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Time of Troubles  World History  Wars, Battles & Armed Conflicts

Table of Contents
Time of Troubles
Russian history
Introduction

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Quick Facts & Related Topics
Also known as: Smutnoye Vremya
Written and fact-checked by The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
For Students Last Updated: Mar 7, 2025 • Article History

Time of Troubles
summary Time of Troubles, period of political crisis in
Quick Facts
Russia that followed the demise of the Rurik
Russian: Smutnoye Vremya
Read Next
dynasty (1598) and ended with the
Date: May 1606 - 1613
establishment of the Romanov dynasty (1613).
Did Duchess Anastasia Location: Russia
Survive Her Family’s During this period foreign intervention, peasant
Execution? On the Web: Cambridge Core - The
uprisings, and the attempts of pretenders to Time of Troubles in Alexander
seize the throne threatened to destroy the state Dugin’s Narrative (Mar. 07, 2025)
Discover
itself and caused major social and economic See all related content
New Seven Wonders of disruptions, particularly in the southern and
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What Is an Aftershock?

The Time of Troubles was preceded by a series of events that contributed to the
country’s instability. In 1598 Fyodor, the last in the line of the Rurik dynasty, died; he
was succeeded as tsar of Russia by his brother-in-law Boris Godunov. Boris was faced
with problems of famine (1601–03), boyar opposition, and the challenge of a Polish-
supported pretender to the throne, the so-called False Dmitry, who claimed to be
Dmitry, half brother of the late tsar and legitimate heir to the throne. (The real Dmitry
had died in 1591.) Boris was able to maintain his regime, but when he died (April
1605), a mob favouring the False Dmitry killed Boris’ son and made “Dmitry” tsar
(June 1605).

The boyars, however, soon realized that they could not control the new tsar, and they
assassinated him (May 1606), placing the powerful nobleman Vasily Shuysky on the
throne. This event marked the beginning of the Time of Troubles. Although Shuysky
was supported by the wealthy merchant class and the boyars, his rule was weakened by
a series of revolts, the most important of which was a peasant rebellion led by the
former serf Ivan Isayevich Bolotnikov in the southern and eastern sections of the
country. Shuysky also had to contend with many new pretenders, particularly the
Second False Dmitry, who was supported by the Poles, small landholders, and
peasants. Claiming to have escaped assassination in 1606 and recognized by the wife of
the First False Dmitry as her husband, the new Dmitry established a camp at Tushino
(1608) and besieged Moscow for two years. A group of boyars, including the
Romanovs, joined him at Tushino, forming a government there that rivaled Shuysky’s.
While elements of “Dmitry’s” army took control of the northern Russian provinces,
Shuysky bargained with Sweden (then at war with Poland) for aid. The arrival of
Swedish mercenary troops caused “Dmitry” to flee from Tushino. Some of his
supporters returned to Moscow; others joined the Polish king Sigismund III, who
declared war on Muscovy in response to the Swedish intervention and in September
1609 led an army into Russia and defeated Shuysky’s forces (June 1610).

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Russia: The Time of Troubles

Disappointed with Shuysky, the Muscovites deposed him; and the conservative
boyars, fearing the rule of “Dmitry,” whose supporters desired radical social changes,
agreed (August 1610) to accept the compact already made between Sigismund and the
boyars who had been at Tushino, named Władysław (son of the Polish king) tsar-elect,
and welcomed Polish troops into Moscow. “Dmitry,” however, was killed by his own
allies (December 1610), and Sigismund, changing his mind, demanded direct personal
control of Russia and continued the Polish invasion (autumn 1610). This finally
stimulated the Russians to rally and unite against the invader. The first resistance, an
alliance—instigated by the patriarch Hermogen—between small landholders led by
Prokopy Petrovich Lyapunov and some Cossacks, quickly disintegrated. But it was
followed in October 1611 by a new movement, composed of landowners, Cossacks, and
merchants. Prince Dmitry Mikhaylovich Pozharsky led the army, and the merchant
Kuzma Minin handled the finances. The army advanced toward Moscow and,
threatened by the approach of Polish reinforcements, attacked and captured the
garrison (October 1612). The following year a widely representative zemsky sobor
(“assembly of the land”) elected a new tsar, Michael Romanov, establishing the dynasty
that ruled Russia for the next three centuries.

Ivan the Terrible  Politics, Law & Government  World Leaders  Emperors & Empresses

Table of Contents
Ivan the Terrible 
tsar of Russia
Introduction & Top Questions

Early life Ask the Chatbot a Question  More Actions

Early reforms
Also known as: Ivan Grozny, Ivan IV, Ivan Vasilyevich
The Livonian War Written by Nikolay Andreyev
Fact-checked by The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
The Oprichnina
Last Updated: Feb 19, 2025 • Article History
Later years
Top Questions
Legacy

References & Edit History

What was Ivan the Terrible’s childhood like?

Quick Facts & Related Topics What was Ivan the Terrible’s family like?

Images & Videos How did Ivan the Terrible change the world?
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 
Ivan the Terrible (born August 25, 1530,
Kolomenskoye, near Moscow [Russia]—died
For Students March 18, 1584, Moscow) was the grand prince
Ivan IV summary of Moscow (1533–84) and the first to be
proclaimed tsar of Russia (from 1547). His reign Ivan the Terrible Ivan the Terrible (Ivan
IV), portrait by Viktor Mikhaylovich
saw the completion of the construction of a Vasnetsov.
Quizzes
centrally administered Russian state and the
Rulers with Unfortunate creation of an empire that included non-Slav Quick Facts
Nicknames: The Quiz
states. Ivan engaged in prolonged and largely Russian: Ivan Grozny
unsuccessful wars against Sweden and Poland, Byname of: Ivan Vasilyevich
Related Questions
and, in seeking to impose military discipline Also called: Ivan IV
What was Ivan the Terrible’s
and a centralized administration, he instituted a Born: August 25, 1530,
reign of terror against the hereditary nobility. Kolomenskoye, near Moscow
[Russia]

Died: March 18, 1584, Moscow

(aged 53)

 Show More

Early life
Ivan was the son of Grand Prince Vasily III of
Moscow and his second wife, Yelena Glinskaya. 
He was to become the penultimate
representative of the Rurik dynasty. On
December 4, 1533, immediately after his
father’s death, the three-year-old Ivan was
proclaimed grand prince of Moscow. His
mother ruled in Ivan’s name until her death
(allegedly by poison) in 1538. The deaths of
both of Ivan’s parents served to reanimate the
struggles of various factions of nobles for
control of the person of the young prince and
Ivan IV Ivan IV, icon, late 16th century; in
for power. The years 1538–47 were thus a the National Museum, Copenhagen.
period of murderous strife among the clans of
the warrior caste commonly termed “boyars.” Their continual struggles for the reins of
government to the detriment of the realm made a profound impression on Ivan and
imbued him with a lifelong dislike of the boyars.

Early reforms
On January 16, 1547, Ivan was crowned “tsar and grand prince of all Russia.” The title
tsar was derived from the Latin title caesar and was translated by Ivan’s
contemporaries as “emperor.” In February 1547 Ivan married Anastasia Romanovna, a
great-aunt of the future first tsar of the Romanov dynasty.

Since 1542 Ivan had been greatly influenced by the views of the metropolitan of
Moscow, Makari, who encouraged the young tsar in his desire to establish a Christian
state based on the principles of justice. Ivan’s government soon embarked on a wide
program of reforms and of the reorganization of both central and local administration.
Church councils summoned in 1547 and 1549 strengthened and systematized the
church’s affairs, affirming its Orthodoxy and canonizing a large number of Russian
saints. In 1549 the first zemski sobor was summoned to meet in an advisory capacity—
this was a national assembly composed of boyars, clergy, and some elected
representatives of the new service gentry. In 1550 a new, more detailed legal code was
drawn up that replaced one dating from 1497. Russia’s central administration was also
reorganized into departments, each responsible for a specific function of the state. The
conditions of military service were improved, the armed forces were reorganized, and
the system of command altered so that commanders were appointed on merit rather
than simply by virtue of their noble birth. The government also introduced extensive
self-government, with district administrators elected by the local gentry.

One object of the reforms was to limit the powers of the hereditary aristocracy of
princes and boyars (who held their estates on a hereditary basis) and promote the
interests of the service gentry, who held their landed estates solely as compensation for
service to the government and who were thus dependent on the tsar. Ivan apparently
aimed at forming a class of landed gentry that would owe everything to the sovereign.
All the reforms took place under the aegis of the so-called “Chosen Council,” an
informal advisory body in which the leading figures were the tsar’s favourites Aleksey
Adashev and the priest Silvestr. The council’s influence waned and then disappeared in
the early 1560s, however, after the death of Ivan’s first wife and of Makari, by which
time Ivan’s views and his entourage had changed. Ivan’s first wife, Anastasia, died in
1560, and only two male heirs by her, Ivan (born 1554) and Fyodor (born 1557),
survived the rigors of medieval childhood.

Britannica Quiz

Rulers with Unfortunate Nicknames: The Quiz

Russia was at war for the greater part of Ivan’s

reign. Muscovite rulers had long feared 
incursions by the Tatars, and in 1547–48 and
1549–50 unsuccessful campaigns were
undertaken against the hostile khanate of
Kazan, on the Volga River. In 1552, after
lengthy preparations, the tsar set out for Kazan,
and the Russian army then succeeded in taking
the town by assault. In 1556 the khanate of
Expansion of Russia, 1300–1796
Astrakhan, located at the mouth of the Volga,
was annexed without a fight. From that
moment onward, the Volga became a Russian river, and the trade route to the Caspian
Sea was rendered safe.

The Livonian War

With both banks of the Volga now secured, Ivan prepared for a campaign to force an
exit to the sea, a traditional concern of landlocked Russia. Ivan felt that trade with
Europe depended on free access to the Baltic and decided to turn his attention
westward. In 1558 he went to war in an attempt to establish Russian rule over Livonia
(in present-day Latvia and Estonia). Russia was at first victorious and succeeded in
destroying the Livonian knights, but their ally Lithuania became an integral part of
Poland in 1569. The war dragged on; while the Swedes supported Poland against
Russia, the Crimean Tatars attacked Astrakhan and even made an extensive incursion
into Russia in 1571; they burned Moscow, leaving only the Kremlin standing. When
Stephen Báthory of Transylvania became king of Poland in 1575, reorganized Polish
armies under his leadership were able to carry the war onto Russian territory while the
Swedes recaptured parts of Livonia. Ivan at last asked Pope Gregory XIII to intervene,
and through the mediation of his nuncio, Antonio Possevino, an armistice with Poland
was concluded on January 15, 1582. Under its terms Russia lost all its gains in Livonia,
and an armistice with Sweden in 1583 compelled Russia to give up towns on the Gulf of
Finland. The 24-year-long Livonian War had proved fruitless for Russia, which was
exhausted by the long struggle.

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The Oprichnina of Ivan the Terrible

Ivan’s first executions apparently arose out of
his disappointment over the course of the
Livonian War and the suspected treason of

several Russian boyars. The defection of one of
Ivan’s outstanding field commanders, Prince
Andrey Kurbsky, to Poland in 1564 greatly
startled the tsar, who announced later that year What made Russian Tsar Ivan IV so
terrible? Overview of Ivan IV's reign.
his intention of abdicating in view of the boyars’
See all videos for this article
betrayal. The Muscovites, however, led by the
clergy, implored him to continue to rule, and in
1565 he acceded to their request on condition that he should be allowed to deal with
the traitors as he wished and that he should form an oprichnina—i.e., an aggregate of
territory that would be administered separately from the rest of the state and put under
his immediate control as crown land. A bodyguard of 1,000–6,000 men, known as the
oprichniki, was raised; and specified towns and districts all over Russia were included
in the oprichnina, their revenues being assigned to the maintenance of the tsar’s new
court and household, which consisted of a number of carefully selected boyars and
service gentry. Ivan lived exclusively in this entourage and withdrew from the day-to-
day management of Russia’s administrative apparatus (now called the zemschina, or
“the land”), which he left in the hands of leading boyars and bureaucrats. Ivan cut
himself off from almost all communication with them, while the oprichniki trampled
with impunity on everyone beyond Ivan’s immediate circle.

Since nearly all the documents relating to this epoch were destroyed in one of
Moscow’s periodic fires, historians tend to give differing explanations for Ivan’s actions
during this part of his reign. The majority tend to the view that the struggle was
between the tsar and the old hereditary nobility, which, jealous of surrendering its
power and privileges, had resisted his internal reforms and military projects. The
oprichnina thus may have been Ivan’s attempt to create a highly centralized state and
destroy the economic strength and political power of the princes and the high nobility.
The increasingly resentful boyars had indeed opposed Ivan and plotted against him on
occasion, but the reign of terror that Ivan initiated by the oprichnina proved far more
dangerous to the stability of the country than the danger that it was designed to
suppress. In 1570, for example, Ivan personally led his oprichniki troops against
Novgorod, destroying that city and executing several thousand of its inhabitants. Many
boyars and other members of the gentry perished during this period, some being
publicly executed with calculated and symbolic cruelty. Ivan later sent to various
monasteries memorials (sinodiki) of more than 3,000 of his victims, most of whom
were executed in the course of the oprichnina.

The oprichnina lasted only seven years, from 1565 to 1572, when it was abolished as a
result of the failure of the oprichnina regiments to defend Moscow from attack by the
Crimean Tatars. The oprichnina army was reintegrated with that of the zemschina,
and some of the estates confiscated by Ivan’s followers were returned to their owners.
The entire episode of the oprichnina leaves a bloody imprint on Ivan’s reign, causing
some doubts about his mental stability and leaving historians with the impression of a
morbidly suspicious and vindictive ruler.

Later years
Withdrawal and flight are themes that run through the later years of Ivan’s reign. He
expressed an interest in establishing diplomatic and trade relations with England, even
suggesting his readiness to marry an English noblewoman. In 1575 he seems to have
abdicated for about a year in favour of a Tatar prince, Simeon Bekbulatovich. During
the 1570s he married five wives in succession in only nine years. Finally, in a fit of rage,
he murdered his only viable heir, Ivan, in 1581. This murder set the clock ticking for
the political crisis, known as the Time of Troubles, that began with the extinction of the
Rurik dynasty upon the infirm Fyodor’s death in 1598.

Legacy
Ivan’s achievements were many. In foreign
policy all his actions were directed toward 
forcing Russia into Europe—a line that Peter I
the Great was to continue. Internally, Ivan’s
reign of terror eventually resulted in the
weakening of all levels of the aristocracy,
including the service gentry he had sponsored.
The prolonged and unsuccessful Livonian War
overextended the state’s resources and helped
bring Russia to the verge of economic collapse.
These factors, together with Tatar incursions,
resulted in the depopulation of a number of
Russian provinces by the time of Ivan’s death in
1584. Nevertheless, he left his realm far more
centralized both administratively and culturally
than it had been previously. Ivan the Terrible Ivan the Terrible statue in
Oryol, Russia.
Ivan also encouraged Russia’s cultural
development, especially through printing. He himself wrote well, and, though his
surviving writings are mainly of a political nature, his command of words and his
biting sarcasm are very evident. Ivan was a devout adherent of the Orthodox church.
His arguments on religious questions are striking in their power and conviction, but he
placed the most emphasis on defending the divine right of the ruler to unlimited power
under God—a view with which most other monarchs of the time would have been in
agreement.

Nikolay Andreyev

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

False Dmitry  Politics, Law & Government  World Leaders  Emperors & Empresses

Table of Contents
False Dmitry
Russian pretenders
Introduction

References & Edit History Ask the Chatbot a Question  More Actions
Quick Facts & Related Topics
Also known as: Pseudo-Demetrius
Written and fact-checked by The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Related Questions Article History

What is the divine right to rule in a

False Dmitry, any of three different
monarchy?
Also called: Pseudo-demetrius
pretenders to the Muscovite throne who, during
Russian: Lzhedmitry, orDmitry
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All 119 References in “We brother-in-law Boris Godunov succeeded him, the first False Dmitry appeared and
Didn’t Start the Fire,”
Explained challenged Godunov’s right to the throne. The first pretender is considered by many
historians to have been Grigory (Yury) Bogdanovich Otrepyev, a member of the gentry
who had frequented the house of the Romanovs before becoming the monk Grigory
and who apparently sincerely believed he was the legitimate heir to the throne. He
claimed to be Prince Dmitry while living in Moscow (1601–02); but, when he was
threatened with banishment, he fled to Lithuania, where in 1603 he began to solicit
support for a campaign to acquire the Muscovite throne.

Aided by individual Lithuanian and Polish nobles, as well as by the Jesuits, the False
Dmitry gathered an army of Cossacks and adventurers and invaded Russia in the fall of
1604. His forces were defeated militarily, but he attracted followers throughout
southern Russia. When Tsar Boris suddenly died in April 1605, the government army
shifted its support to the pretender; Muscovite boyars murdered Boris’ infant son and
heir, and the False Dmitry triumphantly entered Moscow in June 1605 and was
proclaimed tsar.

Dmitry, however, alienated his supporters by failing to observe the traditions and
customs of the Muscovite court, by favouring the Poles who had accompanied him and
Marina Mniszek (a Polish nobleman’s daughter who became Dmitry’s wife) to Moscow,
and by attempting to engage Muscovy in an elaborate Christian alliance to drive the
Turks out of Europe. In May 1606 Vasily Shuysky, one of the boyars who had turned
against him, led a coup d’état, murdered the first False Dmitry, and succeeded him as
tsar.

Rumours spread that Dmitry had survived the coup d’état, and in August 1607 another
pretender appeared at Starodub claiming to be the recently deposed tsar. Although the
second False Dmitry bore no physical resemblance to the first, he gathered a large
following among Cossacks, Poles, Lithuanians, and rebels who had already risen
against Shuysky. He gained control of southern Russia, marched toward Moscow, and
established his headquarters (including a full court and government administration) at
the village of Tushino (spring 1608).

Known thereafter as the Thief of Tushino, the second False Dmitry sent his bands to
ravage northern Russia, and, after Marina Mniszek formally claimed him as her
husband, he wielded authority that rivaled Shuysky’s. In the spring of 1610, however,
Shuysky, aided by Swedish troops, ejected the Thief of Tushino from northern Russia
and forced him to flee to Kaluga. The second False Dmitry continued to contend for the
Muscovite throne until one of his own followers fatally wounded him in December
1610.

In March 1611 a third False Dmitry, who has been identified as a deacon called
Sidorka, appeared at Ivangorod. He gained the allegiance of the Cossacks (March
1612), who were ravaging the environs of Moscow, and of the inhabitants of Pskov,
thus acquiring the nickname Thief of Pskov. In May 1612 he was betrayed and later
executed in Moscow.

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