Peter Alexandrovich Saburov

Peter Alexandrovich Saburov (22 March O.S./3 April 1835 — 28 March O.S./10 April 1918) [His name is often given its French transliteration "Sabouroff" in contemporary references; hence "the Sabouroff Painter" of vases, named from a vase in Antikensammlung Berlin.] was a diplomat, collector of ancient Greek sculpture and antiquities, and a strong amateur chess player and patron of chess tournaments, as an honorary President of the St Petersburg Chess Club. [ [http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/saburovs.html The Saburovs by Edward Winter ] at www.chesshistory.com]

As the Tsarist Russian envoy to Greece, he assembled an outstanding collection of Ancient Greek sculpture, Tanagra figurines, painted vases and other Greek antiquities, which, at the end of his subsequent embassy to Berlin (1879-84) he then sold to the Antikensammlung Berlin, where the collection was catalogued by Adolf Furtwängler, [Furtwängler, "Die Sammlung Sabouroff: Kunstdenkmaler aus Griechenland.", 2 vols. (Berlin: Asher) 1883-1887; a French edition was also published.] who thereby established his reputation as a master of Greek terracottas, and where it occasioned an acute lack of space that spurred additional construction.. Among the prize works was the headless bronze of an "Apollo" or "Dionysus" found in the sea off the coast of Salamis. During his retirement in Saint Petersburg, the Hermitage Museum purchased part of the remainder of his collection, [ [http://ancientrome.ru/art/artworke/book/neverov/ac01.htm O. Neverov, "Antique Cameos" p. 57.] ] about 1909 [ [http://ancientrome.ru/art/artworken/img.htm?id=972 Chalcedony head of Severus Alexander, purchased 1909] .] including 233 molded terracotta statuettes, which he bought in the 1870s when treasure hunters had plundered the necropolis of ancient Tanagra (Boeotia). [ [http://www.hermitagemuseum.org/html_En/05/hm5_4_2_2_2.html The State Hermitage Museum: The Imperial Hermitage] ]

Saburov was born on the estate of Veryaevo in the district of Elatma in the Government of Taboff. His brother Andrei held for several years the portfolio of the Minister of Public Instruction. Petr Alexandrovich graduated from the Imperial Alexander Lyceum, St Petersburg, in 1854, gaining a first gold medal. After employment in the Chancellery (1857-59), he worked in Munich, and then in England, where he stayed for eleven years, moving in upper-class British society. In 1870 he went to Karlsruhe, and subsequently moved on to Athens, where he stayed until 1879. In the summer of 1879 he went to Constantinople, where he was appointed Russian Ambassador, although he never entered upon the official duties. Then he was posted to Berlin (1880-1884), which involved him at the center of the secret negotiations that led to the unpublished pact, the League of the Three Emperors. [J.Y. Simpson, "The Saburov Memoirs, or Bismarck & Russia: Being fresh Light on the League of the Three Emerors 1881" (Cambridge University Press, 1929) translated, with the cooperation of Saburov's son, Peter Petrovich, Saburov's "Ma Mission à Berlin 1879-1884", filled out with a review of his career.] In 1884 he left the diplomatic service and returned to Saint Petersburg.

During the last decade of the century he became well known as a financial and economic advisor. He listed his pastimes as pomiculture, architecture, the piano and chess. His son Alexander Saburov, the former Civil Governor of St. Petersburg, was arrested by the Bolsheviks in Moscow in 1918 and shot in 1919. In the early stages of the Russian Revolution, Saburov was a senator but was dismissed upon the accession of the Bolsheviks. Following a short illness he died in Petrograd.

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External links

* [http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/extra/saburovs.html (Chess History): Edward Winter, "The Saburovs"]