Hanging in the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg is a painting of the young Catherine the Great with a sash of scarlet moiré cutting across her chest. Her skin is pearlescent, her expression a tad coquettish. Pinned to her golden dress is a diamond-crusted silver star--the Order of Saint Catherine, an award given to the Prussian princess to mark her rather inauspicious entry into Russia's imperial family. Catherine's arranged marriage--to the sadistic, sniveling man-child Peter III--would end ...
Hanging in the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg is a painting of the young Catherine the Great with a sash of scarlet moiré cutting across her chest. Her skin is pearlescent, her expression a tad coquettish. Pinned to her golden dress is a diamond-crusted silver star--the Order of Saint Catherine, an award given to the Prussian princess to mark her rather inauspicious entry into Russia's imperial family. Catherine's arranged marriage--to the sadistic, sniveling man-child Peter III--would end ...
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