50 Fun Facts About Grigori Rasputin

Rasputin gained his influence through his friendship with the family of which ruler?

He first met the tsar on 1 November 1905; Nicholas's diary calls him 'a man of God – Grigory, from Tobolsk province'.

In which region of Russia was Rasputin born?

His village lies on the Tura River in what is now Tyumen Oblast.

What was the name of Rasputin's home village?

He kept returning there throughout his years of fame; his wife stayed there for the whole of his rise.

Rasputin was named after which saint, whose feast fell the day after his birth?

He was christened the day after his birth on 21 January 1869.

Besides farming, what job did Rasputin's father Yefim do between Tobolsk and Tyumen?

Seven or eight of Rasputin's siblings died in infancy or early childhood.

How was Rasputin's youth described by historian Douglas Smith?

Archives show an unruly youth but no charge of horse theft, blasphemy or false witness, the crimes later pinned on him.

Whom did Rasputin marry in February 1887?

She stayed in the home village and remained devoted to him until his death; three of their seven children reached adulthood.

How old was Rasputin when he left home on the 1897 pilgrimage that transformed him?

He had been married ten years and had an infant son and another child on the way.

Where, in 1897, was Rasputin 'profoundly humbled' by the elder Makary?

He may have learned to read and write there; he came home a vegetarian who had sworn off alcohol.

What Russian term describes the wandering holy man Rasputin became after 1897?

He held no official position in the Orthodox Church, despite the 'mad monk' label.

Where did Rasputin's small circle of followers hold secret prayer meetings in the early 1900s?

Villagers rumoured that women washed him before each meeting and that he had joined a secret sect.

Rasputin was repeatedly rumoured to belong to which ecstatic sect, though investigations never proved it?

The sect's rituals were said to include self-flagellation and orgies; historian Fuhrmann calls the rumours unfounded.

Which two Montenegrin princesses introduced Rasputin to the Russian imperial family?

They were known in society as the 'Black Princesses'.

At which palace did Rasputin first meet the tsar on 1 November 1905?

He went home soon after and did not come back to the capital until July 1906.

From what condition did the tsarevich Alexei suffer, which Rasputin was believed able to ease?

The empress came to see Rasputin as essential to her only son's survival.

Which confidante of the empress became one of Rasputin's chief advocates from around 1907?

He was later buried at a small church she was building at Tsarskoye Selo.

Where was the imperial family when Alexei's 1912 haemorrhage prompted a telegram to Rasputin?

The boy had been injured on a jolting carriage ride near the imperial hunting grounds there.

What did Rasputin's 1912 telegram advise the empress about the doctors?

'The Little One will not die,' he wrote; the bleeding stopped two days later, and Dr Fedorov called the recovery medically inexplicable.

Which common painkiller, unknown as an anti-clotting agent until the 1950s, do some think Rasputin kept from Alexei?

Pierre Gilliard, the boy's French tutor, was among those who made the suggestion.

How did the imperial children refer to Rasputin?

He sent them telegrams; one to nine-year-old Maria began 'My Dear Pearl M!'

Which governess was fired after complaining that Rasputin visited the grand duchesses in their nightgowns?

The tsar asked Rasputin to stop the visits, but Alexandra had the governess dismissed.

Where did the tsar send Rasputin on pilgrimage after the tsarina's letters and pornographic cartoons circulated?

Alexandra was displeased; the family's association with him continued right up to his murder.

What palace job did the tsar appoint Rasputin to, giving him regular access to the family?

The 'lampadnik' kept the lamps lit before the religious icons.

In December 1906, the healer asked the tsar's permission to change his surname to what?

The speed of the approval shows how early he had won the tsar's favour.

Which prime minister ordered an investigation into Rasputin and confronted the tsar, without success?

The Okhrana secret police also opposed him; the Bishop of Tobolsk had launched an inquest in 1907.

When the tsar left for the front in 1915, Rasputin's influence reached its peak alongside whom?

A far-right Duma deputy called them 'the evil genius of Russia and the Tsarina... who has remained a German on the Russian throne'.

On 12 July 1914, who stabbed Rasputin in the stomach outside his home?

She was a follower of the defrocked priest Iliodor and was declared insane; Rasputin recovered after surgery in Tyumen.

What was Rasputin on his way to do when he was stabbed in 1914?

He had just learned from the tsarina that Russia was preparing for war.

Which prince's palace was Rasputin lured to on the night of his murder?

The Moika Palace basement is now a museum tableau of the killing.

According to Yusupov's memoirs, what poison was in the cakes and Madeira offered to Rasputin?

Rasputin's daughter said he avoided sweets and would never have eaten the cakes; the autopsy found no poison.

In Yusupov's account, what did he tell Rasputin to do just before shooting him in the chest?

He had borrowed the revolver from Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich upstairs.

In Yusupov's account, who fired the shots that finally felled Rasputin in the palace courtyard?

Rasputin had supposedly leaped up and attacked Yusupov after being left for dead.

From where did the conspirators drop Rasputin's body into the river?

Workmen found blood on the railing and a boot on the ice; the body was under the ice about 200 metres downstream.

How many gunshot wounds did Rasputin's body show?

One was a close-range shot to the forehead; the autopsy surgeon found a single, untraceable bullet.

What did the autopsy surgeon Kosorotov find regarding water in Rasputin's lungs?

The story that Rasputin survived poison and bullets only to drown is not supported by the autopsy.

On whose orders was Rasputin's body exhumed and burned by soldiers in March 1917?

The aim was to stop his grave becoming a rallying point for supporters of the old regime.

Which unusual profession did Rasputin's daughter Maria take up after emigrating to the United States?

Born Matryona Rasputina, she first went to France after the October Revolution and worked as a dancer.

Which member of a famous acting family played Rasputin in the 1932 film Rasputin and the Empress?

Ethel played the tsarina and John a prince, making it the only film to feature all three siblings.

Which horror star played the title role in Hammer's Rasputin the Mad Monk (1966)?

Lee had, as a child, met Yusupov and Dmitri Pavlovich, two of the real murderers.

Which vocal group had a 1978 hit song called 'Rasputin'?

In 2022 Doctor Who had the Master, disguised as Rasputin, dance to it.

Who voiced Rasputin in the 1997 animated musical Anastasia?

The film turned him into a literal sorcerer with a talking bat.

Which Welsh actor played Rasputin in The King's Man (2021)?

His Rasputin fights with a sword while dancing.

Which Soviet director's film about Rasputin, Agony, was shot in 1973–75 but only released in 1981?

Alfred Schnittke wrote the score.

Which 'holy men', popular in Saint Petersburg before Rasputin, did he outdo by being a native Russian?

Spiritualism and theosophy were fashionable among a bored and cynical aristocracy hungry for the occult.

Which archimandrite took Rasputin into his home and opened aristocratic salons to him?

He later turned against Rasputin after a follower accused him of rape in 1909.

Rasputin's would-be assassin of 1914, Khioniya Guseva, was a follower of which former priest?

Iliodor had once backed Rasputin before denouncing him in 1911; he fled the country before he could be questioned.

In which Volga city did Rasputin first build a reputation as a wise starets around 1904-05?

From there he moved on to Saint Petersburg, where Archimandrite Theofan introduced him to society.

Which royal joined Yusupov and Purishkevich in leading the plot to kill Rasputin?

After the killing, one conspirator, Sukhotin, wore Rasputin's coat and hat to make it look as if he had returned home.

Where was Rasputin buried in January 1917?

Only the imperial family and a few intimates attended, and he was buried with an icon signed by the grand duchesses and their mother.

In 1886 Rasputin met his future wife in Abalak, a village roughly how far east-northeast of Tyumen?

Abalak lies about 2,800 km east of Moscow, deep in Siberia.