Ivan IV Vasiljevich the Terrible

Ivan IV Vasiljevich
August 25, 1530 - March 18, 1584

Ivan the Terrible
Grand Duke of Moscow
Grand Prince of Moscow
Tsar (Czar) of Russia

Ivan IV Vasiljevich the Terrible (1530-1584) was a Grand Prince "all over the Rus" (since 1533), the first Russian Tsar (since 1547), the son of Vasili III. Since 40s he governed together with elected the Rada. Meeting of the Zemstvo was began at his time, code of laws was compiled in 1550. He reformed the Government and Court (province, zemsky and so on ...). He conquered Kazan Khan (1552) and Astrakhan Khan (1556). For strengthening of state power and unification of Rus he introduced "the oprichnina" in 1565. He took part in Livonian War (1558-1583). Commercial connections with England were set up (1553), the first printing-house was created in Moscow. Joining of Siberia to Russian State was begun (1581). Home policy of Ivan IV was accompanied with repressions and strong enslaving of peasants.

Tsarism began on Jan. 16, 1547, with the crowning of Russian Grand Prince Ivan Vassilyevich IV as tsar. He would later be known as Ivan the Terrible because of his ruthlessness. However, despite his cruelty, Ivan the Terrible was also a talented ruler.

Four hundred and fifty years ago this month, Ivan the Terrible became the first Russian ruler to hold the title 'tsar.' Andrei Yurganov examines the life of this exceptionally talented and cruel ruler, and discovers that his legacy goes far beyond the founding of a 470-year institution.

IVAN IV [Ivan IV] or Ivan the Terrible, 1530-84, grand duke of Moscow (1533-84), the first Russian ruler to assume formally the title of czar.

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.

Ivan the Terrible succeeded his father Vasilii III and was the first Grand Prince to have himself officially crowned tsar. With his reign, Russia became a fully autocratic state. He succeeded to the throne at the age of three and regents ruled for him until at the age of 16 he had himself crowned tsar. He also married Anastasia who was a member of the Romanov boyar family. As a boy, Ivan IV suffered under the regents. While he was treated with respect in public, in private he was often neglected and tortured. He also witnessed the boyars fighting to come to power. These two things are believed to have caused Ivan IV to be cruel. As a child he was known to torture animals, and as an adult his actions earned him the name Ivan the Terrible. He was also very suspicious of the boyars and heavily persecuted them. This too may have been from seeing the actions of the boyars when he was a child.

Ivan IV's reign is usually divided into two parts. During the first half, the good period, Ivan IV ruled with the advise of a council. In 1549 he called together a zemskii sobor, assembly of the land, and then in 1550 established a new law code. He also updated the army and was initially successfully in military matters, defending Russia's borders to the east. However, he suffered losses when trying to expand his territories westward. The second half of Ivan IV's reign is known as the bad period. During this time he discontinued using a council of advisors and became especially suspicious of the boyars. He gained the authority to rule with complete autonomy when he threatened to abdicate the throne but was asked to continue his rule. This threat was calculated by Ivan IV to give him more power and he got it by agreeing to remain in power but only if he could rule without the moral guidelines of the church.

After this, Russia was divided into two areas. In the region known as the Oprichnina Ivan IV had sole control. In the other, the boyar Duma was to have direct rule. This agreement was never carried out though and Ivan IV had sole rule over the entire nation. He used the Oprichniki, a militia which was loyal to him to terrorize the country. Ivan IV became famous for torturing and executing thousands of people. Even members of the Russian Orthodox church were not exempt from Ivan IV's executions. The church had traditionally been a check on the power of the rulers, however when church leaders expressed disagreement with Ivan' IV's policies they were often tortured and executed. Oddly, Ivan IV was a member of the Russian Orthodox church and he offered prayers for those he had executed.

Ivan the Terrible

Stalin admired him. The rest of Europe believed he was mad. What is certain is that he was one of the most ruthless tyrants in history.

The name 'Ivan the Terrible' conjours up images of senseless cruelty and paranoia. Yet, for many in Russia, he is a national hero. Ivan appears to be a man of huge contradictions - a man of God who personally tortured his victims and beat his own son to death; a hardened despot who often behaved like a coward, asking his ally, Elizabeth I of England, for political asylum; a man who believed himself chosen to save the souls of his people, but who brutally put thousands to death in carefully orchestrated purges.

Born in 1530, Ivan was only three when he inherited the Russian throne following his father's death. At the age of seven, tragedy struck again when his mother was poisoned by nobles at court. By his early teens, he was already displaying some of his uglier traits. He would throw live animals from towers and appeared to derive pleasure from doing so.

Ivan was crowned Russia's first Tsar at the age of 17. Three weeks later he married, having chosen his bride in a national virgin competition. Virgins over the age of twelve were brought to the Kremlin to be paraded before him. He chose Anastasia, the daughter of a minor noble, and their marriage proved to be a very close one.

Ivan had huge ambitions for his new Imperial dynasty. He launched a holy war against Russia's traditional enemy - the Tartars - showing no mercy to these Muslim peoples and decimating their cultural heritage. Ivan's conquest of Kazan and later Astrakhan and Siberia gave birth to a sixteenth century personality cult glorifying him as the Orthodox crusader.

His wife Anastasia helped to hold his cruelty in check, but in 1560 she died. He accused his nobles of poisoning her, and became even more mentally unstable. Until recently, most scholars have dismissed Ivan's accusation of murder as evidence of his paranoia. But recent forensic tests on Anastasia's remains have revealed more than ten times the normal levels of mercury in her hair. It is likely, that Anastasia was indeed murdered, sending Ivan into a downward spiral of murder and cruelty.

He set up a bodyguard that has been described as Russia's first 'secret police' - the Oprichniki - as a religious brotherhood sworn to protecting God's Tsar. In reality, they became marauding thugs, ready to commit any crime in the Tsar's name. Ivan sentenced thousands to internal exile in far flung parts of the empire. Others were condemned to death; their families and servants often killed as well. Ivan would give detailed orders about the executions, using biblically inspired tortures to reconstruct the sufferings of hell. More than 3,000 people lost their lives in Ivan's attack on Novgorod alone. In a fit of rage, Ivan struck his son and heir dead with his staff. Mad with sorrow and guilt, he had a dramatic volte face, posthumously forgiving all those he'd executed and paying for prayers to be said for their souls. Before his death, Ivan was re-christened as the monk Jonah and buried in his monk's habit - in the hope of finding ultimate forgiveness.

I
Introduction

Ivan IV Vasilyevich or Ivan the Terrible (1530-1584), grand prince of Muscovy (1533-1584) and the first formally proclaimed tsar of Russia (1547-1584). One of Russia’s most brutal and notorious rulers, Ivan oversaw the vast expansion of his country and then brought it to near ruin. He was the penultimate ruler of the house of Ryurik, Russia’s first dynasty.

Ivan was the first child of Grand Prince Vasily III of Muscovy (the official name of the Russian state at that time) and his second wife, Elena Glinskaya. Vasily died in 1533, leaving Ivan fatherless and nominally grand prince. Although Elena became regent, her power was continually challenged by the boyars (nobles). She died suddenly in 1538, apparently from poisoning, leaving eight-year-old Ivan an orphan. Until Ivan was 17, when he was officially crowned, feuding boyars fought each other for control of Muscovy. During his youth, Ivan is reported to have exhibited numerous acts of extraordinary sadism, an inclination toward cruelty that was displayed later in his reign.
II
Early Reign

In 1547 the head of the Russian Orthodox Church arranged an elaborate coronation for Ivan that added the title tsar (from the Roman imperial title caesar) to the traditional title of grand prince. Ivan was the first Russian prince to take that title, which was intended to convey the exalted image of the ruler as the representative of God. The idea that a Russian monarch derived the right to rule directly from God was developed in the early 1500s by the Russian Orthodox abbot Joseph of Volokolamsk, who advocated the divine right of kings. Shortly after he was crowned, Ivan married Anastasia Romanovna, the first of his seven wives.

From 1547 to 1560 Ivan is believed to have governed with the aid of a talented group of advisers dubbed the Chosen Council. It is unknown who wielded more power, Ivan or the council. During those years a number of reforms were instituted to bring stability to Muscovy after the chaos of Ivan’s minority (the years before he was crowned). The Sudebnik, the country’s law code, was expanded in 1550 and widely used. An infantry corps, known as the streltsy, was created. Armed with long guns, the streltsy bolstered the strength of the Muscovite army. Muscovy forcibly annexed Kazan’, a Tatar (a people of Turkic origin) khanate (a state ruled by a khan) on the Middle Volga in 1552, and Astrakhan’, a Tatar khanate on the Lower Volga, in 1556. These annexations removed all military threat to Muscovy’s eastern flank and cut the Turkic world in two. They also removed a major barrier to Muscovy’s eastward expansion to the Ural Mountains and into Siberia, begun by Cossack raiders under Yermak in 1581.

In the 1550s the corrupt system of provincial administration underwent major reform. Since the 1300s, governors had been sent from Moscow (the seat of the Muscovy government) to govern the provinces. Not accountable to the territories they were assigned, these governors wrung money and food from the populace while often providing little in the way of good government in return. Reform began in the 1490s when local officials were appointed to oversee the rebuilding of Muscovy's fortresses and then given other assignments. In the 1530s local police officials were appointed to try to stamp out crime, which was rampant during the disorder of Ivan’s minority years. Then in 1552, Moscow, needing revenue to invade Kazan’, embarked on a plan to sell what was left of provincial administration to the locals. This was so successful that the sale of provincial civil administration was completed in 1556 to raise funds for the Astrakhan’ campaign. The tsar’s treasury benefited, but the Russian people benefited also, as locally elected officials replaced the exploitative governors sent from Moscow. These officials were still responsible to the central government, to which they had to submit semiannual reports.

Ivan also expanded a program to increase government ownership and control of land, while bolstering his army and weakening the nobles’ power. In this program, begun by his grandfather Ivan III in the 1480s, the government confiscated privately held land in annexed principalities or set aside state property and turned it over to cavalrymen who pledged continual service to the tsar. (In some cases, land was also seized in Muscovy from princes deemed treasonous.) In 1556 Ivan exerted control over the boyars and princes who still held private lands in Muscovy by requiring them and their personal slave soldiers to serve in the cavalry as well. By forcing them into the “service class,” Ivan took away the Russian nobility’s independence. The country’s vast lower class, the peasants, also saw their lot worsened during Ivan’s reign. Much of the land turned over to the military servicemen had been state land worked by free peasants. With the introduction of a landholder, burdened himself by military obligations to the tsar, the peasants met with more restrictions and demands. The system gradually turned many peasants into serfs, bound to the land they tilled. In 1581 Ivan even issued an edict forbidding some peasants on service lands from moving.

The first big mistake of Ivan IV's reign was the Livonian War (1558-1583). After the annexation of the Volga, Muscovy had two expansionist alternatives: either to conquer and annex the Crimean khanate, which was ceaselessly raiding Russia and Poland for slaves; or to reconquer Slavic lands to the west which had been annexed by Livonia, Lithuania, and Poland. Adopting a defensive posture toward Crimea (which Russia proved unable to annex until 1783), the Russians plunged into an unsuccessful war against the Livonians on the western front that ultimately contributed to widespread ruin in Russia during Ivan’s reign.

Defeats in the Livonian War aggravated Ivan’s unstable psychological condition. He had begun to show irrational suspicion of those around him in 1553, when he fell ill and the boyars refused to take an oath of allegiance to his infant son, Dmitry. Recalling the feuds of Ivan’s minority years, they preferred an adult successor. Ivan viewed their refusal as treason. When his wife Anastasia died in 1560, Ivan believed she had been poisoned in a plot by the boyars and members of the Chosen Council, and had the council members exiled. Setbacks in the Livonian War led to the defection of some military commanders fearful of the tsar's wrath.
III
Later Reign

In December 1564 Ivan left Moscow with some of his court, supposedly to visit various monasteries. In reality, the paranoid tsar had abandoned the capital, taking valuables and relatives with him. In January 1565 he set down his terms for returning. His perceived enemies were to be punished, and the state was to be split in two: the oprichnina, which was to be Ivan’s personal domain and subject to his absolute control, and the zemshchina, which would be ruled by a council of boyars. When Ivan returned to the capital in February 1565, the hair on his head had fallen out and his beard had turned white, signs of major psychological stress.

The oprichnina (1565-1572) was one of the most bizarre episodes in all of Russian history. It is rivaled only by Joseph Stalin's Great Purge of 1936-1938, with which it is often compared. There were two main periods in the oprichnina, which mirrored the unfolding of Ivan's paranoia. In the first period, from 1565 to 1566, a number of princes were exiled to Kazan’, and all of their properties were confiscated and distributed to Ivan’s special corps of cavalrymen, the oprichniki. In 1566 Ivan allowed some of the princes to return to their devastated estates. When Ivan convened the zemsky sobor (an assembly of boyars, clergy, and cavalrymen) later that year to advise the government on whether the disastrous Livonian War should be continued, a number of the delegates complained about the oprichnina.

This set off the second and most lethal stage of the oprichnina. Among those killed in the second period (1566-1571) was the head of the church, Metropolitan Filipp Kolychëv, who had criticized the oprichnina, and Prince Vladimir Staritsky, selected as the candidate to replace Ivan had he died from his illness in 1553. In 1570 the oprichniki sacked Novgorod and massacred many of its citizens because individuals there had links to Ivan’s perceived enemies. All relatives and slaves of the victims were also murdered. Ivan talked of abdicating or fleeing to England. The second stage of the oprichnina wreaked so much havoc that the Crimean Tatars were able to sack Moscow in 1571, and much of the land around Moscow was depopulated. In 1572 the oprichniki were disbanded after their failure to defend Moscow.

That same year Ivan resumed rule over all of Muscovy, much of which was in ruins. But in 1575 he farcically abdicated in favor of a Christianized Tatar, Simeon Bekbulatovich, for a year. The tragedies of Ivan's existence were not yet over. In 1582 his daughter-in-law Elena appeared immodestly dressed and Ivan censured her. His son Ivan Ivanovich rose to defend his wife, whereupon the tsar killed his son, his only possible respectable heir. This left as heir Ivan’s feebleminded son Fyodor (reigned 1584-1598), the last Ryurikid ruler in a line that extended back seven centuries. Another son, Dmitry, was considered illegitimate because his mother was Ivan's seventh wife (the church only permitted three marriages, and recognized none of Ivan’s later wives). Dmitry either killed himself playing with a knife or was murdered in 1591. Two years after killing Ivan Ivanovich, Ivan died in Moscow while playing chess, probably the victim of a heart attack. A Soviet forensic examination of his remains revealed that he had taken mercury as medicine, but no signs of foul play were discovered.
IV
Evaluation

Ivan left Russia an empire, thanks to the annexation of the non-Russian lands in the Volga region and areas east of the Volga in the Urals and Siberia. Russia would become a world power with the development of Siberia’s abundant natural resources. However, much of the old heartland was in shambles. What remained of Russian society had changed dramatically during Ivan’s rule. With the expansion of the service class, many princes and other members of the elite had to answer to the tsar and no longer rivaled him for power. A new stage in the history of the enserfment of the peasantry also began under Ivan.

Ivan IV

The development of the tsar's autocratic powers reached a culmination during the reign of Ivan IV. Ivan, who became known as "the Terrible" or "the Dread," strengthened the position of the tsar to an unprecedented degree, thus demonstrating the risks of unbridled power in the hands of an unbalanced individual. Although apparently intelligent and energetic, he suffered from bouts of paranoia and depression, and his rule was prone to extreme violence.

Ivan IV became grand prince of Muscovy in 1533 at the age of three. Various boyar (see Glossary) factions competed for control over the regency until Ivan assumed the throne in 1547. Reflecting Muscovy's new imperial claims, Ivan was crowned tsar in an elaborate ritual modeled after the coronation of the Byzantine emperors. Ivan continued to be assisted by a group of boyars, and his reign began a series of useful reforms. During the 1550s, a new law code was promulgated, the military was revamped, and local government was reorganized. These reforms were undoubtedly intended to strengthen Muscovy in the face of continuous warfare.

During the late 1550s, Ivan became angry with his advisers, the government, and the boyars. Historians have not determined whether his wrath was caused by policy differences, personal animosities, or mental imbalance. In any case, he divided Muscovy into two parts: his private domain and the public realm. For his private domain, Ivan chose some of the most prosperous and important districts in Muscovy. In these areas, Ivan's agents attacked boyars, merchants, and even common people, summarily executing them and confiscating their land and possessions. A decade of terror descended over Muscovy. As a result of the oprichnina (see Glossary), Ivan broke the economic and political power of the leading boyar families, thereby destroying precisely those persons who had built up Muscovy and were the most capable of running it. Trade was curtailed, and peasants, faced with mounting taxes and physical violence, began to leave central Muscovy. Efforts to curtail the mobility of the peasants brought Muscovy closer to legal serfdom. In 1572 Ivan finally abandoned the practices followed during the oprichnina.

Despite domestic turmoil, Muscovy continued to wage wars and to expand. Ivan defeated and annexed the Kazan' Khanate in 1552 and later the Astrakhan' Khanate. With these victories, Muscovy gained access to the entire Volga River littoral and Central Asia. Muscovy's expansion eastward encountered relatively little resistance. In 1581 the Stroganov merchant family, interested in the fur trade, hired a cossack (see Glossary) leader, Ermak, to lead an expedition into western Siberia. Ermak defeated the Siberian Khanate and claimed the territories west of the Ob' and Irtysh rivers for Muscovy (see fig. 3).

Expanding northwest toward the Baltic Sea proved to be much more difficult. In 1558 Ivan invaded Livonia, which eventually embroiled him in a twenty-five-year war against Poland, Lithuania, Sweden, and Denmark. Despite occasional successes, Ivan's army was pushed back, and Muscovy failed to secure a position on the Baltic Sea. The war drained Muscovy. Some historians believe that the oprichnina was initiated to mobilize resources for the war and to counter opposition to it. In any case, Ivan's domestic and foreign policies were devastating for Muscovy, and they led to a period of social struggle and civil war, the so-called Time of Troubles (1598-1613).

The Oprichnina of Ivan IV
Part 1: The Creation of the Oprichnina

Ivan IV's oprichnina is frequently portrayed as some sort of hell, a time of mass torture and death overseen by sinister black-robed monks, who obeyed their insane Tsar and slaughtered hundreds of thousands of innocent people. The reality is somewhat different, and although the events that created, and eventually ended, the oprichnina are well known, the underlying motives and causes are still unclear.

The Creation of the Oprichnina

In the final months of 1564 Tsar Ivan IV announced an intention to abdicate; he promptly left Moscow with much of his treasure and only a few trusted retainers. They went to Alekandrovsk, a small, but fortified, town to the north where Ivan isolated himself. His only contact with Moscow was through two letters: the first attacking the boyars and the church, and a second reassuring the people of Muscovy that he still cared for them. Ivan may not have been overly popular with the ruling classes - numerous rebellions had been plotted - but without him a struggle for power was inevitable, and a civil war probable. Ivan was asked - some might say begged - to return, but the Tsar made several clear demands: he wanted to create an oprichnina, a territory within Muscovy governed solely and absolutely by him. He also wanted the power to deal with traitors as he wished. Under pressure from the church and the people, the Council of Boyars agreed.

Ivan returned and divided the country into two: the oprichnina and the zemschina. The former was to be his private domain, constructed from any land and property he wished and run by his own administration, the oprichniki. Estimates vary, but between one third and one half of Muscovy became oprichnina. Situated mainly in the north, this land was a piecemeal selection of wealthy and important areas, ranging from whole towns, of which the oprichnina included about twenty, to individual buildings. Moscow was carved up street by street, and sometimes building by building. Existing landowners were often evicted, and their fates varied from resettlement to execution. The rest of Muscovy became the zemschina, which continued to operate under the existing governmental and legal institutions, with a puppet Grand Prince in charge.

Some narratives portray Ivan's flight and threat to abdicate as a fit of pique, or a form of madness stemming from his wife's death in 1560. It is more likely that these actions were a shrewd political trick, albeit tinged with paranoia, designed to give Ivan the bargaining power he needed to rule absolutely. By using his two letters to attack the leading boyars and churchman while also praising the populace, the Tsar had placed great pressure on his would-be opponents, who now faced the possibility of losing public support. This gave Ivan leverage, which he used to create a whole new realm of government. If Ivan had been acting simply out of madness, he was brilliantly opportunistic.

The actual creation of the oprichnina has been viewed in many ways: an isolated kingdom where Ivan could rule by fear, a concerted effort to destroy the Boyars and seize their wealth, or even as an experiment in governing. In practice, the creation of this realm gave Ivan the chance to solidify his power. By seizing strategic and wealthy land the Tsar could employ his own army and bureaucracy, while reducing the strength of his boyar opponents. Loyal members of the lower classes could be promoted, rewarded with new oprichnina land, and given the task of working against traitors. Ivan was able to tax the zemschina and overrule its institutions, while the oprichniki could travel through the whole of the country at will.

But did Ivan intend this? During the 1550's and early 1560's the Tsar's power had come under attack from boyar plots, failure in the Livonian war, and his own temperament. Ivan had fallen ill in 1553 and ordered the ruling boyars to swear oaths of loyalty to his baby son, Dimitrii; several refused, favouring Prince Vladimir Staritsky instead. When the Tsarina died in 1560 Ivan suspected poison, and two of the Tsar's previously loyal advisors were subjected to a rigged trial and sent away to their deaths. This situation began to spiral, and as Ivan was growing to hate the boyars, so his allies were growing concerned with him. Some began to defect, culminating in 1564 when Prince Andery Kurbsky, one of the Tsar's leading military commanders, fled to Poland.

Clearly, these events could be interpreted as either contributing to vengeful and paranoid destruction, or indicating a need for political manipulation. However, when Ivan came to the throne in 1547, after a chaotic and boyar led regency, the Tsar immediately introduced reforms aimed at reorganising the country, to strengthen both the military, and his own power. The oprichnina could well have been a rather extreme extension of this policy.

Next page > Oprichniks and Terror > Page 1, 2, 3

The oprichniki played a central role in Ivan's oprichnina; they were the soldiers and ministers, the police and the bureaucrats. Drawn mainly from the lower levels of the military and society, each member was questioned and their past checked. Those that passed were rewarded with land, property and payments. The result was a cadre of individuals whose loyalty to the Tsar was without question, and which included very few boyars. Their numbers grew from 1000 to 6000 between 1565 - 72, and included some foreigners. The oprichniks precise role is unclear, partly because it changed over time, and partly because historians have very few contemporary records from which to work. Some commentators call them bodyguards, while others see them as a new, hand-picked, nobility designed to replace the boyars. The oprichniks have even been described as the 'original' Russian secret police, an ancestor of the KGB.

The oprichniki are often described in semi-mythical terms, and it's easy to see why. They dressed in black: black clothes, black horses and black carriages. They used the broom and the dog's head as their symbols, one representing the 'sweeping away' of traitors, and the other 'snapping at the heels' of their enemies; it is possible that some oprichniks carried actual brooms and severed dogs heads. Answerable only to Ivan and their own commanders, these individuals had free run of the country, oprichnina and zemschina, and a prerogative to remove traitors. Although they sometimes used false charges and forged documents, as in the case of Prince Staritsky who was executed after his cook 'confessed', this was normally unnecessary. Having created a climate of fear and murder, the oprichniki could just exploit the human propensity to 'inform' on enemies; besides, this black clad corps could kill anyone they wished.

The stories associated with the oprichniks range from the grotesque and outlandish, to the equally grotesque and factual. People were impaled and mutilated, while whipping, torture and rapes were common. The Oprichniki Palace features in many tales: Ivan built this in Moscow, and the dungeons were supposedly full of prisoners, of which at least twenty were tortured to death everyday in front of the laughing Tsar. The actual height of this terror is well documented. In 1570 Ivan and his men attacked the city of Novgorod, which the Tsar believed was planning to ally with Lithuania. Using forged documents as a pretext, thousands were hanged, drowned or deported, while the buildings and countryside were plundered and destroyed. Estimates of the death toll vary between 15,000 and 60,000 people. A similar, but less brutal, sacking of Pskov followed this, as did the execution of zemschina officials in Moscow.

Ivan alternated between periods of savagery and piety, often sending great memorial payments and treasure to monasteries. During one such period the Tsar endowed a new monastic order, which was to draw its brothers from the oprichniks. Although this foundation did not turn the oprichniki into a corrupted church of sadistic monks (as some accounts might claim), it did became an instrument interwoven in both church and state, further blurring the organisation's role. The oprichniks also acquired a reputation in the rest of Europe: Prince Kurbsky, who had fled Muscovy in 1564, described them as "children of darkness...hundreds and thousands of times worse than hangmen." (Bonney, The European Dynastic States, Oxford, 1991, pg. 277).

Like most organizations that rule through terror, the oprichniki also began to cannibalize itself. Internal quarrels and rivalries led many oprichniki leaders to accuse each other of treason, and increasing numbers of zemschina officials were drafted in as replacements. Leading Muscovite families attempted to join, seeking protection through membership. Perhaps crucially, the oprichniki did not act in a pure orgy of bloodshed; they achieved motives and aims in a calculating and cruel manner.

Next page > End of the Oprichnina > Page 1, 2, 3

The Oprichnina of Ivan IV
Part 3: The End of the Oprichnina

After the attacks on Novgorod and Pskov Ivan may well have turned his attention to Moscow, however, other forces got there first. In 1571 an army of Crimean Tartars devastated the city, burning large tracts of land and enslaving tens of thousands of people. With the oprichnina having clearly failed to defend the country, and growing number of oprichniks implicated in treachery, Ivan abolished it in 1572. The resulting process of reintegration was never entirely completed, as Ivan created other similar bodies throughout his life; none became as notorious as the oprichnina.

The Tartar attack highlighted the damage that the oprichnina had caused. The boyars were the political, economic and social heart of Muscovy, and by undermining their power and resources the Tsar began to destroy the infrastructure of his country. Trade decreased and the divided military became ineffectual against other troops. Constant changes in government caused internal chaos, while the skilled and peasant classes began to leave Muscovy, driven out by rising taxes and almost indiscriminate murder. Some areas had become so depopulated that agriculture collapsed, and the Tsar's external enemies had begun to exploit these weaknesses. The Tartars attacked Moscow again in 1572, but were comprehensively beaten by a newly reintegrated army; this was a small valediction of Ivan's change in policy.

What did the oprichnina ultimately achieve? It helped centralise power around the Tsar, creating a rich and strategic network of personal holdings through which Ivan could challenge the old nobility and create a loyal government. Land confiscation, exile and execution shattered the boyars, and the oprichniki formed a new nobility: although some land was returned after 1572, much of it remained in the hands of the oprichniks. It is still a matter for debate among historians as to how much of this Ivan really intended. Conversely, the brutal enforcement of these changes and the constant pursuit of traitors did more than simply split the country in two. The population was markedly reduced, economic systems were damaged, and the strength of Moscow reduced in the eyes of its enemies.

For all the talk of centralising political power and restructuring landed wealth, the oprichnina will always be remembered as a time of terror. The image of black clothed investigators with unaccountable power remains effective and haunting, while their use of cruel and brutal punishments has guaranteed them a nightmarish mythology, only enhanced by their monastic connections. The actions of the oprichnina, coupled with the lack of documentation, have also greatly affected the question of Ivan's sanity. For many, the period 1565 - 72 suggests that he was paranoid and vindictive, although some prefer plain mad. Centuries later, Stalin praised the oprichnina for it's role in damaging the boyar aristocracy and enforcing central government.

Ivan IV: Reformer or Tyrant?
by Robert O. Crummey

[Ivan IV and his advisers] left behind few programmatic statements of their intentions as re formers. The very word ''reform'' would probably have rung strangely in their ears. Nevertheless, a regime that stages the first coronation of the ruler with an imperial title, is sues a new law code, and conducts a comprehensive review of the state of the church intends to inspect and, if necessary, repair the institutional and ideological foundations of society. Moreover, there seems to have been a widespread perception within the ruling elite that changes had to be made. Reform began during the "boyar rule" of Ivan's childhood and continued through Ivan's life-threatening illness in 1553 to about 1560. Finally, the reforms to a considerable extent form a coherent pattern in that many of the government's measures are clearly interrelated.

The concrete objectives of Ivan and his advisers in making reforms, judging by their actions, were primarily to bring consistency and order to the church and royal courts, strengthen the army, and make the royal administration more efficient and less corrupt. Within these broad rubrics, we can distinguish several general types of reform measures.

First, in the early 1550s, Ivan's government made a number of detailed technical reforms that might be characterized as "housekeeping" in state and church. In putting its house in order, Ivan's government issued a new law code (sudebnik) in 1550. The act of promulgating a legal codex symbolized the regime's determination to assert its authority over its subjects by systematizing legal norms and procedures....

In a similar vein, the Stoglav ("Hundred Chapters") church council of 1551 was the centerpiece of a campaign, supported by the tsar's government, to bring greater order and discipline to the liturgical and moral life and administration of the Eastern Orthodox church and to set limits to its acquisition of lands.

Second, in mobilizing for an all-out assault on Kazan', Ivan's government gave highest priority to strengthening the army. In no sense did its reforms involve a systematic restructuring of the tsar's forces; they consisted instead of piecemeal attacks on specific problems....

In preparation for the assault on Kazan', Ivan's government created a new military force with concentrated firepower that comple mented the noble cavalry. In 1550, Ivan IV or dered the formation of six companies of musketeers (strel'tsy), who fought primarily on foot with the latest firearms. In a certain sense, these units amounted to a small standing army since the men served throughout the year and received a salary from the royal treasury....

At about the same time, Ivan's government attempted to provide lands near Moscow for one thousand military servitors. The idea behind the proposal was reasonable enough. Estates near the capital were at a premium since they allowed a servitor to live on his lands within easy ride of Moscow or alternately in the city, provisioned by his nearby peasants. Whether Ivan's officials were actually able to find enough land suitable for distribution under these conditions is a subject of intense de bate among historians. Whatever its concrete achievements, the government's motive was clear—to strengthen the upper echelons of the service nobility.

The "decree on service" in 1556 set norms for the nobles' military obligations. According to its provisions, the owner of any estate— whether held on hereditary or pomest'e (conditional on service) tenure—had to appear for muster himself and bring with him one fully equipped cavalryman for every one hundred chetverti (about four hundred acres) of good land which he owned. As with so many of Ivan's reforms, the measure gave concrete expression to a well-established assumption— that all members of the traditional warrior caste of Muscovy were obligated to fight for the sovereign when summoned.

In short, the military reforms addressed specific problems of the army. Judging by the army's performance in battle, the results were mixed. Kazan' and other eastern outposts fell to Ivan's troops, but after decades of alternat ing victories, setbacks, and stalemates, the Muscovite armies that invaded Livonia suffered bitter defeat. The social implications of the reforms were also ambivalent; they made clear the government's concern for the well being of the noble cavalrymen who made up most of the army while simultaneously telling them bluntly that they had to serve at its convenience.

Third, in Ivan's early adult years, the central administration grew and assumed more distinct organizational forms. Since the fifteenth century, a small number of officials had served at the Muscovite court in essentially non-military functions; however, according to a num ber of historians, not until the 1550s did the proto-bureaucratic chanceries ( prikazy) take shape. Certainly, a number of the most important chanceries in the bureaucratic system of the seventeenth century ... were already in place in Ivan's lifetime. These administrative offices, consisting of a director and his staff of clerks, kept increasingly elaborate records of the government's most important activities and thus considerably increased its control over the country and its resources, above all the tsar's military servitors and the estates that supported them.

Last, and perhaps most significant of all, was the reform of the local administration of justice and tax collection. Banditry flourished in many parts of the country in sixteenth-century Muscovy, and the governors (namestniki)~ sent out from Moscow were unable or unwilling to put an end to it. The urgency of the problem must have been obvious, since the government took the first steps to deal with it in 1539 in the midst of the political struggles of Ivan's minority. Beginning in that year, the royal government issued charters to the population of particular districts, . . . instructing them to select elders . . . who were to be responsible for assembling posses and on their own authority arresting and hanging highwaymen and other notorious characters. Rather than reporting to the provincial governor, the district elders were to be accountable directly to the appropriate officials in Moscow.

These ruthlessly simple arrangements worked above all to the advantage of the royal administration in the capital. Its officials undoubtedly increased their ability to supervise the administration of justice in the provinces since the district elders were strictly account able to them. The reform placed the elders in an ambivalent position. On the one hand, they gained sweeping powers to deal with troublemakers and were presumably happy to have the central administration's support in doing so. At the same time, as their oath of office made clear, their responsibilities were onerous. For their part, the great nobles of the court who served as provincial governors can hardly have regretted losing functions that brought them little but trouble.

Ivan's government clearly saw the advantages of the new system for, over the next decades, it introduced district elders to more and more areas of the country. The idea that the royal government would function more effectively if it made local elites responsible for their own fate produced an even more sweeping re form of the local administration within a few years. In the mid-1550s, a series of decrees created a new group of officials (the zemskie starosty), drawn primarily from the merchants and prosperous peasants, to serve as tax collectors....

Once again, apparent decentralization served to increase the effectiveness of the central bureaucracy. Unlike the old governors, the local merchants or peasants who received the onerous job of collecting taxes from their fellow citizens had little to gain from cheating the royal exchequer under whose supervision they functioned....

Parallel with the new system of local administration were new modes of establishing national priorities with the support of social elites. In Ivan's reign, as before, the tsar and his inner circle of boyars constituted the nerve center of the government. In the first years of his majority—beginning in 1549 according to one version—he and his advisers summoned assemblies of his leading subjects, known in later generations as the zemskii sobor or "assembly of the land," to gain their support for governmental policy. Over the course of the next century, the zemskii sobor met at irregular intervals, when summoned by the tsar. Its composition was equally unpredictable. Sometimes it consisted only of the boyars and the leaders of the church; on other occasions, the government reached out to include members of the lesser nobility who happened to be in Moscow and perhaps even merchants and artisans from the capital.

Even though at the height of its development this institution bore a rough resemblance to the parliaments or national estates of the monarchies of western Europe, it would be a mistake to view it as an embryonic representative institution. With rare exceptions in the early seventeenth century . . . the zemskii sobor served not as the authentic voice of Muscovy's leading citizens but as a means by which the government mobilized the support of its leading servitors. Even the most widely representative zemskii sobor of Ivan's reign, the assembly of 1566, did not meet to decide whether to continue the war with Poland; instead, it was called to lend its support to decisions that the tsar and his advisers had already made.

As a result of Ivan's reforms, the so-called middle classes of Muscovite society—the provincial nobles and merchants—undeniably played a more prominent role in public life than before. At the same time, it would be a mistake to see their participation in the zemskii sobor and the local administration as the germ of representative government. The modern word which is most applicable to these institutional arrangements of the mid-sixteenth century is "mobilization." Nobles and merchants were invited to support the government and work for it, not to help it make basic decisions about the future development of government and society. Participation had its price.

For these reasons, it is misleading to look to Ivan's reforms for signs of political modernization or convergence with emerging western European patterns of representative government or civil rights. The institutional scope, legal implications, and social impact of the reforms of the 1540s and 1550s were quite limited. Although a veritable golden age in comparison with the horrors to come, the reform period of the reign was a time of freedom only in the most relative sense. The creation of institutions of political mobilization went hand in hand with the increasingly rigid codification of ecclesiastical ideology and the repression of religious dissenters.

However we interpret the period of reforms, the oprichnina (1565-72) represents some thing dramatically different. Where it fits in a discussion of political reform is not easy to determine. The narrative sources describing the dramatic scenes Ivan IV staged in the first weeks of 1565 demonstrate that he intended to make radical changes in his mode of governing. Nevertheless, the word "reform" seems a singularly inappropriate characterization of the oprichnina for at least two reasons. The tsar's statements and gestures—and his subsequent actions—showed that he intended to make not gradual but sudden and dramatic changes in the body politic. Moreover, the changes he made can scarcely be interpreted as steps to improve the administration of the realm or better the lot of downtrodden groups in society....

From the beginning, Ivan made clear that, in order to escape from the clutches of the boyars and chancery officials and the leaders of the church whom he collectively accused of treason, he intended to create for himself a separate administration, court, and army. To support himself and the men who would serve in these new institutions, the tsar took direct personal control of substantial areas of the country, selected primarily for their promise as sources of tax revenues. In the oprichnina lands in central Muscovy, Ivan undertook a re view of the nobility. Those who satisfied him of their loyalty joined his private army; those who failed the test had their lands confiscated and were forced to find new estates outside of the oprichnina's boundaries.

Oddly enough, Ivan arranged for the Boyar Council to administer the zemshchina (the areas of the country outside of his private principality) and report to him only the most important matters of state. Thus, Muscovy suddenly found itself with two administrations, two armies, and two separate groups of territories, one ruled directly by Ivan IV and the other by the aristocrats of his old court.

The oprichnina's most notorious feature was a reign of terror designed to purge those whom Ivan regarded as his enemies. On a number of occasions during the course of the seven-year experiment, groups of prominent courtiers and officials were executed on charges of treason, often with bloodcurdling brutality. Many times the victims were not only men of prominence but also their more obscure male kin and, on some occasions, their retainers and servants.

The roster of Ivan's victims included prominent aristocratic courtiers—both princes and non-titled servitors—leading chancery officials; Metropolitan Filipp, the head of the church; other prominent clergy; and Vladimir Andreevich of Staritsa, head of the only cadet branch of the ruling dynasty. Most startling of
the victims was an entire city—Novgorod— which oprichnina troops occupied and sacked with great loss of life after Ivan accused its population of treasonous negotiations with the Poles. Finally, as students of more recent reigns of terror have come to expect, the oprichnina devoured its own leaders; Ivan's most prominent advisers and officials mounted the scaffold in their turn....

If the oprichnina cannot be viewed as "reform," even by the most elastic use of that word, was it a "counterreform"? Use of the latter term is justified only if we regard the reforms of the 1550s as steps toward political modernization in a Western sense. Moreover, "counterreform" implies that the reforms were reversed or that the oprichnina was directed against the middle classes of Muscovite society who presumably benefited from the earlier changes. Most recent historians would accept the general proposition that, in the oprichnina, the tsar and his inner circle of advisers were aiming at the same goal they had pursued earlier—more effective control over the population and lands of the realm. In addition, the new institutions created in the re form period continued to do their work. The district elders functioned well into the seventeenth century, and the zemskii sobor went on meeting intermittently. Indeed, the liveliest assembly of the sixteenth century took place in 1566 in the midst of the oprichnina.

The social impact of Ivan's experiment was extremely ambiguous. Some lesser nobles suffered death or loss of their lands, while others thrived. The experience of the merchants was equally complex. At one extreme, Ivan favored the wealthy northern regions with their mer chant and peasant population by including them in his private principality. On the other, he ravaged Novgorod, the wealthiest trading city of his realm, and executed many of its people.

These observations in no way undermine the common sense judgment that there was a world of difference between the reforms of the 1550s and the oprichnina. The differences lie, however, not so much in the objectives of royal policy or their social implications as in the impatience and brutality with which the oprichnina regime pursued them and in the devastating consequences of its actions.

The indiscriminate and often sadistic methods of the oprichnina regime appear to reflect more than anything else the complex and troubled personality of its leader, Ivan IV. A number of historians have suggested that Ivan suffered from paranoia in the oprichnina years. Some of his actions during the period, including his request for a guarantee of polit ical asylum in England, dramatically testify to his exaggerated concern for his own safety. At times, burdened by his fears and chronic ill ness, he seems to have been obsessed with the need to escape from the dangers of leadership in one way or another.

To put it bluntly, the meaning of the oprichnina is to be sought above all in the realm of psychology. Ivan IV created the oprichnina to keep himself and his realm safe from enemies, real and imagined. Individual paranoia begot social pathology; the tsar's desperate search for security destroyed his subjects' confidence in the order and predictability of life. Years of absurd denunciations, sudden arrests, and horrifying executions left Muscovite society numb and made Ivan IV the terrible and awe-inspiring figure of literature and legend.

However real the substance of Ivan's fears, the social, economic, and political results of the oprichnina were a genuine disaster. Al though it did not revolutionize social relations in Muscovy or destroy the princely aristocracy or any other social group, it killed off a wide variety of Russians, ranging from aristocrats to the poorest artisans, peasants, and domestics. One can easily imagine the demoralization and shock of those who survived the whirl wind. Moreover, the oprichnina's operations contributed to the economic decline and social dislocation of much of Muscovy, particularly the Novgorodian lands. The sack of the great trading city contributed significantly to its rapid decline into a run-of-the-mill provincial town. The depredations of Ivan's body guards, combined with natural disasters and rising taxes to feed the war in Livonia, forced thousands of peasants to flee from their ancestral homes to the remote forests, the open steppe, or the estates of the wealthiest land lords who could offer them minimal protection and support. Their action, in turn, forced the government to set legal limits on their movement in order to protect the interests of the poorer service nobles and the royal treasury. The enserfment of the peasantry was in sight.

As a program of political reform or enforced social change—if it was ever intended as such—the oprichnina was a dismal failure.

Ivan IV, know as Ivan the Terrible, b Aug 25, 1530, czar of Russia 1547-1584, He centralised the administration of Russia and expanded the boundaries of the Russian Empire. He was born in Moscow, the oldest son of Vasilij III. Ivan died Mar 18, 1584.

Ivan was only three years old when his Father, Vasilij III died. Ivan's Mother, Yelena Glinskaya was leading Boyar (Noble) Family established a regency, but it soon degenerated into intrigue, denuncation and wild violence as rival boyars disputed the dominance of Glinsky Family. Yelena died in 1538 and misrule continued. Ivan had a poor health, he was largely ignored and his education was neglected. In 1547, Ivan was crowned as Tsar (first time in Russian history, before this, title was Grand Duke) and in same year Ivan married Anastasia Romanov. But Anastasia died in 1560, he married Marie Tscerkaski in 1561, Maria Sobakin in 1571 and some other times. but he was never able to recapture the happiness he had enjoyed with Anastasia. The years 1547 through 1560 are usually considered the constructive period of Ivan's reign, although the exact date that he assumed de facto control from the aristocracy is in dispute. He appointed an advisory council, founded (1549) a national assembly, enacted reforms in local government (approved by the advisory council), drew up (1550) a new law, and standardized the responsibilities and duties of the aristocracy. Ivan annexed two of the three Tatar states in Russia-Kazan (1552) and Astrakhan (1556, the first non-Slavic states in the empire). Thus Russian control of the Volga River and access to the Caspian Sea was assumed. Expansion to the east, beyond the Ural Mountains, also began during this period. (Before Ivan's death Russia had established itself in Siberia.) In addition, trade contacts with the English, French, and Dutch were begun. Anastasia's death in 1560 marked the end of Ivan's constructive policies. Increasingly powerful, Ivan turned against his advisors-convinced that they, backed by the boyars, had caused her death. Threatening to abdicate unless the boyars were punished for their greed and treachery, Ivan abandoned Moscow in 1564, settling in the village of Aleksandrovsk. Confused and frightened, the people of Moscow begged Ivan to return and rule over them. He eventually agreed to do so on two conditions: he was to have the right to punish traitors and wrongdoers, executing them when necessary and confiscating their possessions; and a political and territorial subdivision-the oprichnina-was to be established, managed entirely at the discretion of the tsar.

The oprichnina included most of the wealthy towns, trade routes, and cultivated areas of Russia and was, therefore, a stronghold of wealthy old boyar families. To Ivan's select bodyguard, the oprichniki, fell the task of destroying many of these great lords. Contemporary estimates of the number killed are from 400 to as high as 10,000. Only a few of the old boyar families survived. Those who were not killed were ruined by Ivan's political and economic reforms. Ivan controlled this personal territory until 1572.

In foreign affairs, too, turmoil and disaster marked the latter part of Ivan's reign. Russia attempted, unsuccessfully, to gain access to the Baltic Sea in the Livonian War (1557-82) with Poland-Lithuania. Ivan died on Mar. 18, 1584. Although the transition from Ivan to his son and successor, Feodor I, was relatively easy and quiet, Moscow was, according to most observers, on the verge of anarchy as a result of Ivan's policies.

What happens when a child is orphaned, then raised with abuse and ill attention? When a wife dies, and leaves the husband distraught? When a country is led by a hypocrite in the name of God? And most crucially, what happens when the focus of all these events happens upon the same man? Basically, what we have here is a recipe for a monster. Since the resurrection of Christ, men have dealt with hardships and sorrow in two ways: theirs, or God’s. The latter is by far the best and most effective way to go about it, but the former often takes top priority. The Bible tells us Psalm 37:3 “Trust in the Lord and do good.” Ivan IV, first Czar of Russia, did not embody this verse at all. Looking at his life and times, one cannot imagine a more fitting description for him than the one his own soldiers coined: the Terrible. And that’s just about what Ivan was: a terrible ruler who delighted in spilling blood and harming others. Ironically, he was very much involved in religion, following orthodox rituals and church dealings. A larger irony than seeing such a man attending church regularly is virtually unthinkable. But that was the key element to Ivan’s legacy: unthinkable, yet possible.

To understand why Ivan was such a vicious ruler, take a look at his tragic childhood. Ivan Basiljevich was born to . His father, Basil III, had tried for years to have a child, but divorced his wife after no success. His second wife, Elena Glinskaya, bore him two sons four years after they were married in 1526. On August 25, 1530, Ivan IV was born into a world that held little joy for him. Two years later, his brother Fyodor was born. A year after this his father died. But in his last remaining moments on earth, Basil asked that Ivan become ruler over Russia once he grew up. After his father died, his mother Elena ruled Russia with a few faithful boyars (members of the Russian aristocracy) for four years until she was assisinated. Ivan was left with only his nurse, Agrafena, to care for him. However, she was taken away from him when his mother was killed. Traumatized by these proceedings, seven-year-old Ivan was left orphaned with no one who cared whether he lived or died, except the boyars. They intercepted his right to rule, abusing and abandoning him, reducing him to a beggar in his own home. The only time he received attention was when a ceremony occurred. He was cleaned and dressed exquisitely, to be presented to visitors. Afterwards, he was disrobed and isolated again. In the palace, Ivan witnessed a bloody feud for power through horrific murders and abuse in the palace. Frustrated at the indignities he was suffering, he took out his anger on vulnerable animals. Thus was the upbringing of the future Russian czar.

One cold day in December, after Ivan had reached his teens, he denounced the boyars of their conduct in ruling the country, doomed their neglect of him, and punished their leader by setting a pack of wild dogs on him. Not long after, the boyars renounced their claim to rule and gave Ivan full power. Ivan was complex, being both malicious as well as intelligent. In 1547, at the age of 17, Ivan was crowned czar of “all the Russia’s.” A month later, he married the lovely Anastasia Romanovna. Some months after the wedding, rampaging fires burned down half of Moscow. Ivan was moved deeply by the ruins left from the fires. He soon after took responsibility for governance, and put into action a new social code and system of justice that would make laws equal for lower people, and improved their lives. Russian government was becoming steady and contemporary with Ivan at the helm. His next move was to conquer Kazan, the capital of khanate. He succeeded with help from German engineers and artillery use. It was after this invasion that he earned the name “Grozny” from his own soldiers. Not long after, he conquered Astrakahn, the Caspian Sea and Ural Mountains as well as Livonia and Narva. Shortly afterwards, tragedy struck his life again. From that point on, he would live up to his title of Grozny.

In 1560, during the summer months, Ivan’s wife Anastasia died from a long-term illness. He married up to seven times after her death, but was never happy with any of his later wives Ivan became irate and miserable, going mad in the process. His old nature of careless brutality resurfaced, and never went away. Convinced that the boyars had poisoned Anastasia, he had them all killed or tortured. The Oprichnina, a Russian secret police, was formed soon afterwards. Oprichniki dressed in black, rode black horses and carried two symbols with them: a broom, which symbolized sweeping Ivan’s enemies out of Russia, and dog’s head, which symbolized how watchful Ivan was, which went to an extreme. Ivan was becoming more bloodthirsty and malicious. Massacres and public executions were becoming regular occurrences. Finally, his angry madness took its toll. In a furious temper one day, he struck and killed his eldest son. Stricken with guilt, he never rested correctly again. Miserable and angry at the world, he left it three years later on March 18, 1584.

Clearly, Ivan’s life was difficult and complex. Even though he went to church regularly, he never realized that the answer to his problems was giving his life and problems to Christ. In Psalm 94:17, the Bible states: “Unless the LORD had been my help, I would have died.” Ivan clearly didn’t believe in God, nor did he reign with a Godly standing. Ideal examples of a Godly leader would be men like Solomon or Moses, who were wise, and cared for their people. Ivan was neither wise nor compassionate. Brought up under nightmarish conditions, suffering tremendous loses, and not taking God seriously, Ivan became an insane monster with too much power. Forced to keep his anger within him for most of his youth, he took out on those around him in his adulthood, including his loved ones. At age 54, he died as he had lived: miserable and alone, with no one to care for him.