Such a publication came across in the friend feed
I wanted to share it with the readers of the magazine
I won’t comment, draw your own conclusions...
Original taken from kara881 in Bastards: two sons of Kshesinskaya from Nicholas 2
BASTARDS: Two sons of Kshesinskaya from Nicholas II
November 5, 2016
Matilda Kshesinskaya always bet on the number 17.
Be it the casino in Monte Carlo or the Romanov house, where she became the mistress.
Matilda Kshesinskaya had a son from Nicholas II.
They are afraid to make this fact public, since it turns out that the children, and their two sons, can lay claim to the throne Russian Empire, as part of the substitution historical facts, which occurred in 1853 with the outbreak of the First World War on the territory of Russia, or Tartaria, as the expanses of 1/6 of the Earth’s landmass are called today.
But Poland remembers and knows this. Poland talks about this.
1890 - four years later, after the romance of 18-year-old Nicholas II and a 14-year-old ballerina, Matilda gives birth to a son. This is quite a bold step towards the crown of the Russian Empire.
But for the heir of Nicholas, this is a threat not to receive the crown. A bride from among his relatives has already been prepared for him. She's 18 and he's 22.
August 31, 1872 Kshesinskaya May 18, 1868 Nicholas II.
And then the joint son of the heir to the throne and the ballerina are sent to Poland. There Kshesinskaya hid her son, who would later be able to lay claim to the Russian crown. It's more reliable. There were people in Poland interested in coming to power with the young heir. Let it be a secret for now. However, the secret may come true.
A few years later, in 1902, Kshesinskaya again gave birth to another heir to the crown.
Whom he decides to keep next to him and not hide from society.
There is one secret up my sleeve. The first son is hidden in Poland.
Another secret is already on the surface.
Kshesinskaya's position strengthened at the royal court. She's part of the family.
All male members of the royal family celebrate their holidays with the ballerina. The Emperor and his related Grand Dukes are here.
After the birth of his second son from the ballerina, Nikolai the second asks his uncle Sergei Alexandrovich to look after the ballerina and his son. To be constantly near her. Protect. This concerns the empire and its heir.
The heir that Nicholas wants to announce. But he can’t yet.
Before the revolution, Nicholas abdicates the throne. And he divorces his wife. Thus he is free.
In a matter of days, he and Kshesinskaya get married and announce their marriage.
Now the sons of Kshesinskaya can calmly inherit the legacy of Nicholas II.
Father-Tsar Alexander III introduced Kshesinskaya to the heir Nicholas.
Yes, he took it and introduced him: he brought his son to the ballet, to the royal harem. After the performance, he entered the restroom and asked: Where is Kshesinskaya number two? Alexander III seated a 14-year-old ballerina at the table between himself and his son.
The ballet was the harem of the royal court. Entertaining. Sexy fun.
All high courtiers and members of the royal family came to the theater to watch the ballerinas.
Open harem. He was kept royal family, or rather, the Russian treasury. In the art of seducing love, 14-year-old Matilda, they say, had no equal. On her 14th birthday, she crashed a wedding between one famous couple, immediately seducing the groom of someone else's bride. The bride discovered Matilda naked in the arms of her groom.
Matilda chose the young heir, throwing her silver bracelet to the heir, who was sitting in the front row at her performance.
The wedding of Nicholas II with the Princess of Hesse took place in 1897.
All this time, from 1890 to 1897, the ballerina lived with the heir in a civil marriage in a house given to her by Nicholas II on Alekseevskaya Embankment in St. Petersburg. They say the house, like all precious jewelry, was given to the ballerina from the treasury of the Empire, with the approval Alexandra III. There are financial reports about this. Apparently, for some reason, Kshesinskaya was needed by the crown of the Empire, or more precisely by the Romanov family.
For what?
After the birth of his second son, Vladimir, Nicholas II gave Kshesinskaya his photograph with Nika’s signature. This speaks of a close relationship even after the birth of the second son. Nicholas II granted the boy nobility and the title of count. The mother of the Emperor’s two children was guarded by all the Grand Dukes of the House of Romanov.
This was an order from Nicholas II.
They protected the heirs. After all, the first son of Kshesinskaya was the first heir of Nicholas II and, therefore, the eldest heir. By seniority, the crown should belong to him. It is possible that a secret wedding took place between Nicholas II and Kshesinskaya even before the wedding of the Princess of Hesse. Otherwise, how can one interpret the order of Tsar Nicholas II to protect the ballerina day and night?
Perhaps the first son of Nikolai and Matilda lived with his parents at that time. But history is hiding this for now.
Since Emperor Nicholas II disappeared from the pages of history, responsibility for the heirs and the crowned ballerina lay on the shoulders of Andrei Vladimirovich, the Grand Duke.
On January 17, 1921, Matilda and Andrei Romanov got married in Cannes with the consent of the head of the Romanov family, Kirill Vladimirovich. What does Andrei Romanov have to do with it? After disappearing from the official historical page Nicholas II Romanov, - the marriage of Matilda and Nicholas did not bring any benefit. And Matilda needed status for her sons. For the future. Which was unknown to everyone then. And she did everything so that her sons could inherit the titles of the imperial court.
Her dream came true. She became for the whole world Grand Duchess Romanova. And her children are members of the royal family.
After the wedding, Grand Duke Andrei adopted Kshesinskaya’s son, Vladimir. Both sons from a civil marriage, and then a married one, between Nicholas II and Kshesinskaya, are hidden under various pretexts and fables. As well as the fact of Nicholas II’s divorce from his wife and wedding on Kshesinskaya.
Or maybe the so-called heir Alexei, the son of Nikolai Romanov and the Princess of Hesse, was ill for a reason.
Maybe there was a conspiracy to put Kshesinskaya’s first son on the throne? That's why the boy was sick.
Moreover, when he was born, he did not have that disease. It seems like I started getting sick when I was 4 years old.
This is a courtyard, a royal courtyard, where everyone is squabbling for power.
In Europe, Kshesinskaya was called “Madame 17”.
Having read about the release of the historical drama “Matilda” and initially writing an article about the Polish actress Michalina Olshanska, who played main role in this film, I wanted to know as much as possible about the ballerina Matilda Kshesinskaya, the prototype main character. Who is this woman who, more than a hundred years after her two-year (three-year?) romance with Tsarevich Nicholas, still remains remembered and discussed from time to time by our contemporaries? Her name is rinsed and bowed by everyone and everything, including me. This dark-haired fairy seemed to have been forgotten, but the film “Matilda”, shot by the Russian director Alexei Uchitel, stirred up the muzzle of Matilda Kshesinskaya with a new, all-consuming force.
To be honest, before I heard about the new scandal surrounding the drama of Matilda and Tsarevich Nicholas, I didn’t even know about the existence of this ballerina. I am not interested in ballet, but regarding the personal life of the last All-Russian Emperor Nicholas II, I believed that his only woman was his legal wife Alexandra Fedorovna. It should be noted that I four days in a row Like an obsessed person, I read memoirs, letters, diaries of Matilda Kshesinskaya, Nicholas II, Alexandra Fedorovna, and all sorts of articles about them. Opinions and facts vary everywhere, but by comparing all the data and incorporating logic, much becomes clear. So, Matilda Kshesinskaya fell in love with Nicholas II, then still the Tsarevich Heir. In those days, being a ballerina meant having the opportunity to become the lover of high-ranking officials, wealthy aristocrats; many contemporaries call this a social elevator. That is, girls from the lower classes sought to get into ballet schools, become prima ballerinas, then it would be quite possible to grab yourself a rich patron who would buy you a palace, shower you with jewelry, provide comfortable existence. Was it condemned in society then or was it commonplace? Surely, among the ladies of the upper classes it was condemned, but the male population, of course, rejoiced at this order of things. That is, the building where the ballet was danced was something like the current stage with pop divas or a podium with models. Men had the opportunity to look at ballerinas; every self-respecting ballerina had a rich admirer. How else? Until now, as happened before, the Russians, now pop singers, they are looking for rich lovers, but now more often they become their legal wives. Everything is bought and sold, and it still saddens me. But don’t think that Matilda Kshesinskaya became a ballerina in order to acquire a rich and influential admirer; our heroine grew up in an artistic family, her father and mother danced in ballet, and since childhood the girl could not imagine herself outside the stage. Many children were born into the family, but only one Matilda was seen in relations with aristocrats, in particular with the three Romanovs.
Many male historians sincerely admire Matilda not only as a prima ballerina who danced superbly, but still, first of all, as a girl capable of bewitching anyone. Matilda Kshesinskaya did not have the appearance of a diva, I will say more, if you did not know that this is the famous Matilda, who broke dozens of hearts, you would think that these are photographs of an ordinary ballerina of the 19th century. When women call Matilda Kshesinskaya an ugly, short-legged, snaggle-toothed intriguer, men cut them off and say with admiration that she had amazing energy! Most likely this was the case. After all, Matilda looks completely ordinary, but for sure. possessed extraordinary magnetism.
Was Nicholas II unconsciously in love with Matilda Kshesinskaya or was she just a short-term infatuation for him? After all, there are not only the diaries of the ballerina, but also the diaries of the Emperor himself. Well, he was in love, but at the same time he loved his bride - Princess Alix - born Princess Victoria Alice Elena Louise Beatrice of Hesse-Darmstadt, whom he first saw as a twelve-year-old girl. The Heir was 16 years old at that time. Princess Alix sank deeply into his heart; Nicholas’s diaries contain more and more about her. But since distance separated him and the sweetheart of his heart, they saw each other extremely rarely, but had the opportunity to correspond. Nikolai dreamed of becoming Alix’s husband, he cherished this dream for 10 years! But Nikolai was still a mere mortal, yes, he was the future Emperor, he was canonized after his death, but nothing human was alien to him, and therefore, when the ballerina Matilda Kshesinskaya began to charm him, he could not resist, although by all appearances, that he resisted for a very long time and stubbornly, was extremely careful and did not rush headlong into the pool, that is, he completely wanted to limit himself to talking until the morning. Matilda purposefully made the royal person fall in love with her; only after receiving a small hint of what Nicholas liked, she began to do everything to settle in his heart. Is it for selfish purposes?
Matilda or Malya, as her relatives called her, was definitely madly in love with Nikolai, although she was known as vain, but even such women are capable of losing their heads with love! She walked along the same streets as him, she looked at him point blank during her performances, she literally showered him with her vibes, she went out of her way to please him. And in the end she succeeded. At one time, Nikolai even wrote in his diaries that two women lived in his heart - Princess Alix and ballerina Matilda. But all this lasted only a few years, the fact is that Nikolai traveled around the country, went on long trips abroad, and during this time his feelings for Matilda faded away, that is, out of sight, out of mind, but as soon as he visited the ballet again, he noticed how much prettier Matilda had become in his absence. The ballerina persuaded him to continue the affair, she insisted and demanded, but he resisted as best he could, because he believed that having entered into more serious relationship, will be responsible for her future fate and life. But isn’t this what Matilda herself wanted? To have such a patron? Of course, she was in love, the future king was handsome, there is no doubt about that, and then how women are affected by the realization that they can go down in history, perhaps as the first woman of one of the kings. At that time, Matilda did not know that this was the last All-Russian Emperor, otherwise she would have gone out of her way even more to achieve her goal. But do not think that all women of this kind do not love their benefactors.
Nikolai was often very cool, he rarely answered Matilda’s letters, she wrote him news after message, but he was in no hurry to answer, being in the ballet he looked at other ballerinas, gave reason for jealousy, all this infuriated Matilda, and sometimes made her angry. The most interesting part of the novel did not last long; judging by the analysis of Nikolai’s own diary, it lasted no more than 3-4 months. And if initially the future Sovereign was wildly pleased by Matilda Kshesinskaya, then he somehow gradually began to cool towards her, and in the end everything came to naught. There were no torments about the fact that he was forced to part with Malechka in his diaries! All his dreams were directed towards his deeply beloved Princess Alix! The diaries and letters of Nicholas II and his wife Alexandra Fedorovna, the presence of five beloved children, the henpeckedness of the tsar, who dreamed of choosing not to rule the country, but to a calm, measured family life, suggests that he was deeply devoted to his wife, loved her, allowed her a lot. In the end, her unconscious actions led to many tragedies. The entire royal family died. A lot of stupid things were done.
Was the infatuation with Matilda Kshesinskaya just a small episode in the life of Nicholas II? Malya meant in his life exactly as much as not his first love, but his first woman means in the life of any man. Everything happened out of mutual love, which means the memories remained the brightest, then everyone went their own way, naturally, without sadness about what happened. This connection opened the way for Matilda Kshesinskaya to join high-ranking aristocrats; now she would not agree to anything less and arranged her life perfectly, living until she was 99 years old. She married Andrei Vladimirovich Romanov, the grandson of Alexander II. By the way, her husband was 7 years younger and was dearly loved by her, but she never forgot her first love. Throughout her adult life, Matilda Kshesinskaya was a coquette, she charmed, played with men, and drove many crazy. There will always be such women, some condemn them, others admire them, others lose their heads as soon as they approach them.
In this photo you see the only son of Matilda Kshesinskaya and Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich Romanov. This elegant guy's name is Vladimir. He never married and left no offspring.
In this photo little Vova with his mother.
In this photo, Matilda Kshesinskaya is on the left, elder sister Yulia is in the middle, brother Joseph is on the right.
In this photo, one of Matilda Kshesinskaya’s lovers - Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich Romanov.
In this photo, Tsar Nicholas II with his wife Alexandra Feodorovna.
Take a look at this photo, this is what Matilda Kshesinskaya looked like in old age.
In this photo, Matilda Kshesinskaya with her husband Andrei and son Vova.
In 1920, 48-year-old Matilda Kshesinskaya emigrated to France with her eighteen-year-old son Vova and 41-year-old beloved Prince Andrei Vladimirovich, Vova’s father. At 57, Matilda Kshesinskaya opened her own ballet studio in Paris.
Kshesinskaya's husband is Grand Duke Andrei.
Matilda Kshesinskaya and Nicholas II, as you know, had an affair. And, perhaps, common children... In 1959, 90-year-old Kshesinskaya wrote a letter from France to a relative, young engineer Yuri Sevenard, in which she begged for a meeting - to tell him something very important. But the meeting did not take place.
About the love story of the heir to the Russian throne Nikolai Alexandrovich Romanov and the young talented ballerina Matilda Feliksovna Kshesinskaya in last decade a lot has been written. It is generally accepted that the romance ended shortly before the official wedding of the Tsarevich. “No king can marry for love,” in late XIX centuries, strict rules of dynastic marriages in the Russian Empire were strictly observed.
However, there is a lot of evidence that after his marriage and coronation, Nicholas II met with the ballerina several times. Kshesinskaya enjoyed the undoubted and energetic support of the autocrat. Nicholas clearly took her side in the conflict with the director of the imperial theaters, Prince S. M. Volkonsky, as a result of which he was forced to resign from government service.
“Primaballerina Assoluta” enjoyed deep respect and respect from many great princes and close relatives of the Tsar. And after the marriage of her elder sister Yulia Kshesinskaya, who married Nicholas II’s adjutant Baron A.L. Zeddeler, Matilda had the unhindered opportunity to directly contact the emperor at any time, and he to her.
The Mystery of the Konstantinovsky Palace
The dacha of Matilda Kshesinskaya and the imperial Konstantinovsky Palace in Strelna were adjacent and were separated only by a small canal. Currently, the territory of the ballerina's dacha and the palace park, together with the palace, make up the state complex of the Konstantinovsky Palace, which housed the heads of state invited to celebrate the 300th anniversary of our city.
It is known that the emperor visited the Konstantinovsky Palace at the same time that Matilda Kshesinskaya was at her dacha. Could it be possible for people who once loved each other so dearly not to meet? This is how the ballerina describes one of the episodes in her memoirs: “Niki, through Grand Duke Sergei Mikhailovich, let me know that on such and such a day, at such and such an hour, he would ride horseback with the Empress past my dacha. He asked me to be in the garden at this time. I chose a bench that could not be missed from the road. On the appointed day and hour, Niki walked with the Empress past my dacha and, of course, saw me perfectly. They moved slowly, and I gave them a low bow, which was kindly accepted. This incident indicates that Nicky was by no means hiding his attitude towards me if he openly expressed his sympathy, and even in such a refined form. I continued to love him."
In September 1910, the emperor lived in the Constantine Palace without his family. Matilda Kshesinskaya spent the entire autumn of 1910 and winter of 1911 mostly at her dacha in Strelna, rarely appearing in the capital.
And in the spring and summer (until July 1911) Matilda Kshesinskaya completely disappears from view secular society St. Petersburg. At this time, she lived on the estate of the relatives of her friend Sima Astafieva in the Staritsky district of the Tver province. The estate belonged to the nobles Sevenards, and it was then that the paths of two families crossed for the first time: the Kshesinskys and the Sevenards.
Her brother I.F. also lived here. Kshesinsky, who had recently left his position as a teacher at a theater school, with his young wife. They spent the entire summer and autumn of 1911 on the Sevenard estate and returned to St. Petersburg only in November with the girl Tselina, who is listed in the birth certificates as being born in October, although the newlyweds were observed with a small child almost the entire summer.
“I continued to love him”
And Matilda Kshesinskaya returned to the capital in July 1911, where she appeared at almost all public events. The apogee of her vigorous activity is her triumphant performance in the “Russian Seasons” in London in October November 1911, when Vaslav Nijinsky himself, Matilda Kshesinskaya’s partner, staged a scene of jealousy for S. P. Diaghilev and tore his suit out of anger, since the Londoners received his partner more enthusiastically, than him.
And here’s how this extraordinary woman recalled one of the Krasnoselsky performances in July 1912: “When I went on stage, my heart jumped, and I knew that I would be a success, and I was infinitely happy to dance in front of the Emperor. When, after finishing “Russian”, they began to call me, my happiness and joy knew no bounds.
After the performance, when Niki was driving away from the theater, he looked out the window of my dressing room, where I stood as I stood twenty years ago as a young girl, and he is now a prince, the emperor of the most powerful country in the world...”
Stage life left little free time, but the fate of little Tselina, officially considered her brother’s daughter, was under close attention Matilda Kshesinskaya. In the mansion on Kronverksky Prospekt and at the dacha in Strelna, the girl feels at home, since Matilda Feliksovna does not distinguish between her and her son Volodya. All holidays and celebrations are celebrated only together, and the ballerina’s brother with his wife and little Tselina live almost continuously at their dacha in Strelna. On accidentally found unique films from 1914, footage was preserved where the little three-year-old girl Tselina, an adjutant of Nicholas II, was given royal honors in accordance with the strict etiquette of that time.
Letters from Paris
In 1920 M.F. Kshesinskaya left Russia, and since then she lived constantly in France, but until 1937 she did not lose contact with her brother. And each of her letters contained deep pain and great love, first of all, for young Tselina Kshesinskaya. In response letters to I.F. Kshesinsky talks not so much about himself, his wife and son Roma, but about Tselina. About her ballet successes, about the fact that everyone says with one voice: “How similar she is on stage to the great Matilda... Yes, she is even more talented...”, about the fact that she fell in love with and married the young engineer Konstantin Sevenard, that their son Yura was born, that Tselina left the stage forever.
In her last letters to her brother M.F. Kshesinskaya persuaded him to come to her in Paris or somehow transport Tselina to her... But the situation in the country became more and more difficult. In a letter dated 1937, I.F. Kshesinsky asked his sister not to write to him anymore, as this was already becoming dangerous for both him and his family members.
Already during the “thaw” era, in 1959, M.F. Kshesinskaya, in a letter to the director of the Tchaikovsky House Museum in Klin, V.K. Zhuravlev, wrote that she would like to know about the fate of her brother and his family. And only in the early 1960s, by some miracle, she received the address of the young engineer Yuri Konstantinovich Sevenard and wrote him a letter in which she begged him to meet her. For this meeting to take place, the elderly Matilda Feliksovna Kshesinskaya, who was already over 90 years old, was ready to sail by boat to Odessa.
The meeting did not take place
In the letter, Kshesinskaya wrote that she should inform Yu.K. Sevenard had something very important and asked me to keep this letter secret. The young engineer, who was then in charge of blocking the Yenisei, had a very vague idea of who Matilda Kshesinskaya was and what relation she had to him. He showed the letter to his father Konstantin Vladimirovich Sevenard, who at that time supervised the construction of the Krasnoyarsk hydroelectric station. The father burned the letter and asked his son not to react in any way to M. F. Kshesinskaya’s letter.
But if Yu.K. Sevenard agreed to meet with his relative, then the Soviet competent authorities would not have allowed this meeting. Not only does M.F. herself Kshesinskaya was considered a “dangerous emigrant”; her son, His Serene Highness Prince Vladimir Andreevich Romanov, was a very popular person among the youth of the Russian emigration in Paris. He led the Young Russian movement, and one of the program points of this organization was the construction of a constitutional monarchy in Russia. When the Most Serene Prince was asked whether he meant himself by a person who could become a new Russian Tsar, he replied that in Russia there are people in whose veins the blood of the last emperor flows.
His Serene Highness Prince V.A. Romanov was found murdered in 1974, three years after the death of his great mother M.F. Kshesinskaya, Your Serene Highness Princess Romanovskaya-Krasinskaya. The archives of mother and son disappeared without a trace. However, copies of some documents from these archives, including letters from I.F. Kshesinsky's sister, strangely appeared in the library of the Abraham Lincoln Center in New York.
So, the meeting between M.F. Kshesinskaya and Yu.K. Sevenard did not take place, and many questions remained open.
Who were you, Tselina Kshesinskaya, so similar on stage and in life to your “aunt”? Perhaps you were the last daughter of the last Emperor of Russia.
Valentin BOBROV,
member of the St. Petersburg Society of Creative museum workers, Honored Worker of Culture of the Russian Federation
On the New Stage Bolshoi Theater took place for the third time All-Russian competition young performers of the Russian Ballet. Conceived and conducted for the first time by the wife of the current Prime Minister of the Russian government, Svetlana Medvedeva, in 2013, it still today represents the best students of Russian ballet schools and is supported by the Ministry of Culture and the Foundation for Socio-Cultural Initiatives.
Out of 44 applications, the jury conducted the first round in absentia, behind closed doors, based on recordings, and selected 29 schoolchildren from 13 schools to participate. In addition to the Moscow and St. Petersburg academies, their number included students from schools from Perm, Novosibirsk, Voronezh, Kazan, Krasnodar, as well as students from Krasnoyarsk, Buryat, Bashkir, and Yakut colleges. Students from two Moscow schools also took part in the competition. In addition to the Leonid Lavrovsky School, the Moscow Choreographic School was also represented here. academic theater dance "Gzhel", which, among other things, can boast of such a graduate as Denis Rodkin, who became the premier of the Bolshoi Theater (together with the prima Big Anna Nikulina) and host of the second ceremony of the competition.
The problems for the competition participants appear to be the same ones that plague the competitors at this kind of competition from year to year: “schoolboy” performance, a chronic lack of sense of style, and difficulties with technique often made themselves felt: some fell, some could not twist consistently fouette... And all this almost through one performer...
Special complaints must be made about the form of many participants. The jury does not seem to have paid sufficient attention to this circumstance. Otherwise, the “knocked down” (the girl did not have these problems last year) with an uncultivated foot, but well-rotating and generally very technical undergraduate student of the Vaganova Academy, Eleonora Sevenard, would never have received the “gold” (on the Bolshoi Theater website for some reason: then named as Sevenardze). The girl, who is said to be the great-great-granddaughter of a ballerina, also has some problems with natural softness; she also lacks the “extended lines” that are in demand today in ballet (which apparently was passed down “inheritedly”, since there were none and at my great-great-grandmother's). So on at the moment“silver” is its limit.
With somewhat greater justification, the silver laureate of the competition, Italian Camilla Mazzi, representing the Moscow Academy, could claim gold, since it is located in much in better shape than her gold-winning competitor. But this participant can be reproached for her excessive mannerisms. But the bronze of the representative of the Perm school, Anna Grigorieva, is generally in question. There are problems not only with the form, but also with the purity of execution. Looking much more advantageous against her background was the long-legged and long-armed, and also expressive from an acting point of view, second-year student of the Gzhel School Irina Zakharova, who, nevertheless, was not included in the list of nominees (just as another representative of this school, Anastasia Shelomentseva, who performed a quality performance, did not get there). Variation of Medora from the ballet “Corsair”).
To be honest, you can’t really envy the members of the jury this year, because for the boys they had to make a truly “Solomon” decision: it was really difficult to choose the Grand Prix winner at this competition; absolutely all the young men who became laureates were worthy of it.
It’s especially insulting for the graduate of the Moscow Academy (and now an artist of the Bolshoi Theater) Russian-Japanese dancer Marco (or Maruku as indicated in the program, the guy recently received Japanese citizenship) Chino, who was awarded only third place by the jury’s decision. A multiple winner of many competitions, although he danced at the competition with a sore leg (which, of course, affected the quality of performance), he nevertheless “hit the top ten” at the Russian Ballet, having beautifully performed the pas de deux from Tchaikovsky’s ballet “The Sleeper” with Camilla Mazzi gorgeous". The dancer's excellent training, excellent external characteristics, his plasticity, organic and stylish performance, and partnership qualities made his dance in no way inferior in quality and finishing to the dance of his competitors.
Slightly better than the other prize-winners, almost flawlessly, without making a single mistake (although he had to perform in extreme conditions, after his partner fell on stage while performing a pas de deux from the ballet “Don Quixote”), Arsenty Lazarev from Novosibirsk showed up at the competition, receiving nevertheless silver, but which became a real discovery of this competition. However, the performance of Denis Zakharov, who represented the Moscow Academy and received the Grand Prix as a result, can also be considered stylistically accurate and flawless. The sophomore at the Moscow State Academy of Arts has elongated lines, beautiful feet, and in his manner of performance he is somewhat reminiscent of a young one.
The owner of a noble appearance, luxurious in texture, Egor Gerashchenko ( gold medal). A student of a Moscow school, who received excellent training from his current teacher Nikolai Tsiskaridze already at the Vaganova Academy in St. Petersburg, where he moved from Moscow, in addition to the romantic appearance of Prince Siegfried (which was successfully emphasized by a silver-embroidered tunic and hairstyle), demonstrated beautiful feet, good rotations and jumping with landing in an impeccable fifth position... And most importantly, the “effect of stage presence”, charming the Moscow (actually “native”) audience with his manner. Gerashchenko looked like a “record” premiere and showed the most confident and “adult” performance of all the participants in the duet, beautifully dancing the black pas de deux from “Swan Lake” with Eleanor Sevenard.
As for the jury itself, the decision was made demonstratively (the competition was filmed for television), and was by no means made in the “offices”: the scores were given “online”, that is, right during the performance, and at intervals of every 5 issues the ballots were given to the secretary, for so that they can then be processed by the computer. He actually made the final verdict, depending on the number of points scored by the participants. It seems like everything is transparent, which, however, does not at all exclude the possibility of reaching an agreement in advance.
What is noteworthy: unlike the past two competitions, the current one, its organizer Mrs. Svetlana Medvedeva, was not honored with her presence, sending instead only a long message read out at the award ceremony. Another high-ranking ballet lover, Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets, did not attend the competition this time either. From senior officials Only the Minister of Culture Vladimir Medinsky arrived at the Bolshoi at the very end of the competition in order to present awards to the winners together with the legendary chairman of the jury.
Pavel Yashchenkov, mk.ru
Konstantin Sevenard: “I swear that I’m telling the truth”
The other day, all the media wrote about 19-year-old ballerina Eleanor Sevenard, who was accepted into the Bolshoi Theater troupe. This news was made sensational by the fact that the young dancer from St. Petersburg is the great-great-granddaughter of “that same Kshesinskaya.”
Officially - according to the only surviving side branch of the Kshesinskys, from Matilda’s brother Joseph. Since the ballerina has no direct descendants.
But representatives of the Kshesinsky-Sevenard family are convinced that not everything is so simple in this world and that their grandmother, nee Tselina Iosifovna Kshesinskaya, is in fact not a niece, but own daughter Matilda and... Nicholas II.
Everyone said that Tselina surpassed her famous relative in beauty.
Much already conceived later marriage Tsar - in 1910. And not just like that, but for the sake of saving the country.
A girl with pure blood, who does not carry the broken genes of the deadly hemophilia that ultimately destroyed the empire.
This story is so incredible and looks more like a thick adventure novel than a boring historical chronicle that if someone else had told it to me, and not the father of that very young ballerina Eleanor Sevenard, I would never have believed it.
But Konstantin Sevenard is quite real person who is responsible for his words.
Ex-deputy State Duma of the Russian Federation and the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg, fought in Afghanistan, his father, the communist Yuri Sevenard, ran for the post of mayor of Leningrad in 1991 and lost to Sobchak, and his grandfather Konstantin Sevenard was the patriarch of the Soviet hydropower construction industry, as he was called, who delivered turnkey more than one powerful GES, and grandson Konstantin Yurievich Sevenard is convinced that the scandal with Matilda is not at all accidental.
Konstantin Sevenard.
The series "Matilda" has reached a new level. Having driven three great princes crazy, Kshesinskaya has already almost driven mad modern Russia. Why do we need this? And what was there in this woman, who, to today’s picky eyes, is not so brilliant a beauty? Just a lover? Or something more?
We are sitting with Konstantin Sevenard in his office on the Chernaya Rechka, the view from the window is beautiful, the last warm days, the sun's glare falls like stitches on the Malaya Nevka. St. Petersburg is, after all, history, take any house built about a century ago, and it will probably turn out that it is also connected with the name of Matilda Feliksovna: she visited here, drank tea there... The past is so close, almost nearby.
100 years of revolution - fleeting sunny bunny on the cold September water.
Konstantin Yuryevich, are you outraged that the name of your great-grandmother, dear or cousin, is being tarnished today, to be honest, by everyone? Do you also want to sue the authors of Matilda, as Olga Kulikovskaya-Romanova, the widow of Nicholas II’s nephew, recently did?
How can I file a defamation claim if I haven't seen the film yet? Let him come out and then it will become clear. But I think that all the really ambiguous and controversial episodes have probably already been cut out from there. And if there are still spreading cranberries left, then they are unlikely to offend anyone.
- Is it surprising that the name of Kshesinskaya suddenly emerged from obscurity on the very eve of the centenary of the revolution?
Of course, in Soviet times Kshesinskaya was remembered only in the context of her mansion, which was donated by the emperor and where the Bolshevik headquarters was located in 1917, and then the Museum of the Revolution. The fact that the great-grandmother was not timid is evidenced by the fact that she was not afraid to sue the uninvited guests who evicted her. Imagine, she won the lawsuit against Lenin. Matilda returned to her mansion and even set up a large hiding place there, took all her jewelry and documents there, but, alas, she did not stay there for long, and soon fled abroad... Times were turbulent. In 1990, my family, too, did everything to open an exhibition in this building dedicated to the life of Matilda Kshesinskaya, but we could not even imagine that crowds of people would rush there, that many would find it interesting - archival photographs, documents , our surviving family photographs... Instead of several months, the exhibition ran for about two years. A lot of publications at this time were published in the media dedicated to the life of Matilda and her love.
Brother Joseph and sister Matilda. Is she hiding her pregnancy under a wide skirt?
And yet, what you are telling today about the real fate of your great-grandmother is best case scenario apocrypha. But the family legend that she had a daughter from Nicholas II is yours dear grandmother that she was born much later than the emperor’s marriage to Alexandra Feodorovna and even the birth of their common children is worse than “Matilda,” to be honest.
I swear I'm telling the truth. On October 6, 1910, at the invitation of Nicholas, Matilda met him in the park of the Constantine Palace in a gazebo on the island. She was brought there by boat. On her part, the purpose of the visit was quite prosaic, she had a conflict with the director of the Mariinsky Theater, which she wanted to resolve in her favor, to win Nikolai over to her side, he had other intentions... An episode of intimacy occurred. I don't think it was accidental. Nikolai really wanted a child from Matilda, a healthy child.
- First love forever?
The fact is that they never broke off their relationship. Matilda’s sister, Julia, also a ballerina, 1st Kshesinskaya, as everyone called her, married Colonel Alexander Zeddeler, the Tsar’s adjutant, so Matilda had direct access to Nicholas in any case. Yes, Nikolai was weak and driven, and Matilda was one of the most interesting and charming women of her era; it was not for nothing that she drove two other grand dukes, Sergei Mikhailovich and Andrei Vladimirovich, crazy, whose wife she eventually became.
According to my information, Matilda was pregnant from the end of 1910 to the spring of 1911, officially at that time she was supposedly shining on tour in England, but in fact, since March she had been living continuously in the house of her brother Joseph and his wife Seraphima in Astashkovo. To kill time, she practiced her handwriting, wrote with her left hand, and copied “Woe from Wit.” Many years later, the pioneers seem to have found this notebook and donated it to the Bakhrushin Museum.
Felix Kshesinsky is the head of the dynasty.
Her daughter Celina, my grandmother, was born in midsummer. Brother Joseph offered to enroll the girl in his name. He was already growing up one year old son Slavochka, who was born by his first wife, dancer Sima Astafieva, so the newborn did not require any additional investments; clothes, a stroller, and even a nurse were already ready. Matilda returned to St. Petersburg, where she magnificently celebrated her next birthday in front of everyone, compensating for her long absence. Meanwhile, the nurse did not have enough milk for two children - and Joseph ordered her to feed Tselina first... Seraphim's wife was offended and left, taking the one-year-old boy with her. Later they left for London - and there, unfortunately, traces of Slavik were lost. And Joseph married the beautiful Tselina Spryshinskaya, he urgently needed to straighten his niece’s passport, and official biography It was Tselina Sr. who was considered the mother of little Tselina, named after her.
- But for such loud conclusions there are not enough words, evidence is needed.
Our family has photographs from that era. Here, for example, is a photograph from Astashkov, you see how awkwardly Matilda is sitting sideways, covering her big belly, here she is just pregnant with her grandmother. And here she has already given birth, standing next to the stroller, looking at the baby with tenderness... To hide the family secret, Tselina Jr. was registered only in the fall and under her brother Joseph.
Do you think another illegitimate child could have hampered Matilda’s reputation? Why did she recognize Volodya, her only son according to documents, and abandon her own daughter?
Because Volodya was not the son of the Tsar, but Tselina was. By the way, here is the intertwining of fate - in the photograph where Matilda is standing with a stroller, in the right corner is a five-year-old boy, the son of the Kshesinskys’ neighbors on the estate, Konstantin Sevenard. Many years later he would become my grandfather and Celina's husband.
Matilda Kshesinskaya conquered men not with her beauty, but with her natural charm.
- What an original surname - Sevenard. Where is she from?
The Sevenards' ancestors came from France, an old aristocratic family, and were related to Napoleon, so the second half of my surname did not disappoint.
But how could it happen that in the USSR the nobleman Konstantin Sevenard, married to a relative of Matilda Kshesinskaya herself, niece or daughter, was not only not repressed, but was even allowed to work on objects of national importance?
Grandfather Sevenard was an honored hydraulic engineer and order bearer; the second, more secret part of his biography: wherever he built hydroelectric power stations, military factories also appeared at the same time. For example, they built the Volzhskaya hydroelectric power station - and right next to it the Volzhskie Motors plant was founded, which provided the needs of the army with transport, the same thing happened in the Urals during the construction of the Uralvagonzavod. His solutions were the most advanced at that time. No, the authorities had no doubts about Konstantin Sevenard, although he never received the Hero of Socialist Labor, just like me, who fought in Afghanistan, took part in the rescue of the 9th company and was twice nominated for the title of Hero Soviet Union, - I think all this is not accidental. By the way, the grandfather himself did not talk much about the family’s past; we knew only the bare minimum about our ancestors. The relationship was not maintained in any way. In those days it could not have been otherwise. When in the early 60s Matilda tried to come to the USSR, on a boat to Odessa, giving the opportunity a letter for my father Yuri, her grandson, grandfather Sevenard did not let his son go anywhere. He forced the letter to be burned and forgotten. However, this meeting would not have taken place anyway - since Kshesinskaya was not even allowed to go to her native land.
Summer of 1911. Matilda (center) looks at the stroller in which, according to family legend, lies her newborn daughter.
- What about your grandmother Tselina?
By that time my grandmother was no longer alive. She died at 48. Which is not at all typical for the Kshesinsky family, who lived for nearly a hundred years: Matilda left at 99 (in 1971! - E.S.), her sister Yulia - at 104, but Tselina instantly burned out from cancer , it was due to the fact that she and her husband worked not far from Semipalatinsk when the first nuclear tests took place there. In general, my grandmother began as a ballerina at the Kirov Theater, the former Mariinsky Theater, where her father Joseph continued to work as a dance master in the 30s. I don’t know, to be honest, how it happened that the sisters Matilda and Yulia were able to emigrate, and he stayed in Russia with his adopted niece, then married for the third time. But my great-grandfather did not live his life in vain. He trained a whole galaxy of wonderful Soviet dancers; she considered him her teacher famous ballerina Natalya Dudinskaya, but Tselina’s grandmother herself did not have a career, although we keep her old posters at home... Tselina married her grandfather, a hydraulic engineer, very early and, like a faithful wife, wandered with him all over the country, gave birth to two children, survived the war, oh I had to forget about the theater... My great-grandfather Joseph Kshesinsky disappeared during the siege in 1942. That's all we know about him. His apartment was then searched, the furniture was opened, it seemed that some strange glass plates were found, which were taken with them by those who carried out this search. Much time has passed since then, and there are too many events to count... The USSR collapsed, many archival documents... And so “Matilda” was resurrected again, now in the form of a scandalous film. This means that her fate still worries our compatriots, and this is not without reason.
Probably, if you are related to royal family will be proven, then you can become the center of opposing forces?
Yes, on the one hand, there are those who benefit from the appearance of official heirs Russian Emperor, on the other hand, I understand that the majority will not want to recognize us as descendants of Nicholas II. My father - he is old but vigorous - last year voluntarily donated blood for a DNA test, but there are still no results of the study. And I frankly don’t understand where they went, what’s happening, who doesn’t want or who doesn’t benefit from bringing this old story to light. Although it is not a fact that the remains officially recognized as royal, with which our DNA could be compared, actually are so... The history of their canonization is dark and mysterious. I know that the same Yeltsin in the 90s was categorically against any restoration of tsarism.
Sobchak, whose opponent in the elections was my father. after the events of August 1991, there was an idea to re-establish a liberal monarchy in Russia. He tried to involve Vladimir Kirillovich Romanov, the then official head of the dynasty, in this issue; as far as I know, they even agreed on something. But personally, I didn’t want to and didn’t see myself in this project: for me, great-grandmother Matilda is not a way to achieve some political goals, but a kind of symbol of freedom, spiritual and physical, of that turn in history that would never have happened if she stayed with Nikolai.
Little Celina with Joseph and brother Romuald.
Matilda lived an incredibly long and such different lives. If you look at it, the affair with the heir was just the beginning of her journey, the first episode of an endless series 99 years long. It is quite possible that even now, judging by the latest events around Matilda, we are not seeing the end of this story.
The only pity is that there are practically no unknown authentic archives left. The great-grandmother's memoirs and diaries have already been published. After unexpected death Matilda's son Vladimir Krasinsky, who outlived his mother by only two years, the remaining papers were taken by Vladimir Kirillovich Romanov. In a conversation with me, he did not hide the fact that he was interested in ensuring that these recordings did not surface anywhere. Well, communicating with aristocrats is very easy, at least they never lie. And to a direct question they give the same direct answer.
Your press conference was recently held at Interfax in St. Petersburg. Reviews about it were also mixed. Aren't you afraid that you will be accused of either insanity, or of lying or pursuing some of your own interests? It's such an incredible story...
You know, I once heard a very interesting phrase, I don’t remember who said it: if you remove lies from history, this does not mean at all that the truth will remain in it... But personally, I am ready to give my life to prove that I am right.
...Waiting for her long life, in which the affair with the heir was only one of the episodes. Matilda Feliksovna at 95.
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Matilda Kshesinskaya had an older brother, Joseph, and a sister, Yulia, who was called the 1st Kshesinskaya; she was married to Zeddeler; she had no children.
Joseph Kshesinsky (1868–1942) - character dancer and choreographer of the Mariinsky and later the Kirov Theater. Honored Artist of the RSFSR (1927).
Was married three times.
In 1896, with a graduate of the Mariinsky Theater ballet school, Serafina Aleksandrovna Astafieva (1876-1934), their son Vyacheslav was born.
The second time - on the ballerina Tselina Vladislavovna Spryshinskaya (1882–1930).
Children: Romuald and Celina (1911–1959), who graduated ballet school, danced on Mariinsky stage, married engineer Konstantin Sevenard. Some believe that she was in fact the illegitimate daughter of Matilda Kshesinskaya from Nicholas II.
Tselina's son, Yuri Sevenard, is a hydraulic engineer and former MP State Duma.
In 1990, he was elected as a deputy of the Leningrad City Council of People's Deputies, which he remained until the latter's dissolution in December 1993.
In June 1991 he ran for the post of mayor of Leningrad. He gained 10% (37,000 votes) in these elections and lost to A.A. Sobchak.
In December 1993, he was elected to the State Duma of the 1st convocation on the federal list of the Communist Party Russian Federation. From January 1994 to December 1995, he was First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Industry, Construction, Transport and Energy.
Grandson Konstantin Yurievich (1967), also ex-deputy of the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg and the State Duma of the third convocation. In 2017, his daughter, a graduate of the Vaganov Academy Eleonora Sevenard (*1998), was officially accepted into ballet troupe Bolshoi Theater. Her younger sister, Ksenia, studies at the Vaganova Academy.
Eleanor Sevenard - future star Bolshoi Theater. Photo: social networks
From the editor: Let us note that it is worth making allowance for the fact that Mr. Sevenard has already surprised the public more than once with his stories. Thus, he claimed that Kshesinskaya’s diaries, lost during the revolution, were allegedly bought by Gennady Timchenko - this information was categorically denied by the Timchenko Foundation.
Konstantin Sevenard also told the media that in a crypt in a cemetery in Warsaw he found a document recognizing Nicholas II’s daughter from Kshesinskaya and his agreement... with Rothschild and the President of the United States. Naturally, Sevenard “did not survive” the documents.
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