Count Fyodor Alexeevich Golovin (Russian: Фёдор Алексеевич Головин; 1650 – 10 Aug [O.S. 30 July] 1706) was the last Russian boyar and the first Russian chancellor. In addition to his political roles, he held the military ranks of field marshal and general admiral (1700), mainly during the reign of Peter the Great.^[1]

Golovin was descended from a family of Russian treasurers of Byzantine Greek descent.^[2]

During the regency of Sophia Alekseyevna, the sister of Peter the Great, Golovin was sent to the Amur to defend the new fortress of Albazin against the Qing Empire of China. In 1689, he served as the Tsardom of Russia's representative in signing the Treaty of Nerchinsk with the Qing Empire. Under the treaty, the Amur River territory, up to its tributary the Gorbitsa, was ceded back to China due to the Tsardom's inability to effectively defend it.^[3]

Golovin occupied second place in Peter the Great's Grand Embassy to the West in 1697, immediately after Franz Lefort. It was his duty to hire foreign sailors and obtain everything necessary for the construction and complete equipment of a fleet. Upon Lefort's death, in March 1699, he succeeded him as Field Marshal, and during that same year, he was granted the title of the first Russian count. He was also the first person to be decorated with the newly instituted Russian Order of St. Andrew.^[3]

The conduct of foreign affairs was entrusted to him in 1699, and from then until his death, he was the premier minister of the tsar.^{[citation needed]} Golovin's first achievement as foreign minister was to add to the Treaty of Karlowitz, by which peace with the Ottoman Empire had only been secured for three years, through the forging of a new treaty at Constantinople, on 13 June 1700. In the treaty, the term of Russian-Ottoman peace was extended to 30 years, and the Azov district and a strip of territory extending into Kuban were seceded to Russia. Golovin also managed the activities of the new Russian diplomats at foreign courts with great skill.^[3]

Golovin died on 10 Aug [O.S. 30 July] 1706, on the road from Moscow to Kiev. His remains were delivered to the Simonov monastery.^[4] Historian R. N. Bain claims his death was an irreparable loss to the tsar, who wrote that "Peter was filled with grief" at the news of his death.^[3]

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Bain, Robert Nisbet (1911). "Golovin, Fedor Aleksyeevich". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 12 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 226.
• Bushkovitch, Paul, A Concise History of Russia. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012.