Portrait of Nikolai Martemyanovich Sipyagin

The picture is a chest portrait of Major General Nikolai Martemyanovich Sipyagin from the Military Gallery of the Winter Palace ^[1] .

Since the beginning of the Patriotic War of 1812, Captain Sipyagin was listed in the Life Guards Semyonovsky Regiment , was an adjutant wing and was under the Grand Duke Konstantin Pavlovich , and then under P.I. Bagration . He was in many of the main battles of the campaign of 1812, in the battle near Krasny he commanded a separate detachment, for numerous military distinctions he was awarded the Order of St. George of the 4th class and promoted to colonel . During the Overseas Campaign of 1813, he carried out diplomatic missions and coordinated cooperation with the Austrian forces on the territory of the Grand Duchy of Warsaw , and since May he was chief of staff of the reserve troops, for the difference in battles near Dresden and Kulm he was promoted to major general . In the campaign of 1814 in France, he commanded a separate flying detachment and was awarded the Order of St. George of the 3rd class for military distinctions and was appointed adjutant general ^[2] .

Depicted in the adjutant-general uniform, introduced in 1815, with the monogram of Emperor Alexander I on epaulettes. On the left on the chest is a star of the Order of St. Anne of the 1st degree and a general adjutant aiguille ; on the neck there is a cross of the Order of St. George of the 3rd class; on board the uniform cross of the Swedish Military Order of the Sword 1st degree; a silver medal “In memory of the Patriotic War of 1812” on the St. Andrew’s ribbon , a bronze noble medal “In memory of the Patriotic War of 1812” on the Vladimir ribbon , crosses of the French Order of St. Louis , the Austrian Military Order of Maria Theresa , an unidentified foreign order (possibly confused tape - yellow instead of red displayed - and this award is a British Order of the Bath ; EP Rennes this Order mistakenly identifies as the Prussian Order of the Red eagle 2 nd degree) and the Bavarian Military Order Maximilian Josef third degree, as well as the Swedish star of the Military Order of the Sword , 1 st degree and Kulm Cross . On the back of the painting are inscriptions: Sipiagin and Geo Dawe RA pinx ^{t [3]} . Signature on the frame: N. M. Sipyagin, General Mayor . The artist mistakenly did not depict the cervical cross of the Order of St. Vladimir of the 3rd degree, with which Sipyagin was awarded in 1813 ^[4] .

On August 7, 1820 Sipyagin was included in the list of “generals whose service does not belong before the consideration of the Committee” and on May 19, 1822, Emperor Alexander I ordered his portrait to be painted. At this time, Sipyagin was the head of the 6th Infantry Division and was constantly in Morshansk . On July 29, 1822, he wrote to the Inspectorate Department of the War Ministry : “if the circumstances of the service allow me to come to St. Petersburg next winter and I will get a vacation, I will not leave to notify the painter Dove from me . ” It is known that Sipyagin came to the capital in early December 1824, then he met with the artist, but the Dow fee was paid a year earlier - on April 25 and November 27, 1823. The portrait does not have diamond signs of the Order of St. Anne of the 1st degree, which Sipyagin was granted on December 12, 1824, respectively, the portrait dates from the first decade of December. The portrait entered the Hermitage on September 7, 1825 ^[5] .

In the 1840s, a lithography was published in the book “Emperor Alexander I and His Companions” and subsequently reproduced several times in the workshop of I. P. Pesotsky based on a drawing by I. A. Klyukvin from a gallery portrait ^[6] . As part of the circulation, another lithography of Pesotsky’s workshop was printed, based on a drawing by an unknown artist with signed initials “N. M. "

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  Variant of the portrait, executed in 1827. hermitage Museum

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  Engraving by G. Dow from a portrait of 1827. Museum-Estate Ostafyevo

The Hermitage funds contain another version of the portrait of Sipyagin by Dow (oil on canvas, 126 × 98.5 cm, inventory number GE 9475) ^[7] . On it Sipyagin is depicted in a generational fashion, a fur cloak is thrown over his shoulder, against the backdrop of a hilly landscape, white houses or army tents are visible on the lower right, below which the author's signature: painted by Geo Dawe RA . This variant was probably executed at the end of 1827, when Sipyagin was the military governor of Tiflis and came to St. Petersburg on the occasion of his 2nd degree Order of St. Vladimir , whose star and neck cross are depicted in the portrait. Compared with the gallery portrait, the following awards are also added: neck crosses of the Prussian orders of the Red Eagle of the 2nd degree and Pur le Merit, as well as of the Austrian Order of Leopold of the 2nd degree (the last two on board the uniform), in the buttonhole is the breast cross of the British Order of the Bath .

The circumstances of the creation and the history of this portrait have not been established. He was probably in one of the private collections in St. Petersburg , after the October Revolution, he was nationalized and entered the State Museum Fund, from where in 1923 he was transferred to the Hermitage through the Department of Artistic Values. In the late 1920s, the painting was supposed to be sold abroad , since 1929 it was listed in Gostorg and was transferred to the Antiques office ^[8] . In "Antiques" it was listed as the work of "Dau" under the name "Portrait of a Military Man." However, the sale did not take place and the painting was returned to the Hermitage; adopted by act of October 16, 1931 with an estimated value of 300 rubles ^[9] .

In the late 1820s, in London , the engraved version of the portrait was engraved by G. Dow ^[10] . One of the preserved prints of this engraving is in the collection of the Ostafyevo Museum-Estate “Russian Parnas” (paper, mezzo-tinto , 53 × 37 cm, inventory number Gr 1537, mistakenly attributed to Thomas Wright ) ^[11] .

• State Hermitage Museum. Museum sales of 1928-1929: Archival documents / Comp. E. Yu. Solomakha. - SPb. : Publishing House of the State Hermitage Museum, 2006. - 532 p. - ISBN 5-93572-115-5 .
• Mikhailovsky-Danilevsky A.I. Emperor Alexander I and his associates in 1812, 1813, 1814, 1815. Military Gallery of the Winter Palace. - SPb. : In the printing house of Karl Kraj, 1847. - T. 3.
• Podmazo A. A. Images of the heroes of the Patriotic War of 1812: Military Gallery of the Winter Palace. - M .: Russian Knights, 2013 .-- 864 p. - ISBN 978-5-903389-62-9 .
• Renne E.P. State Hermitage Museum. British painting of the 16th — 19th centuries: Collection Catalog. - SPb. : Publishing House of the State Hermitage Museum, 2009. - 416 p. - ISBN 978-5-93572-376-7 .
• Rovinsky D.A. Detailed Dictionary of Russian Engraved Portraits. Edition with 700 phototype portraits. - SPb. : Printing House of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, 1888. - T. III: P — Ѳ.
• Dictionary of Russian generals, participants in the hostilities against the army of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1812-1815. // Russian archive. The history of the Fatherland in the evidence and documents of the XVIII — XX centuries. : Collection. - M .: TRITE studio N. Mikhalkova , 1996. - T. VII . - S. 555–556 . - ISSN 0869-20011 . (Comm. A. A. Podmazo )