Do you know what a quadruple duel is? It is a duel involving four people: after the opponents face off, their seconds fight. The most famous quadruple duel in the Russian Empire was the one in which the celebrated poet, playwright, composer, and diplomat Alexander Griboyedov was involuntarily forced to shoot and was wounded. As usual, the cause of the dispute was a woman – the ballerina Avdotya Istomina, who drove many contemporaries crazy. Even Pushkin could not resist her: the poet dedicated several lines of the poem "Eugene Onegin" to the charming beauty:

“Brilliant, half-airy,

Obedient to the magic bow,

Surrounded by a crowd of nymphs,

Stands Istomina; she,

Touching the floor with one foot,

Slowly spins with the other,

And suddenly a jump, and suddenly she flies,

Flies like down from Aeolus’ breath;

Now she twists her waist, now unfolds it,

And with a quick foot strikes her other foot.”

In 1817, Griboyedov lived in St. Petersburg in the same apartment with his good friend Count Alexander Petrovich Zavadovsky, at Nevsky Prospect, 13/9, in the Chaplin house.

Griboyedov modeled his Prince Grigory on Zavadovsky:

A unique eccentric! He makes us die laughing!

A century with the English, all English mannerisms...

Alexander Zavadovsky was in love with Istomina, but she gave her heart to the Life Guards Cavalry Staff Captain Vasily Sheremetev. Once the couple quarreled. Sheremetev did not attend Avdotya’s performance, and the Russian diplomat and writer Alexander Griboyedov took advantage of this. After the performance, he approached Istomina backstage and invited her “for tea” to his friend’s place, where he himself was living at the time. Of course, this friend was Zavadovsky. The ballerina accepted Griboyedov’s invitation. Avdotya stayed at the chamberlain’s home for two days.

Istomina was considered a beauty and enjoyed great success with men. Soon Sheremetev decided to reconcile with his beloved but then learned about the possible infidelity of the fickle ballerina, and his mood changed. The offended staff captain turned to his friend, Guards Cornet and future Decembrist Alexander Yakubovich, for advice. Yakubovich declared that there was only one way out of the situation – a duel. When Sheremetev proposed a duel to Zavadovsky, the chamberlain’s friend Griboyedov said that he, in turn, was ready to accept a challenge from Yakubovich, whom he had disliked since university.

The duel took place on November 24, 1817, at Volkovo Field in St. Petersburg. The conditions of the duel were the harshest: the opponents fired from six steps. Sheremetev fired before his opponent could reach the barrier. The bullet tore off the edge of Zavadovsky’s coat collar. “Ah! il en voulait a ma vie... a la barriere!” – said the count (“Ah! He wanted to kill me... at the barrier!”). The seconds, foreseeing a bloody outcome, began to persuade the count to spare his opponent’s life. Zavadovsky was ready to yield to their pleas, intending only to wound Sheremetev; but the latter, forgetting all the rules of duel etiquette, shouted that Zavadovsky must kill him if he himself did not want to be killed sooner or later. The count’s return shot was fatal. Vasily Sheremetev received a mortal wound to the abdomen and died a day later. Yakubovich apologized to Griboyedov, suggesting postponing their duel to a more favorable time... It took place in Tiflis the following autumn.

Immediately after the duel, Zavadovsky left abroad and no longer claimed the ballerina’s hand, and his second was sent by the angry Alexander I to serve in a dragoon regiment in the Caucasus. Griboyedov was not punished.

In his service, Griboyedov often visited Tiflis. During one such visit, he met his old enemy Yakubovich, who was serving in that region. The duel that had been interrupted a year earlier was decided to be resumed. It was scheduled for October 23, 1818, near a ravine by the village of Kuki. Griboyedov’s second was his fellow officer named Amburger, and Yakubovich’s second was the diplomat Nikolay Muravyov. Griboyedov either missed or, according to other sources, fired into the air; his opponent hit Griboyedov in the little finger of his left hand. The injury was not very serious, but it nevertheless changed Griboyedov’s life. Historians believe that the duel and the wound greatly influenced the diplomat’s subsequent literary work.

The quadruple duel that entered history reminded of itself even after the writer’s death. On January 30, 1829, in Tehran, 34-year-old Griboyedov was torn apart by a mob of religious fanatics right inside the Russian embassy building. Along with him, 37 other diplomats died. The writer’s body was so disfigured that Griboyedov could only be identified by the little finger wounded in the duel.

The ballerina Avdotya Istomina, who changed the fate of at least four men, continued to shine on stage and enjoy success with admirers. When Nicholas I ascended the throne in 1825, she stopped receiving major roles. The tsar knew that the ballerina was the cause of the quadruple duel and disliked Istomina. Gradually, Avdotya’s popularity faded. The ballerina was able to arrange her personal life only after 40, finding happiness with her second husband, an actor. The family idyll did not last long: in 1848, Avdotya Istomina died of cholera at the age of 49.

Sources:

Shubinsky S.N. Historical Essays and Stories. St. Petersburg: M. Khan Printing House, 1869.

Fomichev S.A. Griboyedov in Petersburg

https://spb.aif.ru/culture/person/poet_s_prostrelennym_mizincem_kak_duel_izmenila_zhizn_griboedova