to Moscow.' Atkinson, who lived in Saint Petersburg for a long time, was most likely inspired by one of the Russian prints published at the time. In particular, the engraving of Ivan Ivanov's 'Russian Scaevola' created three years earlier — the two works are very similar indeed.

This popular legend was reflected in the national patriotic cartoon by the renowned art historian of the 19th century Dmitry Rovinski. He gives five different versions of the image of the Russian Scaevola in his 'Russian Folk Pictures', which included engravings of 1813–1814 made by four artists — Ivan Terebenev, Ivan Ivanov, Ivan Tupylyov and Domenico (Dementy) Scotty. All of them present a great heritage in the fight against Napoleon through satirical graphics.

Terebenev's version of the Russian Scaevola was repeated in the 1815 split alphabet 'Gift to Children to Commemorate the Events of 1812', which brought together the most popular wartime cartoons. He illustrated the letter ‘K’ in it — either due to the word 'Kleimo' (Russian for 'brand'), or the couplet beginning with the Russian letter ‘K’ saying: 'Black Tsar will not reign in Russia, neither will I bear his name on my hand.'

The most renowned Russian Scaevola in Russian art is perhaps the eponymous sculpture of 1813. Its author is a prominent representative of the Russian Empire style Vasily Demut-Malinovsky (1778–1846), who received the title of Professor of the Imperial Academy of Arts for this sublime image. His work is both considered an outstanding plastic embodiment of a patriotic idea, and one of the first images of a man of the people in the Russian sculpture.

A bronze half-naked, bearded peasant, raising an axe over his hand, is displayed in the State Russian Museum in St. Petersburg, with its full-size plaster replica kept in the Moscow Battle of Borodino Panorama Museum. In 1998, the image of this masterpiece was used to make a commemorative coin with a face value of 3 roubles, issued by the Bank of Russia in honour of the 100th anniversary of the Russian Museum.

Why was this story so popular at the time? Perhaps the key is a religious and mystical interpretation of the plot, which can be traced in the above lines from the alphabet. For our orthodox hero, that brand was a true-to-life metaphor for the mark of the beast.

Holy War

The Patriotic War of 1812 was, in a sense, a religious war for Russians. In Europe of the time, there were many preachers who interpreted the events of the Great French Revolution with its cult of godlessness and separation of Church and State, and then the military success of Napoleon as evidence of the coming Apocalypse. Bonaparte had a special part to play in this theory that quickly reached Russia.

On 6 December 1806, after the outbreak of the Russian-Prussian-French war, the Holy Synod issued a Manifesto intended, among other things, to justify the need to convene a military militia. The document called the French Emperor the Antichrist and false Messiah, who 'showed his contempt for the pastors of the Holy Church of Christ, and now 'threatens to shake the Orthodox Greek-Russian Church in all its purity and holiness…'

The Russian clergy were required to read this Manifesto after the liturgy every Sunday and public holiday. A similar announcement was made for the catholic congregation, too. Although the Manifesto was cancelled a few months later, after the Treaties of Tilsit, it managed to create an unambiguous attitude of Russians to Bonaparte.

A story described by Pushkin's friend Pyotr Vyazemsky in his 'Old Notebook' speaks for the fact, too. It is about the first meeting of Alexander I and Napoleon in Tilsit, which, as we know, took place on a raft in the middle of the Neman River.

'When Russians learned about the meeting of the emperors, there was a talk between two peasants. 'So, our father, the Orthodox Tsar, is coming to terms with this accursed, non-Christian person? After all, this is a terrible sin!' said one peasant. 'Why, brother, don't you understand things?' said the other one. 'Our father ordered the raft to be prepared in order to first baptise Bonaparte in the river, and then allow him to appear before his Royal eyes.'

After the invasion of the French Army, the Holy Synod issued a new Anti-Napoleonic Manifesto, a prayer for deliverance from foes was recited with knelt people around in all the temples of the Empire saying: 'Behold the enemy who troubles your land and wants to put your universe to waste; behold the people of iniquity gather together to destroy your property, ruin your honest Jerusalem, your beloved Russia; desecrate your temples, dig up altars and profane our holy places.'

The above 'Son of the Fatherland' reprinted 'Civil Сatechism' of 1808 made of questions and answers translated from Spanish as follows:

— How many natures does he (Napoleon) have?

— He has two natures: satanic and human one.

— What does Napoleon come from?

— He comes from hell and sin.

Another prominent evidence of the era was a letter written in the summer of 1812 to the Minister of War, Michael Barclay de Tolly, by Goetzel, Professor of scriptural exegesis and oriental languages at the University of Dorpat. In his message, the scholar deduced from the letters that formed the French titulary Le Еmpereur Napoleon the number of the beast from 'The Book of Revelation'.

'Napoleon is the beast that is the number 666 in the Apocalypse,' the Professor summed up, offering to distribute his version in the army 'whether by printed sheets in Russian or by verbal message from the clergy.' The interpretation was regularly distributed by the regimental priests among the soldiers of the 1st Western Army by order of the Minister of War.

Folk art supported it, too, with many examples of the occupiers' abuse of Orthodox shrines, which gave rise to such a genre as tales about Napoleon, in which the French Emperor was miraculously rebuffed when trying to profit in the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, the Chudov Monastery and other sacred places. Naturally, given the circumstances, the subjects of the Russian Emperor could not have any doubts about the story of a peasant who got rid of the 'Antichrist's brand' by cutting off his hand being true.