Ivan IV of Russia

Ivan IV Vassiliévitch (in Russian ИванВасильевич), known as Ivan the Terrible (ИванГрозный), born the August 25th 1530 with Kolomenskoïe, dead the March 18th 1584 with Moscow, large-prince de Vladimir and Moscow of 1533 to 1584, first tsar of Russia of 1547 to 1584.

Biography

Wire of Vassili III (1479-1533) and of its second wife, Héléna Glinska (? - 1538), it succeeds his father dead of this one, the December 4th 1533. Too much young person to reign, the capacity is submitted to a council of regency led by his mother, Elena, and by twenty Boyard S. This one dies the April 3rd 1538, probably poisoned, and the capacity is divided then between various factions of families of boyards (Chouïski, Glinski, Bielski).

It is in this environment of hatred and death that Ivan passed its childhood, in perpetual fear to be assassinated. Its leisures are divided between the torture of animals, hunting, the ill-treatment of the villages around.

Autodidact, it is interested nevertheless in the Holy Scriptures and through prosterner in front of the icon S, its face carries the trace of a callosity. At 16 years, it joined the army with Kolomna, where this one has just taken an action against the Tatars, it made there carry out 50 Arquebusier S of Novgorod carrying a petition about vexations which they undergo.

He is crowned Tsar in Moscow the January 16th 1547 with the Cathédrale of the Assumption. He is the first reigning tsar. More than one title in its eyes, he believes himself invested of a divine mission, and its nomination was devoted only in 1561 by the Greek patriarch Iosaphe of Constantinople.

It Marie the February 3rd 1547 in the cathedral of the Assumption with Anastasia Romanovna Zakharine (1520-1560) which gave him five children: Anna Ivanovna (1548-1550), Maria Ivanovna (1551-?), Dimitri Ivanovitch (1552-1553) 1st tsarévitch, Ivan Ivanovitch (1554-1581) 2nd tsarévitch (which married Eudoxie Sabourova, Prascovia Solova, Elena Cheremetieva), Fédor Ier (1557-1598) 3rd tsarévitch which married Irene Godounova.

In 1561, does Ivan IV marry Maria Kabardie-Temriouk (? - 1569) girl of the prince tcherkess Temriouk who gives him a son: Vassili Ivanovitch (1563-1563). It remaria in 1571 with Marthe Sobakine (? - 1571), in 1572 with Anna Koltovskaïa (? - 1626) divorced in 1575, 1575 with Anna Vassiltchikova (? -?) divorced in 1576, 1576 with Vassilissa Melentieva (? -?) divorced in 1577, 1580 with Maria Fédorovna Nagoï (? - 1612) which gave him a son: Dimitri Ivanovitch (October 18th, 1583 - May 15th, 1591). Following the fires of Moscow of 1547 which caused thousands of deaths, abandoned Ivan being believed of God decides to convene representatives of all the areas of the Russia. This assembly took place in 1550 and Ivan promised there to defend the people against oppression and the injustice. But this assembly also allowed him to force her code tsarien ( tsarski soudiebnik ) to replace that of her grandfather Ivan III which went back to 1497.

The first years of its reign are devoted to a modernization of Russia. It also placed at the key post offices of the empire of people of modest means who were acquired to him, rather than the conceited boyards. It establishes a code of laws in 1550, reorganizes the clergy in 1551, by subjecting it to the State, and creates the body of the Streltsy, a body of infantry constituting the personal guard of the tsar. It also holds, in 1549, the first meeting of the Zemski sobor (земскийсобор, “assembled ground”, first Russian Parliament of the type of feudal State), a council the noble ones consulted at the time of the great decisions. A new code of laws ( sudiebnik ) and the royal diplomas ( ustavnye, otkupnye gramoty ) widen the participation of the country elective representatives in the legal procedure and local management. The first press to print is introduced under its reign.

Starting from 1560, however, the mode hardens. The first laws restricting the freedom of the peasants are taken, who lead then to the serfdom. Ivan IV launches out in a mode of terror against the boyards which he hates since his youth. In 1564, it constitutes the Opritchnina , the royal field, had personally by the tsar. It is managed by its special police force, the opritchiniki , which quickly become local despots, terrorizing the population and the noble ones, imposing the conscription forced for the face livonien (see below).

Outside, Ivan IV ensures the extension of the empire. The Swedish, the Polish and the Tatar S irritate it at the most point and it is against them that it will conduct its first military campaigns. It annexes the Khan ATS of Kazan and Astrakhan in 1552 and 1556, which puts an end to the incursions devastators combatants of Kazan into the areas of the North-East of Russia, embarrasses the migration of the wandering aggressive hordes of Asia in Europe and gives to the empire an access to the the Volga. After two failures in 1547 and 1549, Ivan leaves Moscow the June 16th 1552 with the head of an army of 100 000 men says one. Those made up of heteroclite elements, like the Strélitz, infantrymen provided with firearms or troops (Possokha) neither aguerries nor disciplined provided by the cities and the campaigns are for the first time ordered by officers named with the merit and not by the birth. The October 2nd 1552, Kazan, capital of Tatars, becomes Russian after rough combat. To celebrate this victory, Ivan made build in Moscow the cathedral Saint-Basile. The construction of this one lasted 6 years and according to the legend, the eyes of its architect, Barma Iakovlev, would have been burst so that this one cannot rebuild another also beautiful.

It pushes back the Tatares and opens with the English the White Mer and the port of Arkhangelsk. In 1558, it engages in the Russo-livonienne war, long war which, after him to have ensured an outlet on the the Baltic, finishes in 1583 by a defeat against a coalition joining together the Poland, the Sweden, the Lithuania and the Chevaliers teutonic of Livonie.

1567,1568,1569 are the years of the bad harvest and the epidemic of plague, which cause the immense mortality of the population.

The khanat of the Crimea constantly ruins the frontier grounds of Russia to the reign of Ivan IV (see also Invasions of Tatars of the Crimea in Russia). In 1571 the khan of the Crimea burns Moscow, but the following year Tatars of the Crimea are overcome not far from Moscow (the battle of Molodi).

In 1570 the Polish and Swedish detachments ruin the territories of north and Westerners of Russia, the army of the Polish king Stefan Batory removes the garrisons and the population of some Russian cities.

At the end of the reign of Ivan IV, Russia finds itself bled by a 25 year old war. In 1581, it kills his/her oldest son, probably in an access of anger. With its death, in 1584, it leaves two wire, Fédor Ier and Dimitri V, to which it bequeaths Russia in crisis, at the same time economically, socially and politically, crisis which ends only in the accession with the throne of the first of the Romanov in 1613.

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