Yelizaveta Alekseyevna Tarakanova

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An 1864 painting by Konstantin Flavitsky depicts the legend that Tarakanova was killed by a 1777 flood. In reality, she had died in 1775.

Yelizaveta Alekseyevna Tarakanova (1753 – December 15 [O.S. December 4] 1775), was a pretender to the Russian throne who also styled herself Knyaginya Vladimirskaya (Princess of Vladimir), Fräulein Frank or Madame Trémouille.

She claimed to be the daughter of Aleksey Grigorievich Razumovsky and Elizabeth of Russia, reared in St. Petersburg. Even her place of birth, however, is not certain, and her real name is not known. She is known to have traveled to several cities in western Europe.

She was eventually arrested in Livorno by Aleksei Grigoryevich Orlov, who had been sent by the Empress Catherine to seduce and retrieve her, and brought to Russia in February of 1775. She was imprisoned in the Peter and Paul Fortress, where she died of tuberculosis that December.

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