Russian Czars Increase
Power
From Ivan to the Romanovs
Ivan III (1462-1505)
-conquered area around
Moscow
-liberated Russia from
Mongols
-centralized Russian
gov’t
-laid the foundations for
absolutism in Russia
Ivan the Terrible
*Ivan IV (aka: Ivan the Terrible) 1533-1584
-first Czar or Tsar (“Caesar”)
-boyars: Russia’s landowning nobles
-wife: Anastasia from the Romanov family
-killed in 1560
-began Ivan’s “bad period”
-turned against boyars
-organized police force to use terror
-executed many boyars
-1581 killed his oldest son and heir
-left his weak second son to rule
Time of Troubles
-Ivan V (son of the “terrible”)
died w/o an heir
-boyars struggled for power
-in 1613 representatives
elected Michael Romanov
as czar (random relative
of Anastasia)
-began the Romanov
dynasty (1613-1917)
Peter the Great
*Peter the Great Takes the Throne
-1672-1725
-great reformer and absolute ruler
-Russia’s differences from Europe:
-serfdom
-cut off from the Renaissance and the
age of Exploration (geography)
-Eastern Orthodox rather than
Protestant or Catholic
Peter Visits the West
*Expedition into Europe was called the
“Grand Embassy”
-wanted to learn about western
culture and industrial techniques
-kept his identity a secret (hard to
hide when you are 6’7”!)
-visited England, Austria, and the
Netherlands
-inspired by western methods
Peter Rules Absolutely
-Westernization: using Western Europe as a model to
make Russia stronger
-Peter’s reforms
-increased his absolute power
-brought the Russian Orthodox church under gov’t
control
-reduced the powers of landowners (Boyars)
-hired European officers to modernize the army
-imposed heavy taxes
-believed in the importance of education
-St. Petersburg
-new capital along the sea (swamp)
-By his death, Russia was a powerful nation
St. Petersburg- Swamp
St. Petersburg-Naval Academy
Baroque Architecture
• Absolute Monarchs
attempted to display
their supreme power
with “over-the-top”
Baroque palaces.
• Many of the absolute
monarchs modeled
their palaces after
Versailles in France