Ivan the Terrible

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Ivan IV, icon, late 16th century; in the National Museum, Copenhagen. (credit: Courtesy of the Nationalmuseet, Copenhagen)

(born Aug. 25, 1530, Kolomenskoye, near Moscow — died March 18, 1584, Moscow) Grand prince of Moscow (1533 – 84) and first tsar of Russia (1547 – 84). Crowned tsar in 1547 after a long regency (1533 – 46), he embarked on wide-ranging reforms, including a centralized administration, church councils that systematized the church's affairs, and the first national assembly (1549). He also instituted reforms to limit the powers of the boyars. After conquering Kazan (1552) and Astrakhan (1556), he engaged in an unsuccessful war to control Livonia, fighting against Sweden and Poland (1558 – 83). After the defeat and the suspected treason of several Russian boyars, Ivan formed an oprichnina, a territory separate from the rest of the state and under his personal control. With a large bodyguard, he withdrew into his own entourage and left Russia's management to others. At the same time, he instituted a reign of terror, executing thousands of boyars and ravaging the city of Novgorod. During the 1570s he married five wives in nine years, and, in a fit of rage, he murdered his son Ivan, his only viable heir, in 1581.

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Ivan IV ‘the Terrible’, Tsar of Russia (1530-84). Ivan ‘Grozny’ was the first Russian ruler to take the title tsar (from Caesar). Grozny means ‘terrible’ or ‘awesome’ and he deserved that title more. He became prince of Muscovy at the age of 3 on the death of his father and grew up under the guardianship of the boyars (nobles) who were not anxious to have a strong ruler. It was a time of intrigue and constant danger which moulded his ruthless and suspicious nature. It took him 30 years, but by a process first of tactical alliances and then by physical elimination he gradually won absolute personal power, cemented with the creation of the black-clad Oprichnina, a private army or secret police force whose members owed everything to Ivan and could be relied on to conduct a reign of terror against the boyars.

Ivan's military and foreign policy had two main goals: continuation of the struggle against the Mongol Golden Horde, whose yoke Russia had shaken off in 1480, but who remained a threat, and access to the Baltic Sea. In 1552 he captured the Tartar city of Kazan and in 1556 Astrakhan. The Crimean Tartars repaid the favour by burning Moscow in 1571. His campaigns in the west during the Livonian war (1558-83) were less successful and ended in defeat and renewed isolation from the West.

Ivan's armies were split into five corps, or polk (‘regiments’): the main body (bolʿshoy), left and right flanking (levy and pravy), the advance guard (peredovoi), which also provided scouts and forces for pursuit, and the rearguard (zasadny), each commanded by a high-ranking boyar who had an Ivan loyalist and more professional lieutenant general to advise him. For fighting on the steppe, the Russians devised the gulai-gorod or ‘running castle’—a wagon fort akin to the one made famous by the Hussites.

Ivan was particularly interested in artillery, possibly because it was the only system that outranged the powerful Tartar composite bows, and enjoyed watching firepower demonstrations in which earth bunkers were flattened to see what his gunners could do. Foreign observers were greatly impressed with Ivan's firepower. During his reign the body of the strelsty or musketeers was created and the artillery chancellery was extant by 1581.

Bibliography

• Berry, Lloyd, and Crummey, Robert, Rude and Barbarous Kingdom: Russia in the Accounts of 16th Century English Voyagers (Madison, Wisc. 1968).
• Yanov, Alexander, The Origins of Autocracy: Ivan the Terrible in Russian History (Berkeley, 1981)

— Christopher Bellamy

Opera in four acts by Bizet to a libretto by F. H. Leroy and H. Trianon, completed in 1865.

Ivan IV (1530-1584), known as Ivan the Terrible, was the first Russian sovereign to be crowned czar and to hold czar as his official title in addition to the traditional title of grand duke of Moscow.

The reign of Ivan IV was the culmination of Russian historical developments that began with the rise of Moscow in the early 14th century. The results of these developments were the growth of a unified centralized state governed by an autocracy and the formation of a dominant class of serving gentry, the pomeshchiki.

Very little is actually known about Ivan. None of his papers, notes, or correspondence has survived. It is not possible to establish a precise chronology or to give a trustworthy factual account of Ivan's personal life. There are whole successions of years without a single reference to Ivan himself. All that is possible under these circumstances is to make surmises that are more or less in accord with the evidence of the scanty material that has survived.

One of the biggest stumbling blocks to contemporary students of Russian history in understanding Ivan is the epithet accorded him - "the Terrible" or "the Dread." This epithet indicates sadistic and irrational traits in his character, and there is sufficient evidence to make Ivan's reign a study in abnormal psychology. It is said that as a boy he took delight in throwing young animals to their death from high rooftops. He also formed the habit of robbing and beating the people of his capital. There is also the terrible event in 1581, when Ivan, in a fit of anger, lashed out at his 27-year-old son, Ivan Ivanovich, and struck him dead with an iron-pointed staff.

It would, therefore, be foolish to argue that the personality of Ivan IV is irrelevant to an understanding of his reign. It has been shown, in fact, that there was a very real cause for the monstrous aspects of Ivan's personality. A contemporary study of Ivan's skeleton showed that he must have suffered horribly for many years from osteophytes, which virtually fused his spine.

Regency Period

Ivan was born on Aug. 25, 1530, in Moscow. His father was Basil III and his mother Helen Glinsky, a Russian of Lithuanian origin. Ivan was only 3 years old when his father died in 1533. His mother became regent, and the throne rapidly degenerated into a center of wild violence, intrigue, and denunciation as rival boyar families disputed the Glinksy regency. At times they brought their feuds into the Kremlin itself.

Evidence indicates that Ivan was a sensitive, intelligent boy with a remarkably quick and intuitive mind. He became quite aware of all the intrigues around him and of the precariousness of his own position. He was neglected and at times treated with scorn. Apparently, he was even short of food and clothes. This environment, therefore, nourished a hatred for the boyars that revealed itself in Ivan's later policies toward them.

Early Rule

In 1538 Glinsky died suddenly, and years of strife and misrule ensued. In 1547, however, Ivan decided, much to the astonishment of those around him, to be crowned, not as grand prince, but as czar (God's anointed). In the same year Ivan married Anastasia Romanov. The marriage seems to have been a happy one, and when Anastasia died in 1560, deep grief overcame Ivan. Although he married four more times, he was never able to recapture the happiness he had enjoyed with Anastasia.

In 1547 Ivan also appointed the Selected Council, largely dominated by men of modest social standing. He allowed himself to be both directed and restrained by this Council, even agreeing to do nothing without its approval. The period following the Council's creation is generally considered the constructive period of Ivan's reign.

In 1550 Ivan called the first of two zemskii sobors (consultative assemblies) to meet during his reign. Although knowledge of the assemblies is fragmentary (some historians even deny that there was an assembly in 1550), they appear not to have been elected but appointed by Ivan himself and to have served in a purely advisory capacity. Approval was given, however, to several of Ivan's projected reforms. In 1552 a reform in local government was instituted. In those areas where the local population could guarantee a fixed amount of state dues to the treasury, officials elected from and by the local inhabitants were given the right to collect taxes in lieu of the old governors, who were abolished in such areas.

The Law Code of 1550 was another important reform of the early part of Ivan's reign. It was concerned primarily with discouraging the use of customary law in the courts, and it introduced the principle of statutory law.

Ivan, a devout churchman, called a church council in 1551. Among other matters, the council considered liturgical questions and passed reforms which tightened and perfected the organization of the Church. Ivan was also concerned with standardizing and organizing the responsibilities and duties of the service class. In 1556 he issued a decree which provided new regulations concerning the length, nature, and form of service which a member of the nobility was expected to render.

Foreign Policy

Among Ivan's military accomplishments was the destruction of the Tatar khanates of Kazan in 1552 and Astrakhan in 1556. Thus, of the three Tatar states in the region of Russia, only the Crimean Tatars remained unconquered by Muscovy. With the addition of Kazan and Astrakhan, Muscovy now extended to the Urals in the east and to the Caspian Sea in the south. Russia also began its expansion to the east beyond the Urals at this time and before Ivan's death had established itself in Siberia. Ivan's ambition to restore to Muscovy the western territories which had been annexed by Lithuania in the 16th century, however, was unrealized.

Another of Ivan's ambitions, contact with the West, was achieved. In 1553 an English sea captain, Richard Chancellor, landed on the Russian shore near the mouth of the Northern Dvina River and made his way to Moscow. Upon his return to England, Chancellor became one of the founders of the Muscovy Company, to which Ivan gave special trade privileges. Although traders of other nations, Dutch and French, began to appear, the English dominated the Russian trade with centers in many Russian towns.

Later Years

Despite governmental improvements at home and successes abroad, the constructive or early period of Ivan's rule was not to endure. He broke with his Selected Council, turned against many of his former advisers, and introduced a reign of terror against the boyars. The major turning point came in 1560, when Anastasia died quite suddenly. Convinced that his advisers, backed by the boyars, had caused her death, Ivan condemned them and turned against the nobility. In 1564 he abandoned Moscow. What his intentions were is not clear, although he threatened to abdicate and denounced the boyars for their greed and treachery. Confused and frightened, the people of Moscow begged the Czar to return and rule over them. His eventual agreement to return was dependent upon two basic conditions: the creation of a territorial and political subdivision - the oprichnina - to be managed entirely at the discretion of the Czar; and Ivan's right to punish traitors and wrongdoers, executing them when necessary and confiscating their possessions.

The area encompassed by the oprichnina was a large one, constituting about one-half of the existing Muscovite state. It also included most of the wealthy towns, trading routes, and cultivated areas and was, therefore, a stronghold of wealthy old boyar families. Ivan's establishment of his rule over the area necessarily involved, then, displacement (and destruction) of the major boyar families in Russia. This task fell to his special bodyguards, a select group known as the oprichniki.

In 1584 Ivan's health began to fail. As portents of death came to obsess him, he called on witches and soothsayers to aid him, but to no avail. The end came on March 18, 1584. In a final testament he willed his kingdom to Feodor, his oldest surviving son. Although the transition from Ivan to Feodor was relatively easy and quiet, Muscovy itself was, according to most observers, on the verge of anarchy.

Further Reading

There are several biographies of Ivan in English. The best is probably K. Waliszewski, Ivan the Terrible (trans. 1904). Robert Wipper justifies Ivan's actions in Ivan Grozny (trans., 3d ed. 1947). Other biographies include Stephen Graham, Ivan the Terrible: Life of Ivan IV of Russia (1933), and A. M. Kurbsky, Prince A. M. Kurbsky's History of Ivan IV, edited and translated by J. L. I. Fennell (1965). For a vivid self-portrait of Ivan as well as a justification of his actions see The Correspondence between Prince A. M. Kurbsky and Tsar Ivan IV of Russia, 1564-79, edited and translated by J. L. I. Fennell (1955). A contemporary account of Ivan's Russia is Giles Fletcher, Of the Rus Commonwealth, edited by Albert J. Schmidt (1966). British trade with Russia can be studied in T. S. Willan, The Early History of the Russia Company, 1553-1603 (1956).

Ivan the Terrible (orig. Russ. title Ivan Grozny).Ballet in two acts with choreography by Grigorovich, music by Prokofiev (taken from Eisenstein's film of the same title, with excerpts from his 3rd Symphony and Alexander Nevsky, arr. by M. Chulaki), and design by Simon Virsaladze. Premiered by the Bolshoi Ballet, Moscow 20 Feb. 1975 with Vladimirov, Bessmertnova, and B. Akimov. It is essentially a portrait of the controversial personality of Ivan IV and, via a series of danced tableaux, shows how Ivan sinks into sadistic cruelty after the poisoning of his beloved wife Anastasia. It has been revived by Paris Opera, 1976.

(1530 - 1584), "The Terrible" (Grozny), grand prince of Moscow and tsar of all Russia.

The long reign of Ivan IV saw the transformation of Muscovy into a multiethnic empire through ambitious political, military, and cultural projects, which revolved around the controversial figure of the monarch.

Ivan Iv and the Rurikid Dynasty

Born to the ruling Moscow branch of the Rurikid dynasty, Ivan nominally became grand prince at the age of three after the death of his father, Grand Prince Vasily III. During the regency of Ivan's mother, Yelena Glinskaya, from 1533 to 1538, ruling circles strengthened Ivan's position as nominal ruler by eliminating Prince Andrei Ivanovich of Staritsa and Prince Yury Ivanovich of Dmitrov, representatives of the royal family's collateral branches. Ivan's status as dynastic leader was reinforced during his coronation as tsar on January 16, 1547. Drawing extensively on Byzantine and Muscovite coronation rituals and literary texts to reveal the divine sanction for Ivan's power, the ceremony posited continuity between his rule and the rule of the Byzantine emperors and Kievan princes. Ivan continued the aggressive policy of his ancestors toward the collateral branches of the dynasty by eliminating his cousin, Prince Vladimir Andreyevich of Staritsa (1569).

Ivan was married several times. His wives were from Muscovite elite clans (Anastasia Zakharina Romanova, Maria Nagaya) and from relatively obscure gentry families (Marfa Sobakina, Anna Koltovskaya, Anna Vasilchikova). He also tried to raise the status of the dynasty by establishing matrimonial ties with foreign ruling houses, but succeeded only in marrying the Caucasian Princess Maria (Kuchenei) (1561). Throughout his reign, Ivan sought to secure the succession of power for his sons, although he accidentally killed his elder son Ivan (1581). The tsar's other son, the reportedly mentally challenged Fyodor, eventually inherited the throne.

Ivan Iv and His Court

When Ivan was a minor, power was in the hands of influential courtiers. Under Yelena Glinskaya, Prince Mikhail Lvovich Glinsky competed for power with Yelena's favorite, Prince Ivan Fyodorovich Ovchina-Obolensky. Yelena's death (1538) was followed by fierce competition between the princely clans of Shuyskys, Belskys, Kubenskys, and Glinskys, and the boyar Vorontsov clan. After his coronation, Ivan attempted to stabilize the situation at court through improving the registry of elite military servitors, providing them with prestige landholdings around Moscow, and regulating service relations among the elite during campaigns. The authorities limited the right of some princely families to dispose of their lands in order to pursue the lands policy. Ivan granted top court ranks to a wide circle of elite servitors, which especially benefited the tsarina's relatives, the Zakharins-Yurevs. Ivan also favored officials of lower origin, Alexei Fyodorovich Adashev and Ivan Mikhaylovich Viskovaty, though some experts question their influence at court. Historians sometimes call the ruling circles of the 1550s "the chosen council," but this vague literary term is apparently irrelevant to governmental institutions.

Beginning in 1564, Ivan IV subjected his court to accusations of treason, executions, and disgraces by establishing the Oprichnina. Despite the subsequent abolition of the Oprichnina in 1572, Ivan continued to favor some of its former members. Among them were the elite Nagoy and Godunov families, including Ivan's relative and would-be tsar Boris Godunov. The established princely Shuysky and Mstislavsky clans and the Zakharin-Yurev boyar family retained their high positions at court throughout Ivan's reign.

Ivan's court also included Tatar servitors, including prominent members of the Chingissid dynasty, who received the title of tsar. Ivan granted the last survivor of those Tatar tsars, Simeon Bekbulatovich (Sain-Bulat), the title of grand prince of Moscow and official jurisdiction over a considerable part of the realm. Historians usually interpret the reign of Simeon (1575 - 1576) as a parody of the Muscovite political system. It may be that Ivan, in granting Simeon the new title, sought to deprive Simeon of the title of tsar and thereby eliminate a possible Chingissid succession to the throne.

Ivan Iv and His Realm

In the 1550s, Ivan IV and his advisors attempted to standardize judicial and administrative practices across the country by introducing a new law code (1550) and delegating routine administrative and financial tasks to the increasingly structured chancelleries. The keeping of law and order and control of the local population's mobility became the tasks of locally elected officials, in turn accountable to the central chancelleries. The remote northern territories enjoyed a greater autonomy in local affairs than the central parts of the country.

Albeit limited and inconsistent, these reforms allowed Ivan to maintain an approximately 70,000-man army and to pursue an aggressive foreign policy. With the capture of the Tatar states of Kazan (1552) and Astrakhan (1556), Ivan acquired vast territories populated with a multiethnic, predominantly Muslim population with distinctive cultural and economic traditions. The conquest of those lands, whose peoples remained rebellious throughout Ivan's reign, contributed to the tension between Muscovy and the powerful Muslim states of Crimea and Turkey, which jointly attacked Astrakhan in 1569. The Crimean khan devastated Moscow in 1571, but Ivan's commanders inflicted a defeat on him in 1572. Ivan failed to avoid simultaneous involvement in military conflicts on several fronts. Without settling the conflict in the south, he launched a war against his western neighbor, Livonia, in 1558. Historians traditionally interpret the Livonian War (1558 - 1583) in geopolitical terms, asserting that Ivan was looking for passage to the Baltic Sea to expand overseas trade. Revisionists explain the war's origins in terms of Ivan's short-range interest in getting tribute. The Livonian war only resulted in human and material losses for Muscovy. Ivan supported commercial relations between Muscovy and England, but attempts to conclude a political union with the queen of England were in vain. The war, famines, epidemics, and the Oprichnina caused a profound economic crisis in Muscovy, especially in the Novgorod region. By the end of Ivan's reign, peasants abandoned 70 to 98 percent of arable land throughout the country. Many of them fled to the periphery of the realm, including Siberia, whose colonization intensified in the early 1580s.

Ivan Iv and the Orthodox Church

Ivan IV cultivated a close relationship with the Orthodox Church through regular pilgrimages and generous donations to monasteries. The symbolism of court religious rituals, in which the tsar participated with the metropolitan, and the semiotics of Ivan's residence in the Kremlin stressed the divine character of the tsar's power and the prevailing harmony between the tsar and the church. In 1551, Ivan participated in a church council that attempted to systematize religious practices and the jurisdiction of church courts. Metropolitan Macarius, head of the church and a close advisor to the tsar, sponsored an ideology of militant Orthodoxy that presented the tsar as champion and protector of the true faith. Macarius also played a part in conducting domestic and foreign policy. Contrary to traditional views, the court priest Silvester apparently did not exert political influence on the tsar. Ivan demonstrated a flexible attitude toward the landownership of the church and its tax privileges. Ivan often played ecclesiastical leaders off each other and even deposed disloyal hierarchs.

Controversy Over Ivan's Personality and Historical Role

Ivan is credited with writing diplomatic letters to European monarchs, epistles to elite servitors and clerics, and a reply to a Protestant pastor. Dmitry Likhachev, J. L. I. Fennell, and other specialists describe Ivan as an erudite writer who developed a peculiar literary style through the use of different genres, specific syntax, irony, parody, and mockery of opponents. According to his writings, Ivan, traumatized by childhood memories of boyar arbitrariness, sought through terror to justify his autocratic rule and to prevent the boyars from regaining power. Edward Keenan argues that Ivan was illiterate, never wrote the works attributed to him, and was a puppet in the hands of influential boyar clans. The majority of experts do not share Keenan's view. All information on the influence of particular individuals and clans on Ivan comes from biased sources and should be treated with caution.

Nikolay Karamzin created an influential romantic image of an Ivan who first favored pious counselors but later became a tyrant. Many historians have explained Ivan's erratic policy in psychological terms (Nikolay Kostomarov, Vasily Klyuchevsky); some have assumed a mental disorder (Pavel Kovalevsky, D. M. Glagolev, Richard Hellie, Robert Crummey). The autopsy performed on Ivan's remains in 1963 suggests that Ivan might have suffered from a spinal disease, but it is unclear how the illness affected his behavior. The probability that Ivan was poisoned should be minimized. Other historians sought to rationalize Ivan's behavior, presuming that he acted as a protector of state interests in a struggle with boyar hereditary privileges (Sergei Solovyov, Sergei Platonov). According to Platonov, Ivan was a national democratic leader whose policy relied on the nonaristocratic gentry. This concept was revived in Stalinist historiography, which implicitly paralleled Ivan and Stalin by praising the tsar for strengthening the centralized Russian state through harsh measures (Robert Vipper, Sergei Bakhrushin, Ivan Smirnov). Stepan Veselovsky and Vladimir Kobrin subjected Platonov's concept to devastating criticism. Beginning in the 1960s, Soviet historians saw Ivan's policy as a struggle against various elements of feudal fragmentation (Alexander Zimin, Kobrin, Ruslan Skrynnikov). The political liberalization of the late 1980s evoked totalitarian interpretations of Ivan's rule (the later works of Kobrin and Skrynnikov). Boris Uspensky, Priscilla Hunt, and Andrei Yurganov explain Ivan's behavior in terms of the cultural myths of the tsar's power.

Bibliography

Bogatyrev, Sergei. (1995). "Grozny tsar ili groznoe vremya? Psikhologichesky obraz Ivana Groznogo v istoriografii." Russian History 22:285 - 308.

Fennell. J.L.I. ed., tr. (1955). The Correspondence between Prince Kurbsky and Tsar Ivan IV of Russia. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Fennell, John. (1987). "Ivan IV As a Writer." Russian History 14:145 - 154.

Kalugin, V. V. (1998). Andrey Kurbsky i Ivan Grozny. Teoreticheskie vzglyady i literaturnaya tekhnika drevnerusskogo pisatelya. Moscow: Yazyki russkoy kultury.

Keenan, Edward L. (1971). The Kurbskii - Groznyi Apocrypha: The Seventeenth-Century Genesis of the "Correspondence" Attributed to Prince A. M. Kurbskii and Tsar Ivan IV, with an appendix by Daniel C. Waugh. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Kliuchevsky, V. O. (1912). A History of Russia, tr. C. J. Hogarth, vol. 2. London: J. M. Dent and Sons.

Hunt, Priscilla. (1993). "Ivan IV's Personal Mythology of Kingship." Slavic Review 52:769 - 809.

Perrie, Maureen. (2001). The Cult of Ivan the Terrible in Stalin's Russia. Basingstoke, NY: Palgrave.

Platonov, S. F. (1986). Ivan the Terrible, ed. and tr. Joseph L. Wieczynski, with "In Search of Ivan the Terrible" by Richard Hellie. Gulf Breeze, FL: Academic International Press.

Rowland, Daniel. (1995). "Ivan the Terrible As a Carolingian Renaissance Prince." In Kamen Kraeugln, Rhetoric of the Medieval Slavic World: Essays Presented to Edward Keenan on His Sixtieth Birthday by His Colleagues and Students. Harvard Ukrainian Studies, vol. 19, ed. Nancy Shields Kollmann; Donald Ostrowski; Andrei Pliguzov; and Daniel Rowland. Cambridge, MA: The Ukrainian Research Institute of Harvard University.

Skrynnikov, Ruslan G. (1981). Ivan the Terrible, ed. and tr. Hugh F. Graham. Gulf Breeze, FL: Academic International Press.

—SERGEI BOGATYREV

Early Reign

Ivan succeeded his father Vasily III, who died in 1533, under the regency of his mother. When she died (1538), the regency alternated among several feuding boyar families (see boyars). Boyar rule ended only in 1546, when Ivan announced his intention of becoming czar. He was crowned in 1547. As czar, Ivan attempted to establish czarist autocracy at the expense of boyar power. In the early years of his reign, he reduced the arbitrary powers of the boyar provincial governors, transferring their functions to locally elected officials. The former boyars' council was replaced by a "chosen council" consisting of members who owed their status to the czar.

In 1566, Ivan summoned what was probably the first general council of the realm (Zemsky Sobor), composed of representatives of different social ranks, including merchants and lower nobility. After reorganizing the army, Ivan conquered Kazan (1552) and Astrakhan (1556), thereby inaugurating Russia's eastward expansion. The conquest of Siberia by the Cossack Yermak took place late in his reign (1581-83). Ivan also began trade with England via the White Sea in the mid-1550s. To improve his access to the Baltic Sea, he undertook (1558) a campaign against Livonia. In the resulting war with Poland and Sweden, he was at first successful but was later defeated by Stephen báthory, king of Poland and Lithuania. The peace treaties (1582, 1583) forced the czar to renounce his territorial gains and cede additional territory to Sweden.

Later Reign

In his later years, Ivan's character, always stern, grew tyrannical. Apart from the reverses of the war, the change has been attributed to humiliations at the hands of the boyars during his childhood; a serious illness (1553) and resistance at that time to his efforts to secure the succession of his infant son; the death of his wife, Anastasia Romanov (1560), whom historians credit with exercising a moderating influence; and the defection to Poland of his favorite, Prince Andrew Kurbsky (1564). Suspecting conspiracies everywhere, he acted ruthlessly to consolidate his power. In 1565 he set aside an extensive personal domain, the oprichnina, under his direct control. He established a special corps (oprichniki), responsible to him alone, to whom he granted part of this domain at will. With the help of this corps, he diminished the political influence of the boyars and forcibly confiscated their lands in a reign of terror. Many boyars were executed or exiled.

Ivan formally abolished the oprichnina in 1572, although in effect it continued until 1575. Fits of rage alternated with periods of repentance and prayer; in one of his rages he killed (1581) his son and heir, Ivan. Although the exact number of his wives is uncertain, Ivan probably married seven times, ridding himself of unwanted wives by forcing them to take the veil or arranging for their murder. Despite his cruelty, he was a man of intelligence and learning. Printing was introduced into Russia during his reign. Two sons, Feodor I and Dmitri, survived the czar, but after his death his favorite, Boris Godunov, gained power.

Bibliography

See biographies by C. Francis (1981), B. Bobrick (1987), T. Butson (1987), and H. Troyat (1988); study by M. Perrie (1987).

Ivan Iv, "the Terrible" (Russia) (1530–1584; ruled 1533–1584), grand prince of Muscovy and, from 1547, first tsar of Russia. The early achievements of Ivan IV Vasil'evich, known as "the Terrible," were clouded by failure in war and repression at home in his later years. The son of Grand Prince Vasilii III and Princess Elena Glinskaia, Ivan was only three when his father died. His mother led a regency with Prince Ivan Telepnev-Obolenskii, but on her death in 1538, a boyar regency took over and proved to be dominated by vicious factional struggles. At first the princes Shuiskii ousted Obolenskii and Metropolitan Daniil (1539), then the princes Bel'skii rose to power, only to be replaced by the Vorontsovs and then once again by the Glinskiis, the relatives of Ivan's mother. In 1547 Metropolitan Makarii crowned the young Ivan tsar. The new official title signified a claim to equality in rank with the Holy Roman emperor, the Ottoman sultans, and the Chingisid Tatar khans, as well as the Byzantine emperors of the past. Shortly afterwards, Ivan married Anastasiia Romanova, a woman of one of the major boyar clans. After a major riot in Moscow against the Glinskii clan led to their fall from favor, the Romanovs became the closest boyar clan to the throne.

The next decade was one of major accomplishments on all fronts. Historians dispute how much influence Ivan's inner circle of informal advisers wielded. It is certain that, along with the boyars, Aleksei Adashev, the tsar's chamberlain and head of the Petitions Office, and Ivan's chaplain Sil'vestr advised Ivan about policy. After several expeditions down the Volga, Ivan conquered the Tatar khanate of Kazan' in 1552 and the Astrakhan' khanate in 1556, giving Russia control of the whole length of the river and the steppe around it. In a few years the Russians had built a fort on the Terek River near present-day Grozny. These spectacular successes changed the balance of power in western Eurasia, as Russia was the first sedentary power to break into the steppe, cutting off its western extension from Central Asia. These conquests laid the foundation for Russian settlement of the Urals and, at the very end of Ivan's reign, the expedition of the Cossack Yermak Timofeyevich into Siberia (1581–1584), which began the Russian conquest and settlement of northern Asia.

Ivan's internal measures, often anachronistically called reforms, built up the Russian state apparatus on new foundations. In these years new state offices (prikazy)—no longer household offices—came into being, with an army office (razriad), one for landed estates, and others for bandits, petitions, and other functions. The Ambassadorial Office split off from the treasury in 1549. At the same time, the government continued the policy of ordering local gentry to elect elders to deal with crime and public order, and it replaced the older system of direct collection of taxes by local governors to support their work (kormlenie, or 'feeding') with the requirement for the village community to collect taxes. The older type of provincial government gave way to a more centralized state. In 1550 the government issued a new law code (Sudebnik), really a procedural manual for trials and investigation. In 1551 Ivan called a council of the church that resulted in a series of enactments called the Hundred Chapters, which tried to correct administrative, liturgical, and moral abuses by strengthening episcopal administration as well as the tsar's control.

In 1553 Ivan fell ill and seemed on the point of death, and he tried to guarantee the succession for his infant son. Some boyars supported him, but others feared a regency that would only empower the Romanovs. A third group favored Ivan's cousin, Vladimir of Staritsa, an incapable but certainly legitimate possibility. Fortunately Ivan recovered, but the episode poisoned relations between the tsar and his cousin, as well as with many of the boyars. The poison began to work a decade later.

In 1558 Ivan, confident in his power after the victories over the Tatars, decided to invade and attempt to conquer Livonia, founded in the thirteenth century by a German crusading order on the territory of present-day Estonia and Latvia. The Reformation had destroyed the rationale and unity of the order, and Poland and Russia both craved its lands and trading cities. For Russia, they were the main artery of commerce with Europe. Ivan's army was quickly successful, but the entrance of Poland into the war provided a new enemy. At first victorious over the Poles, Ivan's army bogged down in a long stalemate that lasted until the 1570s, when Poland and Sweden expelled the Russians and divided Livonia between themselves. The failed war was a major burden on the Russian treasury and ruinous for the peasantry, who paid the taxes to support it.

The war also caused discontent among the elite, and in 1564 Prince Andrei Mikhailovich Kurbskii defected to Poland-Lithuania, inaugurating a famous exchange of polemics with Ivan and also contributing to the establishment of the oprichnina. The executions and exactions of the following years struck the boyar elite as well as the gentry and townspeople in Novgorod. In 1575 Ivan suddenly placed a converted Tatar prince, Semen Bekbulatovich, on the throne for a few months, but the strange episode had no consequences. A return to near normalcy failed to improve Russia's position in the war, and a truce with Poland in 1582 brought Ivan no gains for his enormous effort. The one accomplishment was the beginning of the conquest of Siberia under Yermak, but this was sponsored by the Stroganov merchants rather than the government. At the end of Ivan's reign the clans began to return to court and to power, a process completed after Ivan's death.

Ivan's reign was a vivid time, full of light and dark, a reign that saw massive and permanent expansion alongside defeat in war, the foundations of the Russian state apparatus, and enormous political and organizational chaos. The agrarian crisis caused by the Livonian War contributed to the beginnings of serfdom, while trade with England and Holland began and thousands of peasants moved to new and better lands in the south and east. The problems at the core of Ivan IV's reign and his legacy are highly complex, and many aspects remain highly controversial.

Bibliography

Camphausen, Hans-Walter. Die Bojarenduma unter Ivan IV: Studien zur altmoskauer Herrschaftsordnung. Frankfurt am Main, 1985.

Platonov, S. F. Ivan the Terrible. Translated by Joseph L. Wieczynski. Gulf Breeze, Fla., 1974.

Skrynnikov, R. G. Ivan the Terrible. Translated by Hugh F. Graham. Gulf Breeze, Fla. 1982.

Soloviev, Sergei M. History of Russia. Vol. 10, The Reign of Ivan the Terrible: Kazan, Astrakhan, Livonia, the Oprichnina and the Polotsk Campaign. Translated by Anthony L. H. Rhinelander. Gulf Breeze, Fla., 1995.

Zimin, A. A. Oprichnina. 2nd ed. Moscow, 2001.

—PAUL BUSHKOVITCH

A Russian czar of the sixteenth century. Ivan struggled constantly with the nobles of Russia and became famous for his brutality toward his enemies.

Ivan the Terrible, the first czar of Russia whose arbitrary and cruel behavior led to his comparison with Vlad the Impaler the historical Dracula Ivan inherited the title of Grand Duke of Moscovy when he was three and grew up watching the leading families (the boyars) of his land lead the countries through a period of chaos as they fought among themselves for bits of power. He was 17 when a Chosen Council emerged to bring about reform. Although they succeeded in ending the chaos, Ivan continually fought with them over a multitude of administrative matters. In 1564, in frustration, he suddenly abdicated. When the people demanded his return, he was able to dictate the terms of his reinstatement and gain almost absolute power. He moved quickly to establish his own ruling elite, the Oprichnina, which wrested much of the remaining power from the boyars.

Ivan's reign of two decades was marked, in part, by his conquest of the lands along the Volga River and his movement into Siberia, as well as by a disastrous war in which he unsuccessfully tried to capture Livonia (today Estonia). He is most remembered however, not for his political actions, but for his personal conduct. In his desire to establish a strong central Russian government, he was quick to punish (and even execute) many who challenged his rule or in anyway showed disrespect for what he considered his exalted status. He manifested symptoms of extreme paranoia and had a quick and fiery temper. In 1580, in a moment of rage, he killed his own son, a prospective heir.

Outstanding among the traits remembered by his contemporaries, Ivan possessed a dark sense of humor , quite similar to that attributed to Vlad. It often characterized the tortures and executions of those who became the objects of his rage. As one historian, S. K. Rosovetskii, has noted, many of the stories told about Ivan were variations of those originally ascribed to Vlad a century earlier. For example, there was a Romanian folk story about the leading citizens of the town of Tirgoviste Dracula's capital. The citizens had mocked Dracula's brother. In revenge, he rounded up the leading citizens (the boyars) following Easter Day celebrations and, in their fine clothes, he marched them off to work on building Castle Dracula Ivan, it was reported, did something quite similar in the town of Volgoda when the people slighted him on Easter morning. He rounded them up, still dressed in their Easter finery, to build a new city wall for the town.

Possibly the most famous Dracula story told of Ivan concerned the Turkish envoy who refused to remove his hat in Dracula's presence. Dracula, in turn, had the man's hat nailed to the top of his head. Ivan, it was reported, did the same thing to an Italian diplomat (or in an alternative account, to a French ambassador).

Ivan, like Vlad, often turned on powerful figures in Russian society and humiliated them to prevent their return to the dignity of their offices. The story was told, for example, of his attack on Pimen, the Russian Orthodox metropolitan of Novgorod. He stripped Pimen of his church vestments, had him dressed as a strolling minstrel (an occupation denounced by the church), then staged a mock wedding in which Pimen was married to a mare. Presenting the defrocked prelate with the signs of his new status, a bagpipe and a lyre, Ivan sent him from the city.

Ivan differed from Vlad in his sexual appetite. He was a polygamist with seven wives and as many as 50 concubines. He also left his immediate successors with a very mixed inheritance. Although he had expanded the territory of Russia, he left behind a bankrupt country, and discontent with his rule grew steadily. Ivan, however, died quietly in the middle of a chess game on March 18, 1584.

Parrie, Maureen. The Image of Ivan the Terrible in Russian Folklore. London: Cambridge University Press, 1987. 269 pp.

For other uses, see Ivan the Terrible (disambiguation).

Ivan The Terrible
Ivan IV, parsuna, 16th-century (National Museum of Denmark)
Tsar of All Russia
Reign	3 December 1533 – 28 March [O.S. 18 March] 1584
Coronation	16 January 1547
Predecessor	Vasili III (as Grand Prince of Moscow)
Successor	Feodor I
Consort	Anastasia Romanovna Maria Temryukovna Marfa Sobakina Anna Koltovskaya Anna Vasilchikova Vasilisa Melentyeva Maria Dolgorukaya Maria Nagaya
more... Issue
Tsarevich Dmitri Ivanovich Tsarevich Ivan Ivanovich Feodor I of Russia Tsarevich Dmitri Ivanovich
Full name
Ivan Vasilyevich
Dynasty	Rurik
Father	Vasili III
Mother	Elena Glinskaya
Born	25 August 1530 Kolomenskoye, near Moscow
Died	28 March [O.S. 18 March] 1584 (aged 53) Moscow
Burial	Kelmisvi Chapel, Moscow
Religion	Russian Orthodox

Ivan IV Vasilyevich (Russian:  Ива́н Четвёртый, Васи́льевич​ (help·info), Ivan Chetvyorty, Vasilyevich; 25 August 1530 – 28 March [O.S. 18 March] 1584),^[1] known in English as Ivan the Terrible (Russian:  Ива́н Гро́зный​ (help·info), Ivan Grozny; lit. Fearsome), was Grand Prince of Moscow from 1533 until his death. His long reign saw the conquest of the Khanates of Kazan, Astrakhan, and Siberia, transforming Russia into a multiethnic and multiconfessional state spanning almost one billion acres, approximately 4,046,856 km² (1,562,500 sq mi).^[2] Ivan managed countless changes in the progression from a medieval state to an empire and emerging regional power, and became the first ruler to be crowned as Tsar of All Russia.

Historic sources present disparate accounts of Ivan's complex personality: he was described as intelligent and devout, yet given to rages and prone to episodic outbreaks of mental illness. One notable outburst resulted in the death of his groomed and chosen heir Ivan Ivanovich, which led to the passing of the Tsardom to the younger son: the weak and intellectually disabled^[3] Feodor I of Russia.

Contents 1 Sobriquet 2 Early life 3 Domestic policy 3.1 Oprichnina 3.2 Sack of Novgorod 4 Foreign policy 4.1 Diplomacy and trade 4.2 Conquest of Kazan and Astrakhan 4.3 Livonian war 4.4 Crimean raids 4.5 Conquest of Siberia 5 Personal life 5.1 Children 5.2 Arts 5.3 Epistles 5.4 Death 6 Legacy 6.1 Cinema and literature 7 Ancestry 8 See also 9 References 9.1 Notes 9.2 Bibliography 9.3 General references 10 Further reading 11 External links

Sobriquet

The English word terrible is usually used to translate the Russian word grozny in Ivan's nickname, but the modern English usage of terrible, with a pejorative connotation of bad or evil, does not precisely represent the intended meaning. The meaning of grozny is closer to the original usage of terrible—inspiring fear or terror, dangerous (as in Old English in one's danger), formidable or threatening. Other translations were suggested, such as Ivan the Fearsome or Ivan the Formidable.^[4][5][6]

Early life

Ivan was the son of Vasili III and his second wife, Elena Glinskaya. When Ivan was just three years old his father died from a boil and inflammation on his leg which developed into blood poisoning. Ivan was proclaimed the Grand Prince of Moscow at his father's request. At first his mother Elena Glinskaya acted as a regent, but she died of what many believe to be assassination by poison^[7][8] when Ivan was only eight years old. According to his own letters, Ivan along with his younger brother Yuri often felt neglected and offended by the mighty boyars from the Shuisky and Belsky families.

Ivan was crowned with Monomakh's Cap at the Cathedral of the Dormition at age 16 on 16 January 1547. He was the first person to be crowned as "Tsar of All the Russias", hence, claiming the ancestry of Kievan Rus. Prior to that, rulers of Muscovy were crowned as Grand Princes, although Ivan III the Great, his grandfather, styled himself "tsar" in his correspondence.

By being crowned Tsar, Ivan was sending a message to the world and to Russia: he was now the one and only supreme ruler of the country, and his will was not to be questioned. "The new title symbolized an assumption of powers equivalent and parallel to those held by former Byzantine caesar and the Tatar khan, both known in Russian sources as Tsar. The political effect was to elevate Ivan's position."^[9] The new title not only secured the throne, but it also granted Ivan a new dimension of power, one intimately tied to religion. He was now a "divine" leader appointed to enact God's will, "church texts described Old Testament kings as 'Tsars' and Christ as the Heavenly Tsar."^[10] The newly appointed title was then passed on from generation to generation, "succeeding Muscovite rulers...benefited from the divine nature of the power of the Russian monarch...crystallized during Ivan's reign."^[11]

Domestic policy

Despite calamities triggered by the Great Fire of 1547, the early part of Ivan's reign was one of peaceful reforms and modernization. Ivan revised the law code (known as the sudebnik), created a standing army (the streltsy),^[12] established the Zemsky Sobor or assembly of the land, a public, consensus-building assembly, the council of the nobles (known as the Chosen Council), and confirmed the position of the Church with the Council of the Hundred Chapters, which unified the rituals and ecclesiastical regulations of the entire country. He introduced local self-government to rural regions, mainly in the northeast of Russia, populated by the state peasantry.

By Ivan's order in 1553 the Moscow Print Yard was established and the first printing press was introduced to Russia. The 1550's and 1560s saw the printing of several religious books in Russian. The new technology provoked discontent with traditional scribes, which led to the Print Yard being burned in an arson attack and the first Russian printers Ivan Fedorov and Pyotr Mstislavets being forced to flee from Moscow to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Nevertheless, printing of books resumed from 1568 onwards, with Timofey Nevezha and his son Andronik now heading the Print Yard.

Portrait of Ivan IV by Viktor Vasnetsov, 1897 (Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow)

Ivan had St. Basil's Cathedral constructed in Moscow to commemorate the seizure of Kazan. Legend has it that he was so impressed with the structure he had the architect, Postnik Yakovlev, blinded so that he could never design anything as beautiful again. In reality, Postnik Yakovlev went on to design more churches for Ivan and Kazan's Kremlin walls in the early 1560s, as well as the chapel over St. Basil's grave that was added to St. Basil's Cathedral in 1588, several years after Ivan's death. Although more than one architect was associated with this name and constructions, it is believed that the principal architect is one and the same person.^[13][14][15]

Other events of this period include the introduction of the first laws restricting the mobility of the peasants, which would eventually lead to serfdom.

1560's brought hardships to Russia that led to dramatic change of Ivan's policies. Russia was devastated by a combination of drought and famine, Polish-Lithuanian raids, Tatar invasions and the sea-trading blockade carried out by the Swedes, Poles and the Hanseatic League. His first wife, Anastasia Romanovna, died in 1560, and her death was suspected to be a poisoning. This personal tragedy deeply hurt Ivan and is thought to have affected his personality, if not his mental health. At the same time, one of Ivan's advisors, Prince Andrei Kurbsky, defected to the Lithuanians, took command of the Lithuanian troops and devastated the Russian region of Velikiye Luki. The series of treasons made Ivan paranoically suspicious of nobility.

Oprichnina

Main article: Oprichnina

The Oprichniki by Nikolai Nevrev. The painting shows the last minutes of boyarin Feodorov, arrested for treason. To mock his alleged ambitions on the Tsar's title, the nobleman was given Tsar's regals before execution.

On December 3, 1564, Ivan IV departed Moscow for Aleksandrova Sloboda. From there he sent two letters in which he announced his abdication because of the alleged embezzlement and treason of the aristocracy and clergy. The boyar court was unable to rule in the absence of Ivan and feared the wrath of the Muscovite citizenry. A boyar envoy departed for Aleksandrova Sloboda to beg Ivan to return to the throne.^[16] Ivan IV agreed to return on condition of being granted absolute power. He demanded that he should be able to execute and confiscate the estates of traitors without interference from the boyar council or church. Upon this, Ivan decreed the creation of the oprichnina^[17]

The oprichnina consisted of a separate territory within the borders of Russia, mostly in the territory of the former Novgorod Republic in the north. Ivan held exclusive power over the oprichnina territory. The Boyar Council ruled the zemshchina ('land'), the second division of the state. Ivan also recruited a personal guard known as the oprichniki. Originally it was a thousand strong.^[18] The oprichniki were headed by Malyuta Skuratov. The oprichniki enjoyed social and economic privileges under the oprichnina. They owed their allegiance and status to Ivan, not to heredity or local bonds.^[19]

The first wave of persecutions targeted primarily the princely clans of Russia, notably the influential families of Suzdal’. Ivan executed, exiled, or tonsured prominent members of the boyar clans on questionable accusations of conspiracy. Among those executed were the Metropolitan Philip and the prominent warlord Alexander Gorbaty-Shuisky. 1566 saw the oprichnina extended to eight central districts. Of the 12,000 nobles there, 570 became oprichniks, the rest were expelled.^[20]

Under the new political system, the Oprichniki were given large estates, but unlike the previous landlords, could not be held accountable for their actions. These men, "took virtually all the peasants possessed, forcing them to pay 'in one year as much as [they] used to pay in ten.'"^[21] This degree of oppression resulted in increasing cases of peasants fleeing which in turn led to a drop in the overall production. The price of grain increased by a factor of ten.

Conditions were worsened by the 1570 epidemics of plague that killed 10,000 people in Novgorod. the plague killed 600–1000 in Moscow daily.^[22]

Sack of Novgorod

Main article: Massacre of Novgorod

During grim conditions of the epidemics, famine and ongoing Livonian war, Ivan grew suspicious that noblemen of the wealthy city of Novgorod were planning to defect city for Lithuania. In 1570 Ivan ordered the Oprichniki to raid the city. Oprichniki burned and pillaged Novgorod and the surrounding villages, and the city was never to regain its former prosperity.^[23]

Casualty figures vary greatly in different sources. The First Pskov Chronicle estimates the number of victims at 60,000.^{[23][24][25][25]} Yet the official death toll named 1,500 of Novgorod's big people (nobility) and mentioned only about the same number of smaller people. Many modern researchers estimate the number of victims to range from 2000–3000 (after the famine and epidemics of 1560s the population of Novgorod most likely didn't exceed 10,000–20,000).^[26] Many survivors were deported elsewhere.

Foreign policy

Diplomacy and trade

Ivan the Terrible Showing His Treasures to Jerome Horsey by Alexander Litovchenko (1875)

In 1547 Hans Schlitte, the agent of Ivan, recruited craftsmen in Germany for work in Russia. However all these craftsmen were arrested in Lübeck at the request of Poland and Livonia. The German merchant companies ignored the new port built by Ivan on the river Narva in 1550 and continued to deliver goods in the Baltic ports owned by Livonia. Russia remained isolated from sea trade.

Ivan established very close ties with Kingdom of England. Russo-English relations can be traced to 1553, when Richard Chancellor sailed to the White Sea and continued overland to Moscow. Upon his return to England in 1555, the Muscovy Company was formed by himself, Sebastian Cabot, Sir Hugh Willoughby, and several London merchants. Ivan opened up the White Sea and the port of Arkhangelsk to the Company and granted the Company privilege of trading throughout his reign without paying the standard customs fees^[27]. Muscovy Company remained the monopoly in Russo-english trade until 1698.

With use English merchants, Ivan engaged a long correspondence with Queen Elizabeth. While the queen focused on commerce, Ivan was more interested in a military alliance. During his troubled relations with the boyars, tsar even asked her for a guarantee to be granted asylum in England should his rule be jeopardised.

Ivan IV corresponded with Orthodox leaders overseas as well. In response to a letter of Patriarch Joachim of Alexandria asking the Tsar for financial assistance for the Monastery of St. Catherine in Sinai, which had suffered from the Turks, Ivan IV sent in 1558 a delegation to Egypt led by archdeacon Gennady, who, however, died in Constantinople before he could reach Egypt. From then on the embassy was headed by Smolensk merchant Vasily Poznyakov. Poznyakov's delegation visited Alexandria, Cairo and Sinai, brought the patriarch a fur coat and an icon sent by the Tsar and left an interesting account of its 2.5 years of travels.^[28]

Conquest of Kazan and Astrakhan

Main article: Siege of Kazan (1552)

While Ivan IV was a minor, armies of the Kazan Khanate repeatedly raided the northeast of Russia,^[29] In 1530's, the Crimean khan constructed an offensive alliance with Safa Giray of Kazan, his relative. When Safa Giray invaded Muscovy in December 1540, the Russians used Qasim Tatars to contain him. After his advance was stalled near Murom, Safa Giray was forced to withdraw towards his own borders.

These reverses undermined Safa Giray's authority in Kazan. A pro-Russian party, represented by Shahgali, gained enough popular support to make several attempts to take over the Kazan throne. In 1545, Ivan IV mounted an expedition to the Volga River to show his support for pro-Russian factions.

Ivan IV under the walls of Kazan by Pyotr Korovin.

In 1551, tsar sent his envoy to the Nogai Horde and they promised to maintain neutrality during the impending war. The Ar begs and Udmurts submitted to Russian authority as well. In 1551, the wooden fort of Sviyazhsk was transported down the Volga from Uglich all the way to Kazan. It was used as the Russian place d'armes during the decisive campaign of 1552.

On 16 June 1552 Ivan IV led a 150,000-strong Russian army towards Kazan. The last siege of the Tatar capital was commenced on 30 August. Under the supervision of Prince Alexander Gorbaty-Shuisky, the Russians used ram weapons, a battery-tower, mines, and 150 cannons. The Russians also had the advantage of efficient military engineers. The city's water supply was blocked and the walls were breached. Kazan finally fell on 2 October, its fortifications were razed, and much of the population massacred. About 60,000 - 100,000 Russian prisoners and slaves were released. Tsar celebrated his victory over Kazan by building several churches with oriental features, most famously Saint Basil's Cathedral on Red Square in Moscow.

The fall of Kazan had as its primary effect the outright annexation of the Middle Volga. The Bashkirs accepted Ivan IV's authority two years later. In 1556 Ivan annexed the Astrakhan Khanate and destroyed the largest slave market on the river Volga. These conquests complicated the migration of the aggressive nomadic hordes from Asia to Europe through Volga. As a result of the Kazan campaigns, Muscovy was transformed into the multinational and multi-faith state of Russia.

Livonian war

Main article: Livonian War

In an attempt to gain access to Baltic sea and its major trade routes, Ivan launched an ultimately unsuccessful 24 years Livonian war of seaward expansion to the west and finding himself fighting the Swedes, Lithuanians, Poles and the Livonian Teutonic Knights.

This section requires expansion.

Ioannes Basilius Magnus Imperator Russiae, Dux Moscoviae by Abraham Ortelius (1574)

Having rejected peace proposals from his enemies, Ivan IV found himself in a difficult position by 1579. The displaced refugees fleeing the war compounded the effects of the simultaneous drought, and exacerbated war engendered epidemics, causing much loss of life.

Altogether the prolonged war had nearly destroyed the economy, Oprichnina had thoroughly disrupted the government, while The Grand Principality of Lithuania had united with The Kingdom of Poland and acquired an energetic leader, Stefan Batory, who was supported by Russia's southern enemy, the Ottoman Empire (1576). Ivan's realm was now being squeezed by two of the great powers of the day.

After negotiations with Ivan failed, Batory launched a series of offensives against Muscovy in the campaign seasons of 1579–1581, trying to cut The Kingdom of Livonia from Muscovite territories. During his first offensive in 1579, he retook Polotsk with 22,000 men. During the second, in 1580, he took Velikie Luki with a 29,000-strong force. Finally, he began the Siege of Pskov in 1581 with a 100,000-strong army. Narva in Estonia was reconquered by Sweden in 1581.

Unlike Sweden and Poland, Frederick II had trouble continuing the fight against Muscovy. He came to an agreement with John III in 1580, giving him the titles in Livonia. That war would last from 1577 to 1582. Muscovy recognized Polish-Lithuanian control of Ducatus Ultradunensis only in 1582. After Magnus von Lyffland died in 1583, Poland invaded his territories in The Duchy of Courland and Frederick II decided to sell his rights of inheritance. Except for the island of Saaremaa, Denmark was out of the Baltic by 1585.

Crimean raids

Main article: Russo-Crimean Wars

In late years of Ivan's reign southern borders of Muscovy were disturbed by Crimean Tatars. Khan Devlet I Giray of Crimea repeatedly raided the Moscow region. In 1571, the 40,000-strong Crimean and Turkish army launched a large-scale raid. Due to ongoing Livonian war, Moscow's garrison was as small as 6,000, and could not even delay the Tatar approach. Unresisted, Devlet devastated unprotected towns and villages around Moscow and set Moscow on fire. Historians estimate the number of casualties of the fire from 10,000 to as many 80,000 people.

To buy peace from Devlet Giray, Ivan was foced to relinquish his rights on Astrakhan in favor of Crimaen Khanate (although this proposed transfer was only a diplomatic maneuver and was never actually complete). This defeat angered Ivan. Upon his orders, between 1571 and 1572 preparations were made. In addition to Zasechnaya cherta, innovative fortifications were set beyond the river Oka that defined the border.

Next year Devlet launched another raid on Moscow, now with 120,000-strong^[30] horde, equipped with cannons and reinforced by Turkish janissaries. On 26 July 1572 the horde crossed the Oka River near Serpukhov, decimated the Russian vanguard of 200 noblemen and advanced towards Moscow.

Russian army, led by Prince Mikhail Vorotynsky, was twice smaller, estimated at between 60,000-70,000 men, yet it was an experienced streltsi army, equiped with modern firearms and gulyay-gorods. On 30 July the armies clashed near the Lopasnya River in what will be known as the Battle of Molodi, that continued for more than a week. The outcome was decissive Russian victory. The Crimean horde was defeated so thoroughly that both the Ottoman Sultan and the Crimean khan, his vassal, had to give up their ambitious plans of northward expansion into Russia.

Conquest of Siberia

Main article: Russian conquest of Siberia

It was in Ivan's time that Russians started a large-scale exploration and colonisation of Siberia. In 1555, shortly after the conquest of Kazan, Siberian khan Yadegar and Nogai khan Ismail pledged their allegiance to Ivan, in hope he will help them against their opponents. However, Yadegar failed to gather the full sum of tribute he proposed to the tsar, so Ivan did nothing to save his inefficient vassal. in 1563 Yadegar was overthrown and killed by khan Kuchum, who denied any tribute to Moscow.

In 1558, Ivan gave the Stroganov merchant family patent for colonizing "the abundant region along the Kama River", and in 1574 lands over the Ural Mountains along the rivers Tura and Tobol. They also received permission to build forts along the Ob and Irtysh rivers. Around 1577, the Stroganovs hired the Cossack leader Yermak Timofeyevich to protect their lands from attacks of the Siberian Khan Kuchum.

In 1580 Yermak started his conquest of Siberia. With some 540 Cossacks he started to penetrate territories that were tributary to Kuchum. Yermak persuaded the various family-based tribes to change their loyalties and become tributaries of Russia. He also established distant forts in the newly-conquered lands. The campaign was successful, and cossacks managed to defeat Siberian army in Battle of Chuvash Cape, but Yermak was still in need for reinforcements. He sent an envoy to Ivan the Terrible, who agreed to reinforce cossacs with his streltsi. Yermak's conquest expanded Ivan's empire to the east and allowed him to style himself "Tsar of Siberia" in the tsar's very last years.

Personal life

This section requires expansion.

Children

Tsar Ivan IV admires his sixth wife Vasilisa Melentyeva. 1875 painting by Grigory Semyonovich Sedov (1836–1886)

• By Anastasia Romanovna:

1. Tsarevna Anna Ivanovna
2. Tsarevna Maria Ivanovna
3. Tsarevich Dmitri Ivanovich
4. Tsarevich Ivan Ivanovich
5. Tsarevna Eudoxia Ivanovna
6. Tsar Feodor I of Russia
7. Tsarevich Vasili Ivanovich

• By Maria Nagaya:

1. Tsarevich Dmitri Ivanovich

• By an uncertain mother:

1. Xenia Shestova (possibly)

In 1581 Ivan beat his pregnant daughter-in-law for wearing immodest clothing, and this may have caused a miscarriage. His son, also named Ivan, upon learning of this, engaged in a heated argument with his father, resulting in Ivan striking his son in the head with his pointed staff, causing his son's death.^{[citation needed]} This event is depicted in the famous painting by Ilya Repin, Ivan the Terrible and his son Ivan on Friday, 16 November 1581 better known as Ivan the Terrible killing his son.

Arts

Ivan was a patron of the arts and himself a poet and composer of considerable talent. His Orthodox liturgical hymn, "Stichiron No. 1 in Honor of St. Peter", and fragments of his letters were put into music by Soviet composer Rodion Shchedrin. The recording was released in 1988, marking the millennium of Christianity in Russia, and was the first Soviet-produced CD.^[31][32][33]

Epistles

Ivan's repentance: he asks a father superior of the Pskovo-Pechorsky Monastery to let him take the tonsure at his monastery. Painting by Klavdiy Lebedev.

D.S. Mirsky called Ivan "a pamphleteer of genius". The epistles attributed to him are the masterpieces of old Russian (perhaps all Russian) political journalism. They may be too full of texts from the Scriptures and the Fathers, and their Church Slavonic is not always correct. But they are full of cruel irony, expressed in pointedly forcible terms.

The shameless bully and the great polemicist are seen together in a flash when he taunts the runaway prince Kurbsky with the question: "If you are so sure of your righteousness, why did you run away and not prefer martyrdom at my hands?" Such strokes were well calculated to drive his correspondent into a rage. "The part of the cruel tyrant elaborately upbraiding an escaped victim while he continues torturing those in his reach may be detestable, but Ivan plays it with truly Shakespearian breadth of imagination".^[34] These letters are often the only existing source on Ivan's personality and provide crucial information on his reign, but Harvard professor Edward Keenan has argued that these letters are 17th century forgeries. This contention, however, has not been widely accepted, and other scholars, such as John Fennell and Ruslan Skrynnikov continued to argue for their authenticity. Recent archival discoveries of 16th century copies of the letters strengthen the argument for their authenticity.^[35][36]

Besides his letters to Kurbsky he wrote other satirical invectives to men in his power. The best is his letter to the abbot of the Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery, where he pours out all the poison of his grim irony on the unascetic life of the boyars, shorn monks, and those exiled by his order. His picture of their luxurious life in the citadel of ascetism is a masterpiece of trenchant sarcasm.

Death

Death of Ivan the Terrible by Ivan Bilibin (1935)

Ivan died from a stroke while playing chess with Bogdan Belsky^[37] on 28 March [O.S. 18 March] 1584.^[37] Upon Ivan's death, the ravaged kingdom was left to his unfit and childless son Feodor. This period of time was known as "Times of Trouble".

Legacy

Forensic facial reconstruction of Ivan IV by Mikhail Gerasimov

Ivan's throne (ivory, metal, wood)

In the centuries following Ivan's death, historians developed different theories to better understand his reign, but independent of the perspective through which one chooses to approach this, it cannot be denied that Ivan the Terrible changed Russian history and continues to live on in popular imagination. His political legacy completely altered the Russian governmental structure; his economic policies ultimately contributed to the end of the Rurik Dynasty, and his social legacy lives on in unexpected places.

Arguably Ivan's most important legacy can be found in the political changes he enacted in Russia. In the words of historian Alexander Yanov, "Ivan the Terrible and the origins of the modern Russian political structure [are]... indissolubly connected." ^[38]

A title alone may hold symbolic power, but Ivan's political revolution went further, in the process significantly altering Russia's political structure. The creation of the Oprichnina marked something completely new, a break from the past that served to diminish the power of the boyars and create a more centralized government. "...the revolution of Tsar Ivan was an attempt to transform an absolutist political structure into a despotism... the Oprichnina proved to be not only the starting point, but also the nucleus of autocracy which determined... the entire subsequent historical process in Russia."^[39] Ivan created a way to bypass the Mestnichestvo system and elevate the men among the gentry to positions of power, thus suppressing the aristocracy that failed to support him.^[40] Part of this revolution included altering the structure of local governments to include, "a combination of centrally appointed and locally elected officials. Despite later modifications, this form of local administration proved to be functional and durable." ^[11] Ivan successfully cemented autocracy and a centralized government in Russia, in the process also establishing "a centralized apparatus of political control in the form of his own guard."^[41] The idea of a guard as a means of political control became so ingrained in Russian history that it can be traced to Peter the Great, Vladimir Lenin, who "... [provided] Russian autocracy with its Communist incarnation", and Joseph Stalin, who "[placed] the political police over the party." Yanov concludes that "Czar Ivan's monstrous invention [i.e. the guard] has thus dominated the entire course of Russian history."^[42]

Ivan the Terrible And His Son Ivan, 16 November 1581 by Ilya Repin, 1885 (Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow)

By expanding into Poland (although a failed campaign), the Caspian and Siberia, Ivan established a sphere of influence that lasted until the 20th century. Ivan's conquests also ignited a conflict with Turkey that would lead to successive wars. "Russia's victories confined the Turkish conquests to the Balkans and the Black sea region, although Turkish expansionism continued to cast a shadow over the whole of Eastern Europe."^[43]

The acquisition of new territory brought about another of Ivan's lasting legacies: a relationship with Europe, especially through trade. Although the contact between Russia and Europe remained small at this time, it would later grow, facilitating the permeation of European ideals across the border. Peter the Great would later push Russia to become a European power, and Catherine II would manipulate that power to make Russia a leader within the region.

Contrary to his political legacy, Ivan IV's economic legacy was disastrous and became one of the factors that led to the decline of the Rurik Dynasty and the Time of Troubles. Ivan inherited a government in debt, and in an effort to raise more revenue instituted a series of taxes. "It was the military campaigns themselves... that were responsible for the increasing government expenses."^[44] To make matters worse, successive wars drained the country both of men and resources. "Muscovy from its core, where its centralized political structures depended upon a dying dynasty, to its frontiers, where its villages stood depopulated and its fields lay fallow, was on the brink of ruin."^[45]

Ivan the Terrible meditating at the deathbed of his son. Ivan's murder of his son brought about the extinction of the Rurik Dynasty and the Time of Troubles. Painting by Vyacheslav Grigorievich Schwarz (1861).

Ivan's political revolution not only consolidated the position of Tsar, but also created a centralized government structure with ramifications extending to local government. "The assumption and active propaganda of the title of Czar, transgressions and sudden changes in policy during the Oprichnina contributed to the image of the Muscovite prince as a ruler accountable only to God."^[11] Subsequent Russian rulers inherited a system put in place by Ivan.

Another interesting and unexpected aspect of Ivan's social legacy emerged within Communist Russia. In an effort to revive Russia nationalist pride, Ivan the Terrible's image became closely associated with Joseph Stalin.^[46] Historians faced great difficulties when trying to gather information about Ivan IV in his early years because "Early Soviet historiography, especially in the 1920s, paid little attention to Ivan IV as a statesman." This, however, was not surprising because "Marxist intellectual tradition attached greater significance to socio-economic forces than to political history and the role of individuals." By the second half of the 1930s, the method used by Soviet historians changed. They placed a greater emphasis on the individual and history became more "comprehensible and accessible". The way was clear for an emphasis on 'great men', such as Ivan the Terrible and Peter the Great, who made a major contribution to the strengthening and expansion of the Russian state. From this time on, the Soviet Union's focus on great leaders would be greatly exaggerated, leading historians to gather more and more information on the great Ivan the Terrible.^[47]

Today, there exists a controversial movement in Russia campaigning in favor of granting sainthood to Ivan IV.^[48] The Russian Orthodox Church has stated its opposition to the idea.^[49]

Cinema and literature

• The Soviet filmmaker Sergei Eisenstein made two films based on the life of the Great Tsar – Ivan the Terrible. The first film is about the early progressive years of Ivan as a young tsar, it was admired by Joseph Stalin^{[citation needed]}. The second part tells us about the cruel period of Ivan's mature age. Stalin took this film rather coldly^{[citation needed]} as it was too much like a mirror of the Soviet regime of that time. The third one was never completed.
• Tsar – a 2009 Russian drama film directed by Pavel Lungin.
• Ivan the Terrible in Russian folklore.
• In the movie Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian Ivan was played by Christopher Guest.
• In Deadliest Warrior season 3, he fights against Hernan Cortes and loses due to an inability to lead his troops stemming from his sickness and insanity.
• Russka (1991) the novel by Edward Rutherford

Ancestry

Ancestors of Ivan the Terrible

16. Vasily I of Moscow               8. Vasily II of Moscow                       17. Sophia of Lithuania               4. Ivan III of Russia                             18. Yaroslav of Borovsk               9. Maria of Borovsk                       19. Maria Goltiayeva Koshkina               2. Vasili III of Russia                                   20. Manuel II Palaiologos               10. Thomas Palaiologos                       21. Helena Dragaš               5. Sophia (Zoe) Palaiologina                             22. Centurione II Zaccaria               11. Catherine Zaccaria                       23. Creusa Tocco               1. Ivan IV of Russia                                         24. Borys Ivanovich Glinsky               12. Lev Borysevich Glinsky                       25. N. widow of Ivan Korybutovich               6. Vasili Lvovich Glinsky                             3. Elena Glinskaya                                   28. Jakša Brežičić               14. Stefan Jakšić                       7. Ana Jakšić                             30. Miloš Belmužević               15. Milica Belmužević

See also

• Tsars of Russia family tree
• Tsardom of Russia History of the Tsardom of Russia

References

Notes

1. ^ 28 March: This Date in History. Webcitation.org. Retrieved on 2011-12-07.
2. ^ Russia: Land of the Czars, History Channel
3. ^ History International Channel coverage, 14:00–15:00 EDST on 10 June 2008
4. ^ C. G. Jacobsen (1993). "Myths, Politics and the Not-so-New World Order". Journal of Peace Research 30 (3): 241–250. doi:10.1177/0022343393030003001. JSTOR 424804. 
5. ^ Roy Temple House, Ernst Erich Noth, University of Oklahoma. Books Abroad: An International Literary Quarterly. v. 15, 1941; p. 343. ISSN: 0006-7431.
6. ^ Frank D. McConnell. Storytelling and Mythmaking: Images from Film and Literature. Oxford University Press, 1979. ISBN 0195025725; p. 78: "But Ivan IV, Ivan the Terrible, or as the Russian has it, Ivan groznyi, "Ivan the Magnificent" or "Ivan the Great" is precisely a man who has become a legend"
7. ^ Martin, 331
8. ^ Pushkareva, Women in Russian History, 65–67.
9. ^ Martin, 377.
10. ^ Bogatyrev, 245.
11. ^ ^{a b c} Bogatyrev, 263.
12. ^ Michael C. Paul, "The Military Revolution in Russia 1550–1682", The Journal of Military History 68 No. 1 (January 2004): 9–45, esp. pp. 20–22.
13. ^ Постник. Great Soviet Encyclopedia
14. ^ Барма и Постник (Постник Яковлев) ecology-mef.narod.ru/
15. ^ Постник Барма – строитель собора Василия Блаженного в Москве и Казанского кремля. russiancity.ru
16. ^ Isabel De Madariaga, Ivan the Terrible: First Tsar of Russia (London: Yale University Press, 2005), 176-178; Andrei Pavlov and Maureen Perrie, Ivan the Terrible (London: Pearson Education Limited, 2003), 112-113.
17. ^ Isabel de Madariaga, Ivan the Terrible, page 179-80
18. ^ Isabel De Madariaga, Ivan the Terrible: First Tsar of Russia (London: Yale University Press, 2005), 182-183; Andrei Pavlov and Maureen Perrie, Ivan the Terrible (London: Pearson Education Limited, 2003), 112-113.
19. ^ Andrei Pavlov and Maureen Perrie, Ivan the Terrible (London: Pearson Education Limited, 2003), 113.
20. ^ Isabel de Madariaga, Ivan the Terrible, page 183
21. ^ Martin, 410.
22. ^ R. Skrynnikov, "Ivan Grosny", Moscow, AST, 2001
23. ^ ^{a b} Novgorod, Russia (Capital). 1911encyclopedia.org (2006-10-06). Retrieved on 2011-12-07.
24. ^ Ivan the Terrible, Russia, (r.1533–84). Users.erols.com. Retrieved on 2011-12-07.
25. ^ ^{a b} According to the Third Novgorod Chronicle, the massacre lasted for five weeks. Almost every day 500 or 600 people were killed or drowned.
26. ^ Having investigated the report of Maljuta Skuratov and commemoration lists (sinodiki), R. Skrynnikov considers that the number of victims was 2,000–3,000. (Skrynnikov R. G., "Ivan Grosny", M., AST, 2001)
27. ^ Martin, 407.
28. ^ ХОЖДЕНИЕ НА ВОСТОК ГОСТЯ ВАСИЛИЯ ПОЗНЯКОВА С ТОВАРИЩИ (The travels to the Orient by the merchant Vasily Poznyakov and his companions) (Russian)
29. ^ Russian chronicles record about 40 attacks of Kazan Khans on Russian territories (mainly the regions of Nizhniy Novgorod, Murom, Vyatka, Vladimir, Kostroma, and Galich) in the first half of the 16th century. In 1521 the combined forces of Khan Mehmed Giray and his Crimean allies attacked Russia, captured more than 150,000 slaves The Full Collection of the Russian Annals, vol.13, SPb, 1904
30. ^ Новгородская вторая летопись. Год 7080(1572).ПСРЛ т. III, СПб, 1841
31. ^ "Иван IV Грозный / Родион Константинович Щедрин – Стихиры (Первый отечественный компакт-диск)". http://www.intoclassics.net/news/2009-08-09-7942. 
32. ^ "Raritet-CD". http://www.raritet-cd.ru/. 
33. ^ Kuzin, Viktor. "Первый русский компакт-диск". http://www.rarity.ru/CONSALTING.htm. 
34. ^ D.S. Mirsky. A History of Russian Literature. Northwestern University Press, 1999. ISBN 0-8101-1679-0. Page 21.
35. ^ Edward L. Keenan, The Kurbskii-Groznyi Apocrypha: the 17th-Century Genesis of the "Correspondence" Attributed to Prince A. M. Kurbskii and Tsar Ivan IV (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1971)
36. ^ Martin, 328–329.
37. ^ ^{a b} Waliszewski, Kazimierz; Mary Loyd (1904). Ivan the Terrible. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott. pp. 377–78. http://books.google.com/books?id=IEEEAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA377. 
38. ^ Yanov, 31.
39. ^ Yanov, 68.
40. ^ Riasanovsky, Nicholas V., and Mark D. Steinberg. "Russia at the Time of Ivan IV, 1533–1598" in A History of Russia 8th ed. Vol. 1. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011, 151.
41. ^ Yanov, 69.
42. ^ Yanov, 70.
43. ^ Shrynnikov, Ruslan G. "Conclusion" in Ivan the Terrible, translated by Hugh F. Graham. Moscow: Academic International, 1975, 199.
44. ^ Martin, 404.
45. ^ Martin, 415.
46. ^ Maureen, Perrie. The Cult of Ivan the Terrible in Stalin's Russia. New York: Palgrava, 2001.
47. ^ Perrie, Maureen. The Image of Ivan the Terrible in Russian Folklore. Cambridge, UK: Pitt Building, 1987. Google Books. 2002. Web. 6 February 2011.
48. ^ "Russians Laud Ivan the Not So Terrible; Loose Coalition Presses Orthodox Church to Canonize the Notorious Czar" Washington Post, 10 November 2003
49. ^ "Church says nyet to St. Rasputin" UPI NewsTrack, 4 October 2004

Bibliography

• Bogatyrev, Sergei. "10. Ivan IV (1533–1584)". in The Cambridge History of Russia Vol. 1: From Early Rus' to 1689 Maureen Perrie (Ed.) Cambridge Histories Online (2006) doi:10.1017/CHOL9780521812276.011 ISBN 0521812275.
• Martin, Janet. "Ivan IV the Terrible" in Medieval Russia 980–1584 2nd ed. 1993. Reprint, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007 ISBN 0521859166.
• Yanov, Alexander. The Origins of Autocracy. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1981 ISBN 0520042824.

General references

• Bobrick, Benson. Ivan the Terrible. Edinburgh: Canongate Books, 1990 (hardcover, ISBN 0-86241-288-9). (Also published as Fearful Majesty)
• Hosking, Geoffrey. Russia and the Russians: A History. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004 (paperback, ISBN 0-674-01114-7).
• Madariaga, Isabel de. Ivan the Terrible. First Tsar of Russia. New Haven; London: Yale University Press, 2005 (hardcover, ISBN 0-300-09757-3); 2006 (paperback, ISBN 0-300-11973-9).
• Payne, Robert; Romanoff, Nikita. Ivan the Terrible. Lanham, Maryland: Cooper Square Press, 2002 (paperback, ISBN 0-8154-1229-0).
• Troyat, Henri. Ivan the Terrible. New York: Buccaneer Books, 1988 (hardcover, ISBN 0-88029-207-5); London: Phoenix Press, 2001 (paperback, ISBN 1-84212-419-6).
• Ivan IV, World Book Inc, 2000. World Book Encyclopedia.

Further reading

• Cherniavsky, Michael. "Ivan the Terrible as Renaissance Prince", Slavic Review, Vol. 27, No. 2. (Jun., 1968), pp. 195–211.
• Hunt, Priscilla. "Ivan IV's Personal Mythology of Kingship", Slavic Review, Vol. 52, No. 4. (Winter, 1993), pp. 769–809.
• Perrie, Maureen. The Image of Ivan the Terrible in Russian Folklore (Cambridge Studies in Oral and Literate Culture; 14). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987 (hardcover, ISBN 0-521-33075-0); 2002 (paperback, ISBN 0-521-89100-0).
• Perrie, Maureen. The Cult of Ivan the Terrible in Stalin's Russia (Studies in Russian and Eastern European History and Society) . New York: Palgrave, 2001 (hardcopy, ISBN 0-333-65684-9).
• Perrie, Maureen; Pavlov, Andrei. Ivan the Terrible (Profiles in Power). Harlow, UK: Longman, 2003 (paperback, ISBN 0-582-09948-X).
• Platt, Kevin M.F.; Brandenberger, David. "Terribly Romantic, Terribly Progressive, or Terribly Tragic: Rehabilitating Ivan IV under I.V. Stalin", Russian Review, Vol. 58, No. 4. (Oct., 1999), pp. 635–654.
• Isolde Thyrêt, "The Royal Women of Ivan IV's Family and the Meaning of Forced Tonsure," in Anne Walthall (ed), Servants of the Dynasty: Palace Women in World History (Berkeley, Univ. California Press, 2008) (California World History Library, 7), 159-171.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Ivan IV of Russia

• The throne of Ivan the Terrible
• The holy gospel of Ivan the Terrible
• The ancestors tsar Ivan IV Vasilyevich the Terrible (in the Russian languages)
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• Ivan the Terrible with videos, images and translations from the Russian Archives and State Museums
• Stalin's scheme to glorify Ivan the Terrible (RT article in English)

Regnal titles
Preceded by Vasili III	Grand Prince of Moscow 1533–1547	Became Tsar
New title Become Tsar	Tsar of Russia 1547–1584	Succeeded by Feodor I
Russian royalty
Preceded by Yury	Heir to the Russian Throne 1530–1533	Succeeded by Yuri Vasilyevich

v d e Sovereigns of the Vladimir-Suzdal Principality, Grand Principality of Moscow, Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire Grand Princes Yuri Dolgorukiy Andrei I Bogolyubsky Mikhail of Vladimir Vsevolod the Big Nest Yuri II of Vladimir Konstantin of Rostov Yuri II of Vladimir Yaroslav II of Vladimir Sviatoslav III of Vladimir Andrey II of Vladimir Alexander Nevsky Yaroslav of Tver Vasily of Kostroma Dmitry of Pereslavl Andrey of Gorodets Mikhail of Tver Yuri of Moscow Dmitry the Terrible Eyes Alexander of Tver Ivan I Simeon the Proud Ivan II Dmitry Donskoy Vasily I Vasily II Ivan III the Great Vasily III Tsars Ivan IV the Terrible Simeon Bekbulatovich Ivan IV the Terrible Feodor I Boris Godunov Feodor II Dmitry II (False Dmitry I) Vasili IV Vladislaus (formally) Michael Alexis Feodor III Ivan V and Peter I the Great (co-rulers) Peter I the Great Emperors and Empresses Peter I the Great Catherine I Peter II Anna Ivan VI Elizabeth Peter III Catherine II the Great Paul Alexander I Nicholas I Alexander II Alexander III Nicholas II

Authority control: LCCN: n50050805 | WorldCat

Persondata
Name	Ivan IV Vasilyevich
Alternative names	Ivan the Terrible
Short description	Tsar of Russia
Date of birth	25 August 1530
Place of birth	Moscow, Russia
Date of death	18 March 1584
Place of death	Moscow, Russia

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