Peter I the Great or Pyotr Alexeyevich Romanov (Пётр Алексе́евич Рома́нов, Пётр I, Pyotr I, or Пётр Вели́кий, Pyotr Velikiy) ( - ) ruled the Russian Empire from until his death, jointly ruling before 1696 with his weak and sickly half-brother, Ivan V. Peter carried out a policy of Westernization and expansion that transformed the Tsardom of Russia into the Russian Empire, a major European power.