CW: Poverty, Child Death, War, Xenophobia, Murder (Poison, Stabbing, Gun Violence, Physical Beatings)
This time we are venturing into Russia, where Rasputin left a mark on the governance and the still-lingering legacy of being a so-called love machine. He was shot! He was poisoned! He was absolutely harangued! Or… was he?
First thing’s first, let’s get some pictures out of the way so you can have a clear idea of what we’re talking about here.
This is Rasputin. 
And this is Pokrovskoye where he was born. 
This is Rasputin with his family. 
Once Rasputin made his way to Moscow, his was a fascination of the upper class women and ended up in large groups of ladies like this. What earned him the reputation as a sex god, though he wasn’t. 
Eventually, he went to work for Czar Nikolas Romonov and gained a lot of influence with the Romonov family. 
He had so much influence with the Romonov family that they started making these political cartoons of his with them as a puppet master. 
When the plot to assassinate him kicked off, he was brought to this very posh cellar where he was attacked.
This Time article looks at some of the myths of Rasputin that have persisted over time. There are five of them on this list.
If you’re able to read Medium article, or if you’re willing to use a service like 12ft.io, then this one goes into even more myths versus facts. There’s 10 of them on this list.
This is a great article from the Smithsonian Magazine. It contains a lot of quotes from books written by historians about Rasputin’s rise to power, there are video links in here to video essays, links to those books, and just generally a lot of great info about his rise to power and murder.
If you ant an account of his death from the man who killed him, read Lost Splendor: The Amazing Memoirs of the Man Who Killed Rasputin by Prince Felix Youssoupoff.
Now, this is a forensic examination of the post-mortem photos and findings on Rasputin’s bodies. This is from the journal of Forensic Science, Medicine, and Pathology. It really shows a vastly different tale than the one told by the guy who killed Rasputin.
And just for a fun bonus, here is a book written by Rasputin’s daughter Maria, who was a really interesting person herself. In this book, she refutes a lot of the claims made by Prince Felix Youssoupoff about his murder of her father.
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