The Slavic name “Rostislav” (from “growth” and “glory”) is one of the traditional names of ships of the Russian fleet. Three centuries later, justifying itself, this name-motto passed through our maritime history. Its glory was created by the 66-gun Baltic ship - one of the main participants in the extermination of the Turkish fleet at Chesma in 1770, the 100-gun flagship S.K. Greig in the Battle of Gogland in 1786, 84-gun participant in the Sinop victory P.S. Nakhimov in 1853. Their name and traditions were inherited by the fourth, the already armored “Rostislav”. A difficult age fell upon him; his path in history turned out to be very different from his sailing predecessors. But he did not tarnish the honor of his name. “Rostislav” is a ship of a new type in the Russian armored fleet and, in many ways, of an unusual fate. Single in design, it became a model for borrowing a number of technical solutions adopted on it in the projects of other ships. Dropped from all types of classification, it prompted shipbuilders to switch to serial construction of armored ships. Created for the closed Black Sea basin, “Rostislav” turned out to be the only one of the local battleships that visited the threshold of the Mediterranean, representing the interests of the Russian Empire.