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eginning with Peter's children {cf. pp. 86-87), anc ' aboveall the consequences of his acquisition of Livonia andEstonia and his virtual protectorate of Courland, withtheir predominant German upper class (see map 5). 1The Baltic Germans began very badly with Biron(1690-1772), the Courlander favourite of the empressAnna (b. 1693, reigned 1730-40), a daughter of Peter'shalf-brother and by marriage duchess of Courland.Biron has earned for himself the reputation of the mostunpopular German in Russian history. Throughout thereign of Anna he headed the mainly German courtoligarchy which in most respects shamefully misgovernedRussia. He paid the penalty by twenty years' exile inSiberia. The emperor Peter III, a Holsteiner, paid anextremer penalty. His obsession for Holstein and Prussiacost him both his throne and his life (1762).The privileged position of the Baltic Germans withintheir home lands has been mentioned in a previouschapter (see p. 114). However sombre the record of theirrule there, in the empire at large they supplied a valuablenucleus of hard-working administrators, diplomats, andofficers. They had important influence at court, aboveall under Nicholas I. None were perhaps more loyal,or more bureaucratically conservative, servants of theRomanovs, but their loyalty was essentially dynastic.They rarely became russified, and they retained theirLutheran religion, their own distinct culture, and analoofness from, often a hostility to, many of the most potentcurrents in Russian life. This was also true of most ofthe numerous Germans who came from Germany proper.In consequence, Germans were the target of constantattack by various sections of Russian opinion, notably theSlavophils and the panslavs (cf. pp. 241, 245). Theaccusations made of their virtual monopoly of the higherposts in government service were exaggerated, but it wastrue that in proportion to their numbers the Germanswere very influential, whether from the Baltic provinces1The Duchy of Courland was a vassal of the kingdom of Poland, butfor the greater part of the eighteenth century was in effect a Russianprotectorate, until its definite incorporation in the empire in 1795 as aconsequence of the third partition of Poland.341