On August 25, 1530, in the family of the Grand Duke of All Russia Vasily III and the Lithuanian princess Elena Glinskaya, a son was born - Ivan Vasilyevich, known today as Tsar Ivan the Terrible. In 1533, the Grand Duke died of blood poisoning, declaring Ivan his heir before his death.

"Sovereign autocrat"

Until Ivan was eight years old, power in Russia belonged to his mother Elena, but in 1538 she died under unexplained circumstances - according to one version, she was poisoned. Intrigues began around the throne. The boyars, who were considered the guardians of the young prince, launched a fierce struggle for power. This, according to some historians, had a strong influence on Ivan's worldview. According to the tsar's recollections, he and his brother Yuri were subjected to deprivation by the boyars even in clothing and food.

In 1545, Ivan officially became an adult and was given the opportunity to rule on his own. Soon, as historians note, he raised the question of getting the royal title. What led him to this idea, experts find it difficult to answer, but already in 1547 Ivan Vasilievich was married to the kingdom.

“This was one of the most important moments in our history. The Russian state became a kingdom and defender of Orthodoxy on a global scale, and assumed imperial functions. Ivan Vasilyevich himself acquired the status of the world's only Orthodox sovereign autocrat, "said in an interview with RT a professor at the Faculty of Political Science of Moscow State University. M.V. Lomonosov, Doctor of Historical Sciences Sergei Perevezentsev.

Later the royal dignity of Ivan Vasilievich was approved by the Patriarch of Constantinople and officially recognized by a number of European monarchs.

Soon after the wedding to the kingdom, Ivan Vasilyevich decided to marry. During the show of brides, he opted for Anastasia Zakharyina-Yuryeva, a representative of the family that will go down in Russian history as the Romanovs. However, the king's wife died 13 years later after a serious illness.

  • Vasily III blesses his son Ivan IV before his death
  • © runivers.ru / Wikipedia

The boyar elite did not like the queen for her insufficiently noble origin. Ivan the Terrible suspected that his wife had been poisoned, and this further complicated his relationship with the boyars.

Tsar reformer

According to the adviser to the rector of Moscow State Pedagogical University Yevgeny Spitsyn, historians often associate the initial period of the tsarist reign of Ivan Vasilyevich with the activities of the body known as the "Chosen Council" - a circle of statesmen close to the tsar. There is still no reliable information about this association, but it is known that the term was introduced by Prince Andrei Kurbsky, who fled from Russia. Therefore, assessments of the activities of the "Chosen Rada" among historians differ - some consider it a prototype of the Russian government, others just a myth.

Nevertheless, it was during the period of the alleged functioning of the "Chosen Rada" (late 1540s - 1550s) that Tsar Ivan Vasilyevich carried out a number of important reforms.

“In Russia, the component of self-government in the system of authorities was significantly expanded,” Perevezentsev explained.

According to him, this happened within the framework of the Zemsky reform, which introduced a number of elective administrative and judicial positions and transferred many administrative powers to the localities.

"An important role in the history of Russia was played by the military reforms of Ivan Vasilyevich, who streamlined the system of recruiting troops and changed their command and control structures, tax reforms, reforms of state power in general," said Yevgeny Spitsyn.

As historians remind, it was on the initiative of the tsar that an integral system of executive authorities - the so-called orders - was formed, and a unified code of laws - the Sudebnik was adopted, which made it possible to suppress the separatism of the boyars and appanage principalities.

  • Wedding to the kingdom of Ivan the Terrible
  • © sterligoff.ru / Wikipedia

According to Sergei Perevezentsev, on the eastern borders Ivan Vasilyevich eliminated the threat posed by the “fragments of the Golden Horde” - the Kazan and Astrakhan khanates. In 1552 and 1556 they were conquered and annexed to Russia. Later, under Ivan Vasilievich, the development of the Urals and Siberia was also begun. He successfully developed trade and diplomatic relations with both Western European (England, Netherlands) and Eastern countries.

Ambiguous estimates

As Yevgeny Spitsyn notes, in 1558 Ivan Vasilievich decided to provide the Russian kingdom with a wide access to the Baltic and began the Livonian War. At the same time, according to the historian, this decision is today assessed ambiguously. Many contemporaries considered more promising actions against the Crimean Khanate in order to gain access to the Black Sea.

“Ivan Vasilievich is being criticized today for his defeat in the Livonian War. However, there is an opinion in historiography that this war should be viewed as a complex of different campaigns, in most of which Moscow initially won victories, ”said Sergei Perevezentsev.

Russian troops defeated the forces of the Livonian Confederation and inflicted a series of painful defeats on the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Most of the modern Baltic states came under Moscow's control. However, in the mid-1560s, the internal political situation in Russia became more complicated. In 1564, the Russian corps was defeated by the Lithuanians on the Ulla River, rumors spread about the participation of the Moscow nobility in a conspiracy against the tsar.

At the beginning of 1565, Ivan Vasilyevich divided the country's territory into two parts: Zemshchina and Oprichnina. And, if the old order remained in the Zemshchina, then a special regime was introduced in the oprichnina. Traditional rights and privileges of the clan aristocracy were abolished on its territory. Those who criticized the tsar were subjected to repression. Ivan Vasilyevich relied on a special power structure - the corps of oprichniks, which in its structure resembled a monastic order.

  • Kivshenko Alexey Danilovich (1851-1895) “Conquest of Kazan. Kazan foremen and soldiers before Ivan IV ". 1880 Watercolor
  • © Central Naval Museum, St. Petersburg

“Ivan Vasilyevich strove for exactly the same thing as other Christian monarchs of that time - to defend the faith and not allow the heretics to win, and as such were declared all those who encroached on the current government. This state of affairs existed both in Russia and in England, France, Germany and other countries. At the same time, the methods of the European monarchs who ruled at the same time as Ivan Vasilyevich were often much more cruel, ”said Sergei Perevezentsev.

According to him, the severity and rigidity on the part of the monarch was taken for granted. However, at the same time, society expected from the Christian sovereign that under certain circumstances he could show mercy, but this was exactly what Ivan Vasilyevich lacked.

“Within the framework of the Christian worldview, the tsar had a conflict with Metropolitan Philip,” noted Perevezentsev.

According to a number of sources, when the metropolitan refused to bless the monarch's campaign against Novgorod, he was killed by one of the leaders of the oprichnina Malyuta Skuratov.

  • Livonian War. The capture of Narva by Ivan the Terrible
  • © Wikimedia Commons

The apogee of the guardsmen's activity fell on 1569-1570. Several thousand Novgorodians were executed on suspicion of treason. Then, about 200 representatives of the Moscow nobility were also executed. However, the efforts of the guardsmen did not solve the problems that existed in the country. Attempts to create an alliance with the European powers failed, the central part of Russia suffered greatly during the campaign against Moscow by the Crimean Khan Devlet-Girey. Against this background, Ivan Vasilyevich began to gradually liquidate the oprichnina.

The victory over the Crimean-Turkish army at the Battle of Molody in 1572, according to Sergei Perevezentsev, weakened the Crimean Khanate and secured the southern borders of Russia for many years. At the same time, the Livonian War, in which Russia was now forced to oppose the Polish-Lithuanian-Swedish coalition, from the late 1570s began to develop unsuccessfully for Moscow. In the early 1580s, Russia lost not only the recently acquired, but also its historical lands in the Baltic.

In 1581, Ivan Vasilyevich's son, Tsarevich Ivan Ivanovich, died. According to one of the versions, his father inflicted a fatal wound on him during a quarrel. However, some experts consider this version to be untrue.

In the last years of the reign of Ivan Vasilyevich, the country was gripped by a severe economic crisis, associated, in particular, with the consequences of the Livonian War.

  • Reconstruction of the appearance of Ivan IV on the skull, performed by anthropologist Mikhail Gerasimov
  • © Shakko / Wikipedia

On March 28, 1584, after a long illness, Tsar Ivan Vasilyevich died. According to some historians, he was poisoned by representatives of the nobility.

“Ivan Vasilyevich was a talented person in many respects, but of course, you cannot call him an impeccable leader. He was sincerely convinced that his unlimited power is a blessing, "said Igor Kurukin, professor of the Russian State Humanitarian University, Doctor of Historical Sciences, in an interview with RT.

During the reign of Ivan the Terrible, the territory of Russia has almost doubled - from 2.8 million sq. km to 5.4 million sq. km. He succeeded not only in the military-political sphere. Under him, book printing began to develop in Russia.

According to Sergei Perevezentsev, data on the tsar's special cruelty were transferred to Russian historiography from Western sources, and they cannot always be considered completely reliable.

“The more cruel European contemporaries of Ivan Vasilyevich are still perceived as national heroes, and they react to him with a fair amount of bias. If we consider the figure of the king in the existing historical context, then he cannot be called an absolute tyrant. And objectively, he achieved a number of successes. Probably the most important among them is the strengthening of state unity, ”concluded Sergei Perevezentsev.