Pilgrims, holy places, and the multi -confessional empire: Russian policy toward the Ottoman Empire under Tsar Nicholas I, 1825--185

In the minds of most historians of imperial Russia, the reign of Tsar Nicholas I (r. 1825--1855) is closely linked with the ideological slogan known as Official Nationality. Consisting of three principles---Orthodoxy, Autocracy, and Nationality---and promoted by Russian officials as state doctrine beginning in the early 1830s, Official Nationality is generally considered the guiding ideology of both domestic and foreign policy under Nicholas I. Thus scholars have seen Russia's foreign policy toward the Ottoman Empire in this period as an expression of the tsar's commitment to Orthodoxy as a foundation of the Russian state.;This dissertation argues that in fact Russia had no uniform "Orthodox policy" during this period: Russian officials did not only, or even primarily, rely on Orthodoxy to extend Russia's influence into the Ottoman Empire.;While most studies of Russo-Ottoman relations rely on the perspectives of ruling elites in St. Petersburg and Istanbul, this dissertation also examines the correspondence of Russian and Ottoman officials posted in the Russian-ruled Caucasus and the Ottoman regions of Syria and Palestine. These sources reveal that policies favored by leading officials in St. Petersburg---such as restricting Muslim pilgrimage from the Caucasus to Mecca, and using the Orthodox Churches of Syria and Palestine as a base for Russian influence there---were not always embraced or executed by Russian officials on the ground in those regions. In the context of imperial rivalries in predominantly Muslim parts of Syria and Palestine, many saw the presence of Muslim pilgrims from Russia in the region as crucial to the establishment of Russian influence there. Finally this dissertation argues that Tsar Nicholas I's 1853 invasion of the Ottoman Empire on the pretext of "defending" Orthodoxy---the event that triggered the Crimean War---was not the culmination of a well-established "Orthodox policy," but rather marked a sharp break from the ongoing efforts of officials within Nicholas's government to promote the tsar as "protector" of many faiths, and to cultivate the loyalties of Ottoman subjects across confessional and sectarian lines. (Abstract shortened by UMI.).