Tsar of Russia's great saga brought to life

The death of the Romanov dynasty helped mark the birth of modern Europe, but the personal story behind it is just as fascinating. The National Museum of Scotland is putting flesh on the bones of the tale this summer, with a major exhibition that looks at both the family's public and private life. Featuring more than 400 exhibits on loan from the famous State Hermitage Museum in St Petersburg, the show, called Nicholas and Alexandra, The Last Tsar and Tsarina, is exclusive to Edinburgh in the UK.

It represents a major coup for the museum. Maureen Barrie, co-curator, calls it "probably one of the most exciting major summer exhibitions National Museums of Scotland has undertaken. To be able to work with a museum like the State Hermitage gives NMS a fantastic opportunity to bring their world-renowned collections to Scotland on a grand scale."

In the hard, cold light of a St Petersburg spring, it is hard to take in the grand scale of the Hermitage. One of the largest museums in the world, it houses a staggering collection of art and antiquities. Originally built as a winter palace with space for the art collection of Catherine the Great, it was also home to Nicholas and his family before they were ousted by the Bolsheviks.

The exhibits on display at the Hermitage would make Aladdin's Cave seem like a hostel for the homeless. From ancient Egyptian sarcophagi, through 12th-century illuminated bestiaries, past a couple of Da Vincis and on to assorted Titians, Michelangelos and Rembrandts, the arc of human history can be followed through the collection.

Among the many rooms kept as they were since the last days of the Romanovs are the tsar's oak and red leather study lined with thousands of annotated books; the bedroom covered with religious icons in which he slept with the tsarina (granddaughter of Queen Victoria) and, scratched into one of the windows with a diamond ring, the autograph of Nicholas as a boy.

While the items on display at the Hermitage are astounding, they are only a fraction of the three million exhibits the museum holds. Backstage, hidden away in its unseen archives, labyrinthine corridors and a warren of dark store-rooms are more clues to the lives of Nicholas and Alexandra.

Packed in boxes and stacked on shelves are the minutiae that tell later generations of their daily routine, as well as documenting the big state occasions that punctuated their years. From fantastically ornate decorative eggs to plain summer dresses and lavish coronation menus, the last traces of Nicholas and Alexandra are preserved for posterity.

Behind the scenes at the Hermitage is a curious, parallel world that few know quite as well as Dr Viacheslav Federov. Head of the Russian department at the Hermitage, authority on the last tsar and the National Museums of Scotland's liaison contact for its exhibition, Federov has spent the past 30 years tending to the artefacts left by Russia's emperors.

The Russian state, especially during the Soviet era, was not always as keen as Federov on preserving remnants of the imperial past, but sometimes the Hermitage has operated by different laws. "The Hermitage is like a small state within Russia," explains Federov, in his tiny, book-filled office. "It is as though it has its own government and rules."

Along with Galina Printseva, who has dedicated 50 years of her life to the Hermitage, Federov has been working with NMS to decide which objects best illustrate the lives of the last tsar.

"Each of the artefacts coming to the exhibition have their own tale to tell and have a history that is tied in with Nicholas II and his family," explains Federov.

One of the most telling points to emerge through the exhibition is the difference between the personal lives of the tsar's family and their time in the royal court. "The court life was as luxurious as it needed to be, but Nicholas was interested in being among his family circle as much as possible," says Federov.

"Among the European courts, the Russian was the most luxurious," adds Printseva, "but in his private life Nicholas II lived relatively simply. He didn't live in the Winter Palace much. In winter he lived mostly in the Peterhoff Palace. Their rooms were not plain - but nor were they on a scale with, say, Louis XIV." These differences are highlighted in the exhibition by the contrast not just between Nicholas's official uniforms and the summer dresses worn by his children, but also between the uniforms Alexei, as heir to the throne, would have to wear compared with his sisters' informal dresses.

There is a cruel irony in the fact that Nicholas II should have been in power during one of the most turbulent periods of European history, when what he wanted most was a quiet family life. He became tsarevich - or heir to the throne - in 1881, when his grandfather Alexander II was assassinated. Nicholas survived a later assassination attempt on his own life in Japan. The bloodstained shirt he wore on the day is part of the exhibition. In the two decades of his reign, Russia lost one hugely embarrassing war to Japan and was drawn into the First World War despite the fact that Nicholas's cousin was the German emperor at the time.

One of the most interesting exhibits is an engraved cigar box that the tsar was going to present to Britain's King George V when he changed the family name from Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to the much less Teutonic Windsor. The workman made a spelling error engraving the box and it was never sent.

Alexander had close ties to the Windsors. Not only was his wife Queen Victoria's granddaughter, he was also Colonel in Chief of the Royal Scots Greys. Nevertheless, when he paid a low-key state visit to Balmoral, a special portico was erected at Ballater train station to protect him from snipers.

ONE OF THE MORE poignant exhibits coming to Edinburgh is a child's game called War In Europe. It belonged to Alexei, and while it predates the First World War, it is strange to think of the tsar's son moving pieces about the board while his countrymen were being killed in their tens of thousands on the real battlefields of Europe.

If there was trouble abroad, Alexander's domestic politics were no less torrid. His coronation festivities went sour when 1,300 people were crushed to death on the Khodinka field at a ceremony to give out celebratory presents to his subjects. Thousands more Russians were shot dead during Bloody Sunday - an event which saw the tsar give up absolute power and directly led to the Russian Revolution.

"Nicholas was not a strong monarch and he was not someone who could rule the country at such a difficult period," says Printseva. "At that time, Russia needed a very strong, influential and powerful person. Nicholas was not that man." His home life was not without its worries either. Alexei was haemophiliac, a condition passed down through the maternal side.

Alexandra blamed herself for her son's illness, and in seeking answers to alleviate her guilt, came under the baleful influence of Siberian monk and mystic Rasputin.

Even without much focus on Rasputin, the story of the last tsar and his family is a remarkable one. The events of that era still ripple through history, while the themes of familial love, guilt, duty and sacrifice are as relevant to any contemporary family as they were to Nicholas and Alexandra.

"There are elements of the story that we can all identify with," says Barrie. "The tsar and tsarina were an incredibly devoted couple who were very much involved with their children - unlike many of their contemporaries. But their failure to embrace change and recognise the crisis surrounding them became their downfall, and while sympathy fails here, given the suffering of the masses and the huge losses of Russian soldiers during the war, it is their tragic end that has made them such an enduring subject."

Nicholas and Alexandra, The Last Tsar and Tsarina is at The Royal Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh, July 14 until October 30