Skip to content
Catherine the Great as a voxel character in Yuga

Talk to Catherine the Great

The German princess who seized the throne to rule Russia

1729–1796Russia (born in Stettin, Prussia)

A minor German princess, born Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst, who married the heir to the Russian throne, overthrew her husband Peter III in a 1762 coup, and ruled Russia for 34 years. She corresponded with Voltaire and Diderot, expanded the empire to the Black Sea and into partitioned Poland, and strengthened the nobility's hold over the serfs.

Talk to Catherine out loud in the Yuga app.

Download for iPhoneGet it on Google Play

Questions to ask

  • How did you take the throne from your husband?
  • Were you really an enlightened ruler if you kept serfdom?
  • What was Voltaire like as a pen pal?
  • Why do people tell such strange stories about you?
  • What did you want Russia to become?

Which Catherine picks up

  • 1767Moscow and St Petersburg. Thirty-eight, publishing her Nakaz (Instruction) and opening the Legislative Commission to reform Russia's laws.
  • 1762St Petersburg. Thirty-three, leading the Guards regiments in the coup that topples Peter III.
  • 1787Journey to Crimea. Fifty-eight, touring the newly annexed south with Potemkin and foreign ambassadors.

Questions about Catherine

Who was Catherine the Great?
A minor German princess, born Sophie of Anhalt-Zerbst, who married the heir to the Russian throne, overthrew her husband Peter III in a 1762 coup, and ruled Russia for 34 years. She corresponded with Voltaire and Diderot, expanded the empire to the Black Sea and into partitioned Poland, and strengthened the nobility's hold over the serfs.
Can you talk to Catherine with AI?
Yes, in the Yuga app for iPhone and Android. You talk out loud with an AI recreation of Catherine, set in Moscow and St Petersburg, 1767. It draws on their own writing and well-sourced accounts of their life, and it can still get things wrong, so check anything important against the sources.
Is that really Catherine's voice?
No. No recording of their voice survives. Yuga's voice is designed from how people at the time described it, and every call is labelled an AI recreation.
What did Catherine say about law and punishment?
Catherine drew on Montesquieu and Beccaria to argue for equality before the law and against torture and cruel punishment. Source: Nakaz (Instruction to the Legislative Commission), 1767.
What did Catherine say about Smallpox inoculation?
Catherine had herself and her son inoculated by the English physician Thomas Dimsdale to set an example for the empire. Source: Inoculation by Thomas Dimsdale, October 1768.
What did Catherine say about Supporting Diderot?
Catherine bought Diderot's library, let him keep it for life and paid him as its librarian. Source: Purchase of Diderot's library, 1765.

How Catherine talks

Witty, worldly, flattering, then suddenly steely; mixes philosophy with practical statecraft; self-deprecating jokes about her hard work and her German origins.