Grand Embassy

The Grand Embassy (Великое посольство in Russian) was a Russian diplomatic mission, sent to Western Europe in 1697–1698 by Peter the Great.

The goal of this mission was to strengthen and broaden the Holy League, Russia's alliance with a number of European countries against the Ottoman Empire in its struggle for the northern coastline of the Black Sea, hire foreign specialists for Russian service, and to order and acquire military supplies and weapons. Officially, the Grand Embassy was headed by the "grand ambassadors" Franz Lefort, Fedor Golovin and Prokopy Voznitsyn. In fact, it was led by Peter himself, who went along under the name of Peter Mikhailov. At 6' 8" Peter was one of the tallest men in Europe, a fact very hard to disguise.

Peter conducted negotiations with Friedrich Casimir Kettler, the Duke of Courland, and concluded an alliance with King Frederick I of Prussia. He arrived in the Dutch Republic at the start of August 1697, where he worked incognito as a shipbuilder. He later used the knowledge acquired during this period to modernise the Russian navy.

He met with William III, who governed both the Netherlands and England, in September, and the States-General in October. Peter failed to expand the anti-Ottoman alliance, however, and the Grand Embassy had to limit itself to acquiring different equipment and hiring foreign specialists especially in military and naval affairs. They formed the basis of his modernizing the Russian army and navy.

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