Scenarios of Power: Myth and Ceremony in Russian Monarchy, vol. 1.

By "scenarios of power," Richard Wortman has in mind the elaborate ceremonies by which the Russian monarchy conveyed to the world its might. Political theatre occurred elsewhere to support official myths, of course, but Wortman shows that the Russians have practised this arcane art with particular deftness. Wortman describes in detail the changing pomp that marked coronations, tsarist name days, triumphal occasions, military and religious holidays, tsarist visits, and funerals during the century and one-half that ended with the death of Nicholas I in 1855. (He intends to continue his study in a second volume from the Emperor Alexander II to the departure of the last of the Romanovs, Nicholas II, in 1917.)

Bulking largest in this book are Wortman's descriptions of a vast array of imperial ceremonies. These scenarios, although intended to impart ideas of the solidity of Romanov rule and the continuity of Russian traditions, changed over time and followed cultural trends and political needs. They also projected the ideas and personalities of individual …