CHAPTER V
Ivan the Terrible
“A right Scythian, full of readie wisdom, cruell, bloudye, mercilesse.”—Horsey.
MOST conspicuous of all the monuments of the past Moscow contains, is the great weird building familiarly known as the church of Vasili Blajenni; as monstrous and impressive is the era that produced it. The half century during which Ivan the Terrible reigned over Muscovy is a unique period in the history of Russia. And not that of Russia only, for in no country at any time have so many and diverse outrages been perpetrated at one man’s command. Disasters resulting from human ambition and folly sully the history of every land, but all histories are spotless in comparison with that of Moscow under its first Tsar—a creature of unparalleled ferocity and inconceivable wickedness.
Ivan was the son of the crafty Vasili Ivanovich in his dotage; of Helena Glinski, a fiery-natured Lithuanian woman, passionate as a Spaniard, reckless as a Tartar. But if his parentage was unpromising his upbringing was worse. He and his mother had many enemies, the members of princely houses in vassalage in Moscow but with aspirations to the throne. These men, mostly relations of the Tsar, were insistent upon the rules of precedence, both for the gratification of their own vanity, and as of possible importance in the event of a Tsar dying without direct heir. For this reason all the Tsars were merciless towards their relatives on their father’s side, and looked for help from the relations of their mother and wife, who had most to gain from the succession being maintained in a direct line.
Helena, as regent, appears to have governed well. She did not marry again, thus the rights of Ivan and his brother Yuri were not endangered by her. Her lover, Kniaz Telepniev, for a time kept at bay the rival factions of the more powerful nobles, and possibly was instrumental in thwarting the plots of the Glinski. At Helena’s command two of her relatives were executed for conspiring against the infant Tsar. She enclosed the Kitai Gorod with a wall of stone; improved the defences of Moscow in other ways, gave the people a new coinage, founded monasteries, built churches, and continued the policy of the rulers of Moscow. Five years after her husband’s death she died suddenly, of poison it is said, and the rumour may be credited.
In 1538, Ivan, then in his eighth year, and his brother Yuri, his junior by eighteen months, were left to the mercies of the most powerful factions about the court. They were neglected; Ivan himself said of this period, “we two were treated as strangers: even as the children of beggars are served. We were ill clothed, cold, and often went hungry.”