In the Russian Empire, Imperial Russian Guard units ("Leib-Guards", лейб-гвардия, leyb-gvardiya), derived from German 'Leibwächter' (body-guards), were intended to ensure the security of the sovereign, initially, that of Peter the Great in the 1690s. These were based on the Prussian Royal Life Guards. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Imperial Guards consisted of 13 infantry, 4 rifles and 14 cavalry regiments and a few other support units, they were abolished in 1918.
The Imperial Russian Guard units were not exclusively composed of Russian troops, they also included Lithuanian, Finnish and Ukrainian personnel.
Read more about this topic: Russian Guards
Famous quotes containing the words imperial, russian and/or guard:
“The imperial votaress passed on,
In maiden meditation, fancy-free.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“We are all dead men on leave.”
—Eugene Leviné, Russian Jew, friend of Rosa Luxemburg’s lover, Jogiches. quoted in Men in Dark Times, “Rosa Luxemburg: 1871-1919,” sct. 3, Hannah Arendt (1968)
“Let us guard against saying that there are laws in nature. There are merely necessities: there is no one who commands, no one who obeys, no one who transgresses. Once you understand that there are no purposes, then you also understand that nothing is accidental: for it is only in a world of purposes that the word “accident” makes sense.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)