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Ivan the Terrible (World Leaders Past and Present)
Ivan the Terrible - World Leaders Past and Present Author:Thomas Butson Cruel, lecherous, mad, God's scourge on earth: Ivan the Terrible, first tsar of Russia, has borne every epithet of evil. In his zealous attempt to establish a strong state under the central authority of Moscow, Ivan ended by nearly destroying his realm. — Born in 1530, the eldest son of the grand prince of Moscow, Ivan found himself orphaned ... more »in 1538 and became a pawn in the power struggle among the boyars, the Russian noblemen. Determined to prove his strength, in 1543 Ivan threw his guardian to the dogs, and in 1547 he adopted the title tsar. During the first years of his reign Ivan established the Chosen Council, advisers with whom he worked to produce reforms in local government, the law code, and the church. Intent on expanding and securing his state, Ivan captured the Tatar khanates of Kazan (1552) and Astrakhan (1554).
But with the 1564 death of his beloved wife, Ivan suffered a sever emotional trauma. In 1565 he set up a separate court, the oprichnina, and together with its black-robed officials, Ivan embarked on a seven-year reign of terror. Intolerant of criticism and pathologically suspicious, Ivan tortured and murdered thousands of Russians in what amounted to a civil massacre. In a climax of fury, Ivan in 1570 slaughtered the citizens of Novgorod and burned the city. In 1581, in a fit of wrath, Ivan killed his son and heir. Horrified at this final monstrous crime, Ivan could find no peace and died in 1584.
Despite his excesses Ivan left the nucleus of a strong state; during his reign the size of the realm doubled, Siberia was opened up for conquest, and the skeleton of a central bureaucracy was established. The tsar destroyed the feudal political order of medieval Russia and laid a solid foundation for serfdom. He accomplished his goal of an absolutist government, and in sowing the seeds of autocracy Ivan bequeathed his terrible legacy.« less