Iakov Ivanovich Bulgakov

He was born into the family of the secretary of the Preobrazhensky Prikaz (Chancellery). He studied at the gymnasium of Moscow University (1755); after graduation (1759) he entered the University. In 1760-1761 in the magazine 'Useful Amusement' he published a number of prose translations from Latin and French, as a beginner. In 1761 he joined the Collegium of Foreign Affairs. He worked as an interpreter under plenipotentiary minister in Poland, Nikolai Repnin (1763), then as a secretary (1764) and advisor (1768) at the Russian Embassy in Warsaw, as ambassador extraordinary in Constantinople (1781), as ambassador in Warsaw (1790). After Paul I ascended the throne, he was appointed governor of Vilna and Kovno. He translated Matteo Maria Boiardo's poem "Roland in Love" (“Vliublennyi Roland”) (1777-1778, 2nd edition 1799) into prose from the French prose translation by Alain-René Lesage. After the 1770s he was involved in translating Abbé de la Porte's “The World Traveler” (“Vsemirnyi puteshestvovatel”) (1778-1794, 2nd ed. 1780-1786, 3rd ed. 1800-1816). He wrote in French "Mémoire sur la révolution de Pologne" (1792), translated into Russian under the title “Zapiski o nyneshnem vozmushchenii Polshi” (1792). He made a translation of Michel François Dandre-Bardon's work "Customs of ancient peoples" (“Obrazovanie drevnikh narodov”) (1795-1796) by order of Catherine II.