Catherine the Great and Queen Elizabeth I are two regal heroines who developed a masculine side in order to rule. Through contrasting strategies, both heroines successfully embraced the role of honorary men to secure and strengthen their leadership. Both Catherine the Great and Elizabeth I were constrained by their gender and consequently struggled to maintain and manifest power and control throughout their reigns. Nonetheless, both regal heroines grew to become formidable sovereigns, and both women directed their nations to an age of prosperity despite the eminent patriarchy of the societies in which they reigned.
Catherine the Great is a regal heroine who certainly earned her title. Historically, ‘greatness’ has been established through imperialism and expansion. Thus when we consider the accomplishments of Catherine the Great, it is manifest that she deserved her title. Catherine was an accomplished regal heroine who achieved great things during her reign of the Russian Empire. However, Catherine the Great was not always this regal heroine. Born as Sophie Friederike Auguste, she was seen as a failure by her family, and was largely raised by the family’s servants. In 1744, at the age of 15, she was sent from Prussia, Germany, to Russia, to fulfill her arranged marriage to Emperor Peter III. The marriage took place on August 21, 1745, with the bride being converted to Orthodox Christianity and now bearing the name Ekaterina, or Catherine. In 1762, following a coup against Peter’s reign (of which Catherine was a part of) and his subsequent mysterious death, Catherine the Great became the ruler of Russia.
There is no doubt that Catherine the Great adopted a ‘masculine side’ in order to rule. Catherine’s sexuality is a feature of the ruler which was central to her reign. Her sexuality was something which at the time was regarded as being a very masculine feature of Catherine. Numerous sources document the masculine side of her. Judy Chicago observes that Catherine “Loved like a man and worked like a man.” To achieve this masculine side, Catherine was required to relinquish her femininity. She dressed and rode her horses like a man. Voltaire more negatively noted that Catherine was “A loose woman who ate snuff and drank coffee”, a remark which was intended as an insult and to communicate that she was rather unfeminine. Catherine ruled ruthlessly, she was intelligent and demanded power. She embodied traits which at the time belonged to men.
Not only did Catherine use her masculine traits to control the public sphere, but within her private life she became more King-like than Queen-like as she engaged with an abundance of lovers. Her status as a mother was very quiet, eight years of her marriage to Peter passed without a child. In her Memoirs, Catherine acknowledges her masculinity, “I was a true and noble night, with a more masculine than feminine spirit; everyone found that I had the allure of a quite amiable woman together with a man’s character.” Yet Catherine did not only model herself off great men in order to achieve her political success, she also emulated various goddesses such as Semiramis, the ninth C Assyrian ruler renowned for her power and sexuality. Catherine used her masculine approach to sexuality to command power and influence. This masculine sexuality made her a lustful and captivating empress while simultaneously reinforcing her status as an independent and authoritative ruler of Russia.
In 1558, at the age of 25, Elizabeth Tudor assumed the life-long responsibilities of a monarch in a society which regarded women as lacking intelligence, virtue, and judgment compared to men. At Elizabeth’s accession, her gender was seen as a grievous disability. It is therefore of little surprise that following her accession, Elizabeth adopted features associated with men in order to achieve credibility, and to better adjust to her role. Elizabeth is often referred to and referred to herself in masculine terms. For example, in her letters to King James VI she writes “I am that prince”. Elizabeth is famously said to have proclaimed, “I may have the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a King”, as she faced the possibility of Spanish invasion. Whether or not she actually spoke these words, it is of little surprise that they have become one of her most renowned statements as it so plainly captures the struggles that she faced as a woman in power. Elizabeth was forced to develop a ‘masculine side’ in order to consolidate and legitimize her sovereignty, and to, somewhat paradoxically, become one of the most famous woman to ever live.
The majority of the English public responded to Queen Elizabeth’s accession in 1558 with phenomenal hesitancy. The grounds for such hesitancy were based wholly on the conflict between her rule and her womanhood. “If a Queen were confidently to demonstrate the attributes of power, she would not be acting in a womanly manner; yet womanly behaviour would ill-fit a queen for the rigours of rule.” As a female, Elizabeth’s most important role was to produce an heir. The pressure to fulfil this duty was constantly urged by her court.
Elizabeth rejected this burden and discharged such womanly duties by avoiding marriage and effectuating the ideal of chastity through framing herself as the Virgin Queen. Elizabeth made clear to her counsel and to her people that she was married to her country and was the mother to the English people. Virginity turned women into men by offering them independence and the authority to pursue a noble spiritual vocation. Elizabeth’s status as the Virgin Queen emitted an impression of purity and power which cast her above the control of the powerful men who surrounded her. She became a King as well as a Queen by rejecting the traditional motherly figure of a woman.
Simone de Beauvoir: “Queen Isabella, Queen Elizabeth, Catherine the Great were neither male nor female —they were sovereigns. It is remarkable that their femininity, when socially abolished, should have no longer meant inferiority: the proportion of queens who had great reigns is infinitely above that of great kings.”