L’Histoire d’Azov de Gottlieb Siegfried Bayer

Although not comparable to either G.-F. Müller or Schlözer, Gottlieb Bayer is one of the German authors who played an important role in the emergence of Russian historiography, notably in research concerning the origins of Russia. It was undoubtedly Peter the Great’s conquest of Azov which gave Bayer the idea of writing the history of this emblematic city which for centuries found itself on the margins of the Russian world. His text is composed in German, whereas the majority of his other works are in Latin. It stretches from the Greek Tanais of antiquity up to the conquest of 1696 and the loss of the city in 1711, following the disastrous Prut campaign. For reasons of clarity, we have here summarised these 240 pages. Bayer exploited and examined critically virtually all the sources available in his time. His history contains gaps and errors, but does not make up stories. For the most part it is impartial. Lively and clear, despite some infelicities, it has the merit of citing little-known facts and anecdotes. In an appendix, Bayer published in German translation, following a Latin edition, the correspondence in the years 1710-1711 between Peter the Great and the Sultan Ahmet III (one of the Tsar’s letters, apparently unpublished at the time, seems to have been translated from the Russian original).