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IVAN IV
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See also:IVAN IV ., called " the Terrible " (1530-1584), See also:tsar of Muscovy, was the son of Vasily [See also:Basil] III. Ivanovich, See also:grand See also:duke of Muscovy, by his second wife, See also:Helena Glinska. See also:Born on the 25th of See also:August 1J30, he was proclaimed grand duke on the See also:death of his See also:father (1533), and took the See also:government into his own hands in 1544, being then fourteen years old. Ivan IV. was in every respect precocious; but from the first there was what we should now See also:call a neurotic See also:strain in his See also:character. His father died when he was three, his See also:mother when he was only seven, and he See also:grew up in a brutal and degrading environment where he learnt to hold human See also:life and human dignity in contempt. He was maltreated by the leading boyars whom successive revolutions placed at the See also:head of affairs, and hence he conceived an inextinguishable hatred of their whole See also:order and a corresponding fondness for the See also:merchant class, their natural enemies. At a very See also:early See also:age he entertained an exalted See also:idea of his own divine authority, and his studies were largely devoted to searching in the Scriptures and the See also:Slavonic See also:chronicles for sanctions and precedents for the exercise and development of his right divine. He first asserted his See also:power by literally throwing to the See also:dogs the last of his See also:boyar tyrants, and shortly afterwards announced his intention of assuming the See also:title of tsar, a title which his father and grandfather had coveted but never dared to assume publicly. On the 16th of See also:January 1547, he was crowned the first See also:Russian tsar by the See also:metropolitan of See also:Moscow; on the 3rd of See also:February in the same See also:year he selected as his wife from among the virgins gathered from all parts of See also:Russia for his inspection, Anastasia Zakharina-Koshkina, the See also:scion of an See also:ancient and See also:noble See also:family better known by its later name of See also:Romanov. Hitherto, by his own showing, the private life of the See also:young tsar had been unspeakably abominable, but his sensitive See also:con-See also:science (he was naturally religious) induced him, in 1550, to summon a Zemsky Sobor or See also:national See also:assembly, the first of its See also:kind, to which made a curious public See also:confession of the sins of his youth, d at the same See also:time promised that the See also:realm of should henceforth be governed justly and mercifully. In 1551 the tsar submitted to a See also:synod of prelates a See also:hundred questions as to the best mode of remedying existing evils, for which See also:reason the decrees of this synod are generally called stoglav or centuria. The decennium extending from 1550 to 156o was the See also:good See also:period of Ivan IV.'s reign, when he deliberately See also:broke away from his disreputable past and surrounded himself with good men of lowly origin. It was not only that he hated and distrusted the boyars, but he was already statesman enough to discern that they could not be fitted into the new order of things which he aimed at introducing. Ivan meditated the regeneration of Muscovy, and the only men who could assist him in his task were men who could look steadily forward to the future because they had no past to look back upon, men who would unflinchingly obey their See also:sovereign because they owed their whole See also:political significance to him alone. The See also:chief of these men of good-will were See also:Alexis Adashev and the See also: Ivan was also the first tsar who dared to attack the See also:Crimea. In 1555 he sent Ivan Sheremetev against See also:Perekop, and Sheremetev routed the Tatars in a See also:great two days' See also:battle at Sudbishenska. Some of Ivan's advisers, including both Sylvester and Adashev, now advised him to make an end of the See also:Crimean khanate, as he had already made an end of the khanatps of Kazan and Astrakhan. But Ivan, wiser in his See also:generation, knew that the thing was impossible, in view of the immense distance to be traversed, and the pre-dominance of the Grand Turk from whom it would have to be wrested. It was upon See also:Livonia that his eyes were fixed, which was comparatively near at See also:hand and promised him a seaboard and See also:direct communication with western Europe. Ivan IV., like See also:Peter I. after him, clearly recognized the See also:necessity of raising Muscovy to the level of her neighbours. He proposed to do so by promoting a wholesale See also:immigration into his tsardom of See also:master-workmen and skilled artificers. But all his neighbours, apprehensive of the consequences of a civilized Muscovy, combined to thwart him. See also: By this time, Ivan had entered upon the second and evil portion of his reign. As early as 1553 he had ceased to See also:trust Sylvester and Adashev, owing to their extraordinary backward- the truce of Ilyusa he at the same time abandoned Ingria to the ness in supporting the claims of his See also:infant son to the See also:throne while he himself See also:lay at the point of death. The ambiguous and ungrateful conduct of the tsar's intimate See also:friends and proteges on this occasion has never been satisfactorily explained, and he had good reason to resent it. Nevertheless, on his recovery, much to his See also:credit, he overlooked it, and they continued to direct affairs for six years longer. Then the dispute about the Crimea arose, and Ivan became convinced that they were mediocre politicians as well as untrustworthy friends. In r56o both of them disappeared from the See also:scene, Sylvester into a monastery at his own See also:request, while Adashev died the same year, in See also:honour-able See also:exile as a See also:general in Livonia. The death of his deeply beloved See also:consort Anastasia and his son See also:Demetrius, and the See also:desertion of his one bosom friend See also:Prince Kurbsky, about the same time, seem to have infuriated Ivan against See also:God and See also:man. During the next ten years (156o-1570) terrible and horrible things happened in the realm of Muscovy. The tsar himself lived in an See also:atmosphere of See also:apprehension, imagining that every man's hand was against him. On the 3rd of See also:December 1564 he quitted Moscow with his whole family. On the 3rd of January 1565 he declared in an open See also:letter addressed to the metropolitan his intention to abdicate. The See also:common See also:people, whom he had always favoured at the expense of the boyars, thereupon implored him to come back on his own terms. He consented to do so, but entrenched himself within a See also:peculiar institution, the oprichina or " See also:separate See also:estate." Certain towns and districts all over Russia were separated from the See also:rest of the realm, and their revenues were assigned to the See also:maintenance of the tsar's new See also:court and See also:household, which was to consist of loco carefully selected boyars and See also:lower dignitaries, with their families and suites, in the midst of whom Ivan henceforth lived exclusively. The oprichina was no constitutional innovation. The duma, or See also:council, still attended to all the details of the administration; the old boyars still retained their ancient offices and dignities. The only difference was that the tsar had cut himself off from them, and they were See also:net even to communicate with him except on extraordinary and exceptional occasions. The oprichniki, as being the exclusive favourites of the tsar, naturally, in their own interests, hardened the tsar's See also:heart against all outsiders, and trampled with impunity upon every one beyond the charmed circle. Their first and most notable victim was See also: Ivan's generals (he himself rarely took the See also: Ivan IV. was undoubtedly a man of great natural ability. His political foresight was extraordinary. He anticipated the ideals of Peter the Great, and only failed in realizing them because his material resources were inadequate. But admiration of his talents must not See also:blind us to his moral worthlessness, nor is it right to See also:cast the blame for his excesses on the brutal and vicious society in which he lived. The same society which produced his infamous favourites also produced St Philip of Moscow, and by refusing to listen to St Philip Ivan sank below even the not very lofty moral See also:standard of his own age. He certainly left See also:Muscovite society worse than he found it, and so prepared the way for the horrors of " the Great Anarchy." Personally, Ivan was tall and well-made, with high shoulders and a broad See also:chest. His eyes were small and restless, his See also:nose hooked, he had a See also:beard and moustaches of imposing length. His See also:face had a sinister, troubled expression; but an enigmatical smile played perpetually around his lips. He was the best educated and the hardest worked man of his age. His memory was astonishing, his See also:energy indefatigable. As far as possible he saw to everything personally, and never sent away a petitioner of the lower orders. See S. M. Solov'ev, History of Russia (Rus.) vol. v. (St See also:Petersburg, 1895) ; A. See also:Bruckner, Geschichte Russlands bas zum Ende See also:des z8ten Jahrhunderls (See also:Gotha, 1896); E. Tikhomirov, The first Tsar of Moscovy, Ivan IV. (Rus.) (Moscow, 1888); L. G. T. Tidander, Kriget mellan Sverige och Ryssland dren 1555-1557 (See also:Vesteras, 1888) ; P. Pierling, Un See also:Arbitrage pontifical au XVIe siecle entre la Pologne et la Russie (Bruxelles, 1890) ; V. V. Novodvorsky, The Struggle for Livonia, 157o-1582 (Rus.) (St Petersburg, 1904); K. Waliszewski, Ivan le terrible (See also:Paris, 1904) ; R. N. See also:Bain, Slavonic Europe, ch. 5 (See also:Cambridge, 1907). IvAN V .l (1666-1696), tsar of Russia, was the son of Tsar Alexius Mikhailovich and his first consort Miloslavzkoya. Physically and mentally deficient, Ivan was the See also:mere See also:tool of the party in Muscovy who would have kept the See also:children of the tsar Alexis, by his second consort Natalia Naruishkina, from the throne. In 1682 the party of progress, headed by Artamon See also:Matvyeev and the tsaritsa Natalia, passed Ivan over and placed his half-See also:brother, the vigorous and promising little tsarevich Peter, on the throne. On the 23rd of May, however, the Naruishkin See also:faction was overthrown by the stryeltsi (musketeers), secretly worked upon by Ivan's half-See also:sister See also:Sophia, and Ivan was associated as tsar with Peter. Three days later he was proclaimed " first tsar," in order still further to depress the Naruishkins, and See also:place the government in the hands of Sophia exclusively. In 1689 the name of Ivan was used as a pretext by Sophia in her See also:attempt to oust Peter from the throne altogether. Ivan was made to distribute beakers of See also:wine to his sister's adherents with his own hands, but subsequently, beneath the influence of his See also:uncle Prozorovsky, he openly declared that " even for his sister's 1 Ivan V., if we See also:count from the first grand duke of that name, as most Russian historians do; Ivan II., if, with the minority, we reckon from Ivan the Terrible as the first Russian tsar. See also:sake, he would See also:quarrel no longer with his dear brother." During the reign of his colleague Peter, Ivan V. took no See also:part whatever in affairs, but devoted himself " to incessant See also:prayer and rigorous See also:fasting." On the 9th of January 1684 he married Praskovia Saltuikova, who bore him five daughters, one of whom, See also:Anne, ultimately ascended the Russian throne. In his last years Ivan was a paralytic. He died on the 29th of January 1696. See R. Nisbet Bain, The First Romanovs (See also:London, 1905); M. P. Pogodin, The First Seventeen Years of the Life of Peter the Great (Rus.) (Moscow, 1875). Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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