Memories in the Marble Palace

v, 354 pp. Translated from Russian by Nina Toulina. Born at Pavlovsk on 15 July, 1887, Gabriel Contantinovich was the second son of the Grand Duke Constantine Constantinovich and the Grand Duchess Elizabeth Mavrikievna. He was the great-grandson of Emperor Nicholas I. Born into a privileged world, he lived in lavish luxury growing up in some of the most magnificent of the Romanov palaces including the Marble Palace in St. Petersburg, the Constantine Palace at Strelna, Pavlovsk and the family's country estate at Ostashevo. His memoirs, published here for the first time in English, paint a magnificent portrait of the beauty and splendour of the Russian Court in its twilight years before the First World War. Gabriel recalls many events at the Russian Court, which he describes in vivid detail: elaborate balls and lavish dinners, four royal weddings, the Coronation of Tsar Nicholas II, and the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty. His memoirs also share many new anecdotes about his parents, his brothers and sisters, as well as those of his extended family. These included grand dukes and duchesses, princes and princesses. Gabriel paints a very sympathetic portrait of the last tsar, whom he held in very high regard. His more solemn memories relive the personal pain he experienced at the death of his brother Oleg, his beloved father, and the horrors of World War One and his imprisonment. He experienced the nightmare of the Revolution that was to engulf his beloved Russia. His release from prison and escape from certain death at the hands of the Bolsheviks is nothing short of a miracle, thanks to the efforts of his wife. Together, they fled to Finland and lived the rest of their lives in exile in Paris. Gabriel's memoirs are supplemented with excerpts from the diaries of his brother, Oleg, who perished in 1914, and his wife, Antonina Raphailovna Nesterovskaya, whom he married in 1917.