# Canonical recap data for Stalin's Great Purge Begins (1936)
# Source: https://recap.at/1936/great-purge
# Format: YAML 1.2 (UTF-8). Generated at request time.
slug: great-purge
canonicalUrl: "https://recap.at/1936/great-purge"
title: Stalin's Great Purge Begins
subtitle: Stalin's campaign of terror executed thousands of Communist Party officials, military officers, and intellectuals, consolidating totalitarian control through mass violence.
recapType: global_event
eventStatus: concluded
startDate: 1936-08-01
datePrecision: month
year: 1936
decade: 1930
country:
name: Soviet Union
slug: soviet-union
summaryShort: "The Great Purge or Great Terror, also known as the Year of '37 and the Yezhovshchina, was a political purge in the Soviet Union from 1936 to 1938. After the assassination of Sergei Kirov by Leonid Nikolaev in 1934, Joseph Stalin launched a series of show trials known as the Moscow trials to remove suspected dissenters "
summaryLong: The Great Purge or Great Terror, also known as the Year of '37 and the Yezhovshchina, was a political purge in the Soviet Union from 1936 to 1938. After the assassination of Sergei Kirov by Leonid Nikolaev in 1934, Joseph Stalin launched a series of show trials known as the Moscow trials to remove suspected dissenters from the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The term "great purge" was popularized by historian Robert Conquest in his 1968 book, The Great Terror, whose title alluded to the French Revolution's Reign of Terror.
heroImageUrl: "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f5/Vinnycia16.jpg/1280px-Vinnycia16.jpg"
heroImageCredit: Wikipedia · "Great Purge"
importance: 83
sourceConfidence: 75
keyFacts: []
timeline: []
sources:
- url: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge"
  title: Stalin's Great Purge
  provider: Wikipedia
related: []
categories:
- disaster
- war
metaDescription: The Great Purge or Great Terror, also known as the Year of '37 and the Yezhovshchina, was a political purge in the Soviet Union from 1936 to 1938. After the ass
wikidataQid: Q187650
archiveSnapshots:
- url: "https://web.archive.org/web/20260628031846/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge"
  capturedAt: 2026-06-28
  label: Stalin's Great Purge
  originalUrl: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge"
