Rumiantsev, Nikolai Petrovich

(also Nikolay Petrovich Rumyantsev). Born Apr. 3(14), 1754, in St. Petersburg; died there Jan. 3 (15), 1826. Russian statesman and diplomat; count. Son of P. A. Rumiantsev-Zadunaiskii.

From 1776 to 1795, Rumiantsev served at court and in the diplomatic service. In 1801 he became a member of the State Council and a senator. From 1807 to 1814 he was foreign minister, and 1810 to 1812 chairman of the State Council. Until the Patriotic War of 1812 he advocated close relations with France. In 1814 he retired.

Rumiantsev amassed a huge library, which in 1925 served as the basis for the Lenin State Library of the USSR. His collection of manuscripts and ethnographic and numismatic materials is preserved in the Rumiantsev Museum. Rumiantsev subsidized the activities of a circle of scholars that included the historians and students of early texts E. Bolkhovitinov, A. Kh. Vostokov, K. F. Kalaidovich, and P. M. Stroev. He collected documents and materials on the history of Russia at home, as well as from the archives and libraries of Germany, Italy, France, Sweden, and other countries. Rumiantsev sponsored the publication of Ancient Russian Poems: Collected by Kirsha Danilov (1818, two editions), Monuments of 12th-Century Russian Literature (1821), and The Byelorussian Archive of Old Documents (1824). Rumiantsev was an honorary member of many academies and learned societies.