How many did ivan the terrible kill

He has been lionized n poems and ballads. There are even some people that want to make him a Russian Orthodox saint. Some of these same people would also like too see Rasputin and Stalin honored. He survived growing up in an environment of brutality and intrigue and reportedly amused himself as a child by throwing animals off roofs. When he was 20 he did public penance for the sin of his youth. Various factions of the boyars—old Russian nobility and landlords— competed for control of the regency until Ivan assumed the throne in According to madmonarchs.

His uncle Yuri challenged Ivan's rights to the throne, was arrested and imprisoned in a dungeon. There he was left to starve. Ivan's mother, Jelena Glinsky, assumed power and was regent for five years.

She had Ivan's other uncle killed, but a short time afterwards she suddenly died, almost surely poisoned. A week later her confidant, Prince Ivan Obolensky 1, was arrested and beaten to death by his jailers. While his mother had been indifferent toward Ivan, Obolensky's sister, Agrafena, had been his beloved nurse.

Now she was sent to a convent. Without Agrafena to look after him, Ivan's loneliness deepened. The boyars alternately neglected or molested him; Ivan and his deaf-mute brother Yuri often went about hungry and threadbare.

No one cared about his health or well being and Ivan became a beggar in his own palace. A rivalry between the Shuisky and the Belsky families escalated into a bloody feud. Armed men roamed the palace, seeking out enemies and frequently bursting into Ivan's quarters, where they shoved the Grand Prince aside, overturned the furniture and took whatever they wanted.

Murders, beatings, verbal and physical abuse became commonplace in the palace. Unable to strike out at his tormentors, Ivan took out his frustrations on defenceless animals; he tore feathers off birds, pierced their eyes and slit open their bodies.

In the Shuiskys led a raid on the palace, rounding up a number of Ivan's remaining confidants. They had the loyal Fyodor Mishurin skinned alive and left on public view in a Moscow square. On December 29, , year-old Ivan suddenly ordered the arrest of Prince Andrew Shuisky, who was reputed to be a cruel and corrupt person. He was thrown into an enclosure with a pack of starved hunting dogs. The rule of the boyars had ended.

He threw dogs and cats from the Kremlin walls to watch them suffer, and roamed the Moscow streets with a gang of young scoundrels, drinking, knocking down old people and raping women. He often disposed of rape victims by having them hanged, strangled, buried alive or thrown to the bears. He became an excellent horseman and was fond of hunting.

Killing animals was not his only delight; Ivan also enjoyed robbing and beating up farmers. Meanwhile he continued to devour books at an incredible pace, mainly religious and historical texts.

At times Ivan was very devote; he used to throw himself before the icons, banging his head against the floor. It resulted in a callosity at his forehead. Once Ivan even did a public confession of his sins in Moscow. Ivan the Terrible was married seven times.

The last were fraught with trouble but his first one to Anastasia, a member of the Romanov Boyar family, appears to have been happy Ivan and Anastasia were married in the cathedral not long after he crowned himself tsar. This launched a dynasty, springing his Anastasia's side of the family that lasted until Nicholas II abdicated before the Bolshevik Revolution in Reflecting Muscovy's new imperial claims, Ivan's coronation as tsar was an elaborate ritual modeled after those of the Byzantine emperors.

With the continuing assistance of a group of boyars, Ivan began his reign with a series of useful reforms. In the s, he promulgated a new law code, revamped the military, and reorganized local government. These reforms undoubtedly were intended to strengthen the state in the face of continuous warfare. Early in his rule, Ivan was regarded as a fair and just leader who favored the merchant class over the land owners.

He introduced land reform laws that ruined many aristocratic families who were forced to turn over their property to the Russian state and Ivan himself. Ivan and other early tsars destroyed all institutions that could challenge their powers.

The nobility became their servants, the peasantry were controlled by the nobility and Orthodox church served as propaganda machine of tsarist ideology. Ivan the Terrible ruled Russia not long after Constantinople and Byzantium fell to the Turks in He pushed forth idea of making Moscow the third Rome and the third capital of Christendom.

At this time there was little trade, Russia became a primarily agrarian fuel state with peasants becoming serfs. Ivan the Terrible encouraged trade with the West and expanded Russia's borders. After Ivan reclaimed Moscow, outsiders began arriving in larger numbers. In , Ivan the Terrible drove the last Mongol khanates out of Russia with decisive victories in Kazan and Astrakhan.

Could you elaborate? ReliableSource: Not much of an expert myself, by basically Kurbsky was a grand nobleman who was for a while one of Ivan's foremost generals. Then they had a quarrel and Kurbsky fled abroad, becoming Russia's first recorded dissident. They a famous exchange of letters during the latter period.

But I do not recall ever hearing of Kurbsky being complicit in crimes or anything. Maybe I missed something? What was your source? ReliableSource: Oh, I get it. The necrometrics lists Kurbsky. But the context indicates that he was a chonicler in this instance, not a perpetrator.

Meshes well with my recollections. So I suggest an edit. Show 2 more comments. Felix Goldberg 25k 6 6 gold badges 76 76 silver badges bronze badges. Note, though, that Skrynnikov is known as a revisionist nothing wrong with it, he is a legitimate historian, just providing some context.

FelixGoldberg I just want to show that there is no consensus on this issue. A lot of propaganda, a lot of weak researches. Contemporaries of Ivan the Terrible left different versions too. Fair point, I did not touch Skrynnikov's figures in my edit, as you can see.

Novgorod was the nam not for the city only, but for the great area belonging to it. So, if the population of the city inside the city walls was only 40 th, there is no contradiction in these numbers. According to what I have read, he really killed majority of population there.

I had not said that I believe in these numbers. I have said that these numbers are not contradictory. Your numbers have a bit narrow span - I would say rather 5. They only can't decide what was the main reason of mass deaths - epidemies, killings and enslaving by Tartars, or killings by tsar. And this problem cannot be solved here.

Show 3 more comments. But people who remained got wages larger about 2 times. Gangnus Gangnus 6, 22 22 silver badges 39 39 bronze badges. Well, if we put aside the 'legitimate" deaths occurred during wars -- siege of Novgorod which revolted against his rule , capture of Kazan and Astrakhan, war in Livonia etc -- then the number comes down to around , most of whom are listed by Ivan IV himself in his own prayer book which he supposedly kept in order to say proper prayers about all of them Almost all of these people were executed after trials and under court orders - then again, courts were very much under tzar's own authority, although there were rare cases when they ruled for the accused.

Basil's Cathedral was completed in , it completely lived up to Ivan's expectations. However, legend has it that Ivan then gouged out his architect's eyes in order to ensure that he would never design anything as beautiful as the cathedral again. Ivan Fedorov was a member of Tsar Ivan VI's court, until he was accused of involvement in a plot to overthrow the tsar. Ivan the Terrible knew that Fedorov had to die, but he went with a very imaginative route.

In , he forced Fedorov to don the royal robes and sit upon the Tsar's throne with the royal scepter. He then bowed to Fedorov and said, "since I have the power to seat you I can also unseat you.

Ivan really liked embracing his creative side, and this murder was not the only example. During the Massacre of Novgorod, Ivan decided to sew the Archbishop of Novgorod into a bear skin, and then let dogs hunt and kill him. In , Ivan disbanded his private army after they failed to defend Moscow.

He then "abdicated" and placed a Tartar general, Simeon Bekboelatovitch, on the throne. Meanwhile, Ivan stayed at a country estate and regularly came to pay homage to the supposed tsar. He did this for about a year until he decided that it wasn't that fun anymore. In , Ivan claimed to be leaving Moscow in order to visit monasteries. In reality, he just ran away from home, taking valuables with him and threatening to never return.

Of course, he returned a few months later, proving that there's no place like home. Ivan claimed to have left Moscow because he was suspicious that the aristocracy and clergy were plotting against him, and he only agreed to come back on the condition that he be granted total authority over them - a condition that was granted.

When Queen Elizabeth sent some of her trusted ambassadors to Russia, it was likely assumed that everyone was going to take the visit quite seriously.

But Ivan just couldn't help himself, and started playing with Lord Kennilworth's long beard. This is especially regrettable when one considers that Ivan was a potential spouse for Elizabeth at one point, so he really should have been thinking about making a good impression.