Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich: Supreme Commander of the Russian Army

摘要

Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich Romanov (1856-1929) was among the pivotal figures of late imperial Russia. Six feet, six inches tall, he was known by many as 'Big Nicholas', in contrast to his much shorter first cousin once removed, Tsar Nicholas Ⅱ - 'Little Nicholas' or, as the Grand Duke called him, 'Nicky'. The Grand Duke's role in the late empire's military and political life was similarly outsized. As Paul Robinson puts it in this thorough biography, Nikolai Nikolaevich was 'Supreme Commander of the largest army in the world in the greatest war the world had ever seen' and 'probably the person Nicholas Ⅱ trusted more than anybody else and turned to for support in moments of crisis' (p. 3). Not surprisingly, the Grand Duke's image in the historiographical literature has long been an unstable one, shaped by sharply divergent personal recollections of contemporaries who lauded or loathed him. Robinson seeks to provide a balanced picture - and succeeds in doing so.