Šcepan Mali
Encyclopedia
"Tsar" Šćepan Mali (? - 22 September 1773) was a ruler of Montenegro
Montenegro
Montenegro Montenegrin: Crna Gora Црна Гора , meaning "Black Mountain") is a country located in Southeastern Europe. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea to the south-west and is bordered by Croatia to the west, Bosnia and Herzegovina to the northwest, Serbia to the northeast and Albania to the...

 from 1767 until his death in 1773. He seized the throne by falsely representing himself as the Russian Tsar
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...

 Peter III
Peter III of Russia
Peter III was Emperor of Russia for six months in 1762. He was very pro-Prussian, which made him an unpopular leader. He was supposedly assassinated as a result of a conspiracy led by his wife, who succeeded him to the throne as Catherine II.-Early life and character:Peter was born in Kiel, in...

.

Biography

Šćepan Mali was a farmer from Dalmatia
Dalmatia
Dalmatia is a historical region on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It stretches from the island of Rab in the northwest to the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The hinterland, the Dalmatian Zagora, ranges from fifty kilometers in width in the north to just a few kilometers in the south....

. He came to Maine, a village near Budva
Budva
Budva is a coastal town in Montenegro. It has around 15,000 inhabitants, and it is the centre of municipality...

.

In 1762, Russian Tsarina Catherine II
Catherine II of Russia
Catherine II, also known as Catherine the Great , Empress of Russia, was born in Stettin, Pomerania, Prussia on as Sophie Friederike Auguste von Anhalt-Zerbst-Dornburg...

 had her husband Russian Tsar
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...

 Peter III
Peter III of Russia
Peter III was Emperor of Russia for six months in 1762. He was very pro-Prussian, which made him an unpopular leader. He was supposedly assassinated as a result of a conspiracy led by his wife, who succeeded him to the throne as Catherine II.-Early life and character:Peter was born in Kiel, in...

 murdered, and rumours started that Peter III actually fled Russia
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...

 and came to Montenegro. Šćepan Mali was part of those rumours and claimed that he was the Tsar Peter III who had fled Russia.

Metropolitan Sava II
Sava II Petrovic-Njegoš
Sava II Petrović Njegoš was the Vladika of Montenegro, of the Petrović-Njegoš Dynasty. He succeeded Danilo I as Vladika in 1735....

wrote "The land has been silenced" and that all of Montenegro was under Šćepan Mali. When Šćepan Mali ruled Montenegro, he began to behave like an absolute ruler.

The Ottoman Empire was afraid of the fact that a Russian Tsar was in the Balkans. In May of 1768, the sultan ordered an expedition to be made in Montenegro. A few months later, they sent 50,000 Ottoman forces to Montenegro to capture Šćepan Mali, but were unable to do so.

The Russian Government sent Prince Geogriy Dolgorukov to Montenegro to gain control of Montenegro and eliminate Šćepan Mali. In August of 1769, he arrived in Montenegro but was unable to capture Šćepan Mali.

Šćepan Mali was killed on 22 September 1773 by one of his loyals.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK