Princess Tarakanova

She styled herself, among other names, Knyazhna Yelizaveta Vladimirskaya (Princess Elizabeth of Vladimir), Fräulein Frank, and Madame Trémouille.

Tarakanova (tarakan is the Russian word for cockroach) is a later name, used only in entertainment (literature, theater, films, paintings), apparently on the basis of her relatives (from her father prince Razumovsky's side) being the owners of the estate Daraganovka (Tarakanovka) in Ukraine - the place where she (apparently) grew up.

Tarakanova claimed to be the daughter of Alexei Razumovsky and Empress Elizabeth of Russia, reared in Saint Petersburg.

She is known to have traveled to several cities in Western Europe, and to have become a mistress of Count Philipp Ferdinand of Limburg Stirum, apparently in the hope that he would marry her.

She eventually was arrested in Livorno, Tuscany by Alexei Grigoryevich Orlov, who had been sent by Empress Catherine II to retrieve her.

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