32 Russian Expansion under Catherine the Great
any case, the commission had not intended to protect Russian mer-
chants by the formation of such a company but rather wanted it to
be open to anyone who wished to join.^16
Catherine hoped that increased Russian involvement in Iran's north-
ern marches would benefit all concerned. To the inhabitants of these
provinces, Russia would offer the advantages of an enlightened state
of laws. She believed this would be a marked advance over what she
perceived as a cycle of usurpation, tyranny, and civil war in post-Sa-
favi Iran. She was confident that the "example of this country's gen-
tle proprietorship" would make the inhabitants of the region seek
Russian overlordship.
17
The tsaritsa believed that Iran sorely needed
the benevolent rule she offered. Like Raynal, she considered Iran a
potentially wealthy country that had suffered from the depredations
of "the greedy plunderers," such as Aqa Mohammad, who ruled it.^18
His brutal misrule and interference with Russian commerce had to be
ended. Russia would then ensure stable government and personal
security; the revival of commerce and prosperity would follow. That
would provide Russia with a golden opportunity to become the new
master of Europe's Asian trade. As Catherine explained to General
Valerian Zubov (Platon's younger brother), whom she sent to establish
Russian hegemony over Iran in 1796:
The establishment of peace and order in Persia will open to us rich markets not
only along the shores of the Caspian Sea but within the borders of the Persian
provinces. By means of the latter it would be easily possible to open the routes
to India and, attracting this very rich commerce toward us by much shorter
routes than those which all the European nations follow, going around the Cape
of Good Hope, it will be possible to turn to our benefit all the advantages being
obtained by the Europeans.^19
Such hopes were widely shared among the Russian elite. Naturally
the Zubov brothers' expectations about Russia's commercial pros-
pects resembled Catherine's. There was widespread enthusiasm among
the St. Petersburg aristocracy for the 1796 expedition and the econ-
omic gains that were expected to follow. Gabriel Derzhavin, the lead-
ing Russian poet of the age, expressed the prevailing mood in a poem
celebrating Valerian Zubov's capture of Derbent. He compared the
victory to the triumph of Alexander the Great over Darius and added:
Oh happiness! See already thronging to us
Elephants, laden with riches,
Covered with carpets from India!
Throngs of people!
Silver and gold flow like beneficient rain from heaven!^20