As was the vogue in the early 18th century, Peter the Great harboured a partiality for oddities and curiosities; a passion that lead to the establishment of his Kunstkamera, a cabinet of curiosities dedicated to preserving "natural and human curiosities and rarities." The museum boasted an impressive collection of deformed human and animal skeletons, the tsar having issued a macabre proclamation demanding all deformed stillborn babies from every part of Russia to be sent for displaying as examples of accidents of nature.
This provides some context for Peter's more disturbing fascination with little people, which culminated in his organising an elaborate wedding for the royal dwarf Iakim Volkov:
"The tsar ... had instructed Prince-Caesar Romodanovsky to round up all the dwarfs in Moscow and send them to St Petersburg. Their owners were told to provide smart outfits for the dwarfs in the latest Western fashion, with plenty of gold braid and periwigs ... On the day about seventy dwarfs formed the retinue for the wedding ceremony, which was accompanied by the stifled giggles of the full-sized congregation ... a spectacle made all the funnier by the fact that most of the dwarfs were of peasant extraction with coarse manners. At the feast ... the dwarfs sat at miniature tables in the centre of the room, while full-sized guests watched them from tables at the sides. They roared with laughter as dwarfs, especially the older, uglier ones who hunchbacks, huge bellies and short crooked legs made it difficult for them to dance, fell down drunk or engaged in brawls.
On one level, the dwarf wedding was just an entertainment. Being amused by the vertically challenged may offend modern sensibilities, but dwarfs were a standard feature of early modern European courts ... The 6 foot 7 inch tsar loved his contingent of resident dwarfs, who were liable to surprise guests by leaping from pies (sometimes naked), dancing on tables or trotting in on miniature ponies, as well as performing domestic duties ... But like all Peter's mock spectacles, the dwarf wedding also operated on a more symbolic level. [It] suggested that the full-sized guests were watching caricatures of themselves, miniature 'lords and ladies' clad, like them, in unfamiliar Western dress. Peter's courtiers ... still had a long way to go before they were fully fledged, 'grown-up' Europeans."
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The Oddment Emporium
Historical FictionA book based on actual events, a collection of fantastically odd short stories, a cornucopia of eclectic delights with accompanying images on every page.
