SUMMARY:

Elena Vishlenkova explores symbols of the Russian politics and culture in the first quarter of the 19th century as they represented different visions of war and peace. According to the author, traditional interpretations of the memory of the Patriotic War of 1812 in Russia contributed to the emergence of the nationalist discourse in Russia and the dissolution of “imperial consciousness”. However, the author’s research into representations of the monarchy and various symbols of the epoch demonstrate a disconcerting view.
The monarchy’s self-representation focused on the figure of the emperor and the universal and theurgical character of the Tsar. After the war itself the representation of the monarch appealed to the Christian tradition in order to stress peace and re-conciliation. No monuments to the war itself or to the fallen heroes were erected, while the main site of commemoration emerged in the form of a universal temple (Christ the Savior). The memory of the war stressed not the national but the universal character of the turmoil, its religious and cosmological nature.