Peter Shafirov

{{Short description|Russian statesman (1670–1739)}} {{Infobox officeholder | name = Peter Shafirov | native_name = {{No bold|Пётр Шафиров}} | image = Shafirov.jpg | caption = Portrait of Shafirov | birth_date = 1670 | birth_place = Smolensk, Russia | death_date = {{death date and age|1739|3|1|1670|df=yes}} | death_place = Saint Petersburg, Russia | office = Head of the ''Posolsky prikaz'' | term_start = 1706 | term_end = 1708 | predecessor = Fyodor Golovin | successor = Gavriil Golovkin | office2 = President of the Commerce Collegium | term_start2 = 1725 | term_end2 = 1728 | term_start3 = 1733 | term_end3 = 1736 | predecessor2 = Ivan Buturlin | predecessor3 = Andrey Osterman | successor2 = Aleksandr Naryshkin | successor3 = Stepan Velyaminov | citizenship = | alma_mater = | party = | profession = | native_name_lang = ru | rank = | awards = Order of St. Andrew<br/>Order of the White Eagle }}

Baron '''Peter''' or '''Pyotr Pavlovich Shafirov''' ({{langx|ru|Пётр Павлович Шафиров}}; 1670 – 1 March 1739) was a Russian statesman and a prominent coadjutor of Peter the Great. He served as the head of the ''Posolsky prikaz'' (foreign ministry) from 1706 to 1708 and as the president of the Commerce Collegium from 1725 to 1728 and again from 1733 to 1736.<ref name="bigenc">{{cite web |title=ШАФИРОВ ПЁТР ПАВЛОВИЧ |website=Great Russian Encyclopedia |year=2023 |url=https://old.bigenc.ru/domestic_history/text/4691256 |access-date=1 November 2025}}</ref>

==Early life and career== Shafirov was born into a Polish Jewish family. His father, Pavel Shafirov, was a translator in the Russian department of foreign affairs, whose parents converted to the Russian Orthodox Church after Smolensk was ceded to Russia by Poland in 1654.

Peter Shafirov first made himself useful by his extraordinary knowledge of foreign languages. He began his service in the ''Posolsky prikaz'' (foreign ministry) in 1691.<ref name="bigenc"/> He was the chief translator in the foreign ministry for many years, subsequently accompanying Tsar Peter I on his travels. He was raised to the Russian nobility as a baron and received the rank of vice-chancellor. He was considered a diplomat of the highest order.

==Diplomatic missions== Shafirov concluded the Peace of the Pruth during the campaign of 1711. Peter left him in the hands of the Turks as a hostage, and on the breaking of the peace he was imprisoned in the Seven Towers. Finally, however, with the aid of the British and Dutch ambassadors, he defeated the diplomacy of Charles XII of Sweden and his agents, and confirmed the good relations between Russia and Turkey by the treaty of Adrianople (June 1713).

In 1718, Shafirov was appointed as a senator.<ref name="bigenc"/>

==Sentencing and death==

In 1723, however, he was deprived of all his offices and sentenced to death. The capital sentence was commuted at the last minute to banishment, first to Siberia and then to Novgorod. Embezzlement and disorderly conduct in the senate were the offences charged against Shafirov. On the death of Peter, Shafirov was released from prison and commissioned to write the biography of his late master. However, the successful rivalry of his supplanter, Andrei Osterman, prevented Shafirov from holding any high office during the last fourteen years of his life.

==Works== In 1717, he authored a treatise entitled ''A discourse concerning the just causes of the war between Sweden and Russia'',<ref name="Cracraft">{{cite book|last=Cracraft|first=James|title=The Revolution of Peter the Great|chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/revolutionofpete00crac/page/70|year=2003|publisher=Harvard University Press|location=Cambridge, Massachusetts|isbn=0-674-01196-1|pages=[https://archive.org/details/revolutionofpete00crac/page/70 70]|chapter=Diplomatic and Bureaucratic Revolutions|chapter-url-access=registration}}{{subscription required}}</ref> a historical tract on the war with Charles XII. Shafirov detailed some of the greatest exploits of the tsar-regenerator.

==References== {{reflist}}

==Sources== * {{cite Efron|Шафиров, Петр Павлович}} * {{EB1911|wstitle=Shafirov, Peter Pavlovich, Baron|volume=24|last= Bain |first= Robert Nisbet |author-link= Robert Nisbet Bain|page=760|short=1}}

==Further reading== * Cracraft, James. "Diplomatic and Bureaucratic Revolutions". in ''The Revolution of Peter the Great'' (Harvard University Press, 2003) * Butler, W. E. "Shafirov: Diplomatist of Petrine Russia." '' History Today'' (Oct 1973), Vol. 23 Issue 10, pp 699–704 online.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Shafirov, Peter Pavlovich}} Category:1670 births Category:1739 deaths Category:17th-century Russian businesspeople Category:17th-century Russian diplomats Category:17th-century Russian Jews Category:18th-century businesspeople from the Russian Empire Category:18th-century diplomats of the Russian Empire Category:18th-century Jews from the Russian Empire Category:Barons of the Russian Empire Category:Foreign ministers of the Tsardom of Russia Category:Recipients of the Order of the White Eagle (Poland) Category:Russian people of Polish-Jewish descent Category:Senators of the Russian Empire