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 350 PETER I. iards destroyed the edifices, so that scattered heaps of stones are their only remains. More extensive ruins have been discovered during the present century in a forest S. E. of Flores ; and on the desert island of Jax-Haa, in a lake E. of that of Peten, is a square tower of five stories, 45 ft. high. (See ITZAES, and MAYAS.) PETER I. (ALEXEYEVITCH), surnamed the Great, emperor of Russia, born near Moscow, June 10, 1672, died in St. Petersburg, Feb. 8, 1725. His father Alexis died in 1676, and was succeeded by Feodor, who died in 1682 without issue, naming Peter as his successor, to the exclusion of Ivan, the latter's elder half brother, who was an imbecile youth. An in- surrection followed, fomented by their sister Sophia. The difference was settled after much bloodshed by the joint coronation of Ivan and Peter (May, 1682), with Sophia as re- gent. In 1789, after marrying Eudoxia Fe- dorovna Lapukhin, contrary to the regent's wishes, Peter emerged from the inactivity to which Sophia's ambition had consigned him, and, assisted principally by the Swiss Lefort and the Scotchman Gordon, assumed the di- rection of affairs. He shut up his sister in a convent, where she ended her life in 1704, and banished her minister, Prince Gallitzin. Ivan voluntarily withdrew, leaving Peter in effect sole sovereign, and died in 1696. Peter at once organized a new army, entering the ranks himself, and rising through every grade ; and this example he required his nobles to fol- low. He laid the foundation of a navy by employing Dutch and Venetian shipwrights to build several small vessels on Lake Peipus. He learned seamanship by cruising on board Dutch and English ships at Archangel, the only sea- port Russia then had, and sent young Russians to Venice, Leghorn, and Holland for the same purpose. In 1696 he besieged and took the Turkish city of Azov on the sea of that name, and about the same time repudiated his wife on account of her opposing his plans. In order to improve his semi-barbarous subjects, he fos- tered communication with the western nations of Europe, at whose courts Russia was not then represented ; and, sensible of his own deficien- cies, he left his dominions for a temporary resi- dence abroad (1697). This journey formed an epoch in the history of his empire. He went first with a few attendants to Saardam, where in disguise he spent a short time, and next worked in Amsterdam as a ship builder, studied natural philosophy, astronomy, and geography, and attended anatomical lectures. Early in 1698 he went to London, but soon removed to Deptford, where he occupied the house of John Evelyn, and returned to Holland in April, taking with him several men of science. He thence proceeded to Vienna to inspect the army, and was about to visit Italy when a rebellion at home caused his return after an absence of 17 months. The insurgents, whom his general Gordon had put down, he pun- ished with savage cruelty. He disbanded the strelitzes, long the body guard of the czars, and formed new regiments on the German model. He regulated the press, established naval and other schools, and required his subjects to trade with other countries, which was formerly a capital crime. He prohibited the wearing of beards, granting exemptions, for the payment of a special tax. To the horror of the priests, he altered the calendar, making the year begin on Jan. 1 in the place of Sept. 1 as before, and instituted the order of St. Andrew, the patron saint of Russia. To recover the prov- inces of Ingria and Karelia, which had for- merly belonged to the Russian monarchy, he formed an alliance with Augustus II. of Poland and the king of Denmark against the king of Sweden. The first fruit of the league was the disastrous battle of Narva. (See CHAELES XII.) Peter applied himself vigorously to repairing his losses, declaring that his enemies would teach him how at length to beat them. He melted down the church bells for cannon, and organized against Swedish invasion a fleet of small vessels on Lake Ladoga. In 1702 he de- feated the Swedes and took Marienburg in Li- vonia. By skilful manoeuvring he got posses- sion of the river Neva, at the mouth of which, among marshes which proved destructive to tens of thousands of his laborers, he laid the foundations of St. Petersburg (1703). In 1704 he became master of the whole of Ingria, and appointed Prince Menshikoff viceroy. When Augustus abdicated in favor of Stanislas Lesz- czynski, Peter entered Poland with an army, assembled a diet, and deposed Stanislas. Charles XII. soon appearing, Peter retired into the interior of his own dominions, but finally achieved a brilliant victory over him at Pol- tava, July 8, 1709, and in the following year conquered Karelia. Charles, who took refuge in Turkey, instigated Ahmed II. against Peter. A war ensued, in which the czar was narrow- ly saved from destruction (1711) by the finesse of his mistress Catharine, afterward his wife and successor (see CATHAKINE I.), and the sac- rifice of Azov. He built defensive works in his capital ; and by the construction of ships, dockyards, and wharves, which gave employ- ment to thousands of laborers, he laid a sub- stantial basis for commerce. In 1713 he re- moved the senate from Moscow to St. Peters- burg, and in 1715 the summer and winter palaces were completed. In company with the empress Catharine he made a second tour of Europe in 1716, and was received at Paris with great splendor. He carried back a large quantity of works of art to adorn the new city. His son Alexis, the child of his first marriage, and heir to his throne, evincing a treasonable spirit, was tried and condemned to death ; a few days afterward (July 7, 1718) he died in prison, under highly suspicious circumstances. (See ALEXIS PETEOVITCH.) The protracted differences between Russia and Sweden were finally composed, after the death of Charles XII., by the treaty of Nystad (1721), under