Ivan IV Vasilyevich, or “The Terrible” if you prefer, though “The Fearsome” may
be more apt, was only three years old when he became Grand Prince of Moscow.
And like most three-year-old princes he was soundly ignored.
But luckily instead of being swept under the rug in favor of a more senior leader, his
family and the nobles put in charge by his father were too busy crab-bucketing themselves
to take the young prince out of the picture.
Shortly after he came of age, then, Ivan was given the title of Tsar, becoming the emperor
of a Third Rome, great enough to rival the Mongol Khans, appointed to enact God’s will
on Earth, basically what the Holy Roman Emperors did in the West a long time ago, but it meant
that Ivan was in charge, once and for all.
Honest to God, no clue how everyone else got on board with that one.
Next on the agenda Ivan gets hitched to a girl from the Romanov family, yes those Romanovs,
and things are actually pretty all right in Russia.
Right off the bat he started modernizing.
He founded Russia’s first publishing house twice.
The first time a bunch of scribes came and burnt down the building before it could take
their jerbs, so he re-founded it and started printing religious texts because he was also
a devout Christian.
He made a three-estates-style parliament with nobles, clergy, and commoners, bit of a rubber
stamp but gotta start somewhere.
He cracked down on judicial corruption, gave legal and financial power to smaller communities,
nothing crazy, just reasonable proactive governance.
Bazinga.
And, big game changer, he made a standing army that would train during peacetime, which
for reference England didn’t have until Cromwell more than a hundred years later.
And boy howdy did Ivan put that army to use.
In fact there wasn’t that much peace time for them to train in because he was so busy
getting that land, and doing it in a really clever way to boot.
He had his army build a fortress that could be taken apart like some kind of Ikea castle,
floated it down the Volga River, and rebuilt it in enemy territory lickety-split, which
is how he conquered the Kazan Khanate and put an end to a hundred years of conflict.
And what does he do to celebrate, he commissions one of the most iconic pieces of Russian architecture
in history.
It was so lovely, in fact, that he blinded the architect so he could never make anything
more beautiful - I’m kidding, he hired him to make several more buildings, the craziness
comes later.
But first he takes over two more Khanates, and then turns his eyes to Livonia, this bit
of the Baltic here, for those awesome trading ports that don’t freeze over for half the
year.
Long story short he was shaping up to be Peter the Great a hundred and fifty years early
and without the beard taxes.
Except then he hits a wall.
One of his best friends defects to Livonia and his wife up and dies on him.
All this being too much for Ivan, he musters up that Big Tsar energy and quits.
Straight up leaves Moscow.
For months.
No warning, no contact, nada.
You’d think the nobles would love this, but they’re freaking out because most people
kinda hate them and they have no idea what to do.
With nowhere else to turn, they show up at Ivan’s doorstep begging “Please come back?”
“No!
You guys are mean and all you do is embezzle and treason.”
“Please?”
“No!”
“Pretty please?”
“No!”
“Come on, what’s it gonna take?”
“I’ll come back on one condition” “What’s that?”
“Absolute power.”
“...Well he’s been a pretty good ruler so far, I mean what’s the worst that could
happen?”
And it is here that revolutionary revisionist Ivan IV evicts everyone, evincing inner evil.
He claims huge swaths of land as his own private property.
“But sir, people live there already” “Don’t worry, I’ve come up with just the thing.
Say hello to my private army!”
He took mostly from the nobles, but uprooted a good number of peasants along the way, plus
he gave his army their own land to do literally whatever they wanted with, at which point
trickle-down oppression started to take over.
But, technically speaking, he was just clearing out trespassers, it’s not like he was sending
his army into his own towns with the explicit intent of killing, torturing, and pillaging.
About that.
At this point in time there’s an epidemic and a famine and did I mention the Livonian
War is still going after twelve years?
But it’s not all bad.
The city of Novgorod is doing all right.
Too all right.
So all right they might start getting ideas about defecting.
Someone better put a stop to all that all rightness.
Now they’ll never want to leave!
Uh, then he abdicates again and puts this guy Simeon in charge and oh no Simeon is taking
even more land for the Tsar, this time from the monasteries!
That’s not a nice thing to do, Ivan would never do this, better put Ivan back in charge.
You know what else Ivan would never do?
Return all the land that Simeon took.
After that it was mostly a lot accusations of treason and various forms of execution
and torture.
And, lest we forget, he also competed for the title of History’s Worst Dad.
Like any proud father, he saw his daughter-in-law dressed immodestly, and ruthlessly beat her,
potentially causing her miscarriage, did I mention she was pregnant?
Then his son stepped in and said “Dad what the heck” and Ivan bashed his head in with
his staff, which is where this awesome painting comes from.
As a husband, he was second only to Henry VIII.
There’s even a helpful rhyme to help you remember, it goes poisoned, poisoned, poisoned,
nunnery, nunnery, survived.
There’s a reason Henry’s wives are more popular.
So he lost his oldest son and five wives, but it’s not like things were all bad, I
mean he was also a musician!
He wrote the background music you’re listening to right now, how can you not love this guy?
Anyway, the Livonian War finally comes to a close after twenty-five years, then Ivan
dies of natural causes, so I guess all that paranoia must have been worth it after all.
But wait, there’s more!
Long-time viewers may have noticed this channel kind of exploded last month so it’s time
to cash in on that sweet sweet sponsorship money!
Y’know, sponsors whose products and services I can honestly recommend.
And who give you free stuff!
You may still be wondering: what was Ivan’s deal?
Did losing his wife drive him over the edge?
Was he just crazy?
I don’t know, I’m not a forensic psychiatrist, but I know where you can find one: MagellanTV
is a new documentary streaming platform that hosts, for American viewers, Ivan the Terrible,
a dive into Ivan’s psyche from childhood to his dying days.
Not American?
Well I’m sad to say there’s only two thousand other documentaries to choose from with more
each week.
That means they’ve got more WWII docs than you can shake a stick at, and they’ve got
the deep cuts.
Like this really cool one on Henry VII that’s presented by the guy who literally wrote the
book on Henry VII and he gets to travel around England and look at the actual parliament
records from 1485 and I want to be this man!
Not to mention everything they’ve got in current history, culture, crime, technology,
space, this particular Ethiopian wolf named Megeti, the list goes on.
So if you think it sounds cool, the first hundred visitors to magellantv.com/jackrackam
will get a free month to go and binge to their heart’s content.
Just be sure to subscribe before you go, I mean it’s the least you can do right hundred
k let’s go.