Rise of Russia

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Rise of Russia
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Overall Characteristics/ThemesVisible Throughout
Russia History

1. Invasions and fear of invasion
2. Openness to West or not
3. Alternating periods of repression and reform
4. Little or no history of democracy

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Mongol Invasion

• Invasion began political history
• 1237-1240 Mongol Invasion forces of Gengis Khan
  move from North China across the continent to
  take Moscow
• Tatars a Turkish people who were also invading
  Russia became agents/administrators for Mongols

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Mongol/Tatar Rule 1240-1480

• Brutal invasion
• Russia hibernated and missed the high middle
  ages of Europe
• 1480 Ivan III (Ivan the Great) formally renounced
  Mongol rule
• over Russia

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MONGOL EMPIRE
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16TH AND 17TH RUSSIA

• Power tended to rest with boyars (aristocrats)
• Held land
• Controlled serfs
• Boyars struggles with new tsars for control
• New tsars used boyars to serve state
• Created bureaucracy
• Mandatory military service

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Ivan III

• Established hereditary rule
• Adopted Byzantine traditions - Third Rome
• Tsar head of Orthodox Church

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Ivan IV (the Terrible) 1530-1584

• First Russian monarch to use title of tsar (also
  spelled czar)
• Assumed throne at age three
• Killed many boyars, whom he suspected of
  conspiracy
• Died without an heir

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• Along with expansion, also managed contacts with
  western Europe
• Tsars realize disadvantage of Russia because of
  Mongols
• Import Italian artists and architects to design
  churches and royal palace in Kremlin (Moscow)

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Time of Troubles

• Swedish and Polish attacks on Russian territory
• Assembly of boyars chose member of Romanov family
  as tsar leads to Romanov dynasty (lasts until
  1917)

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New Line of TsarsRomanov

• 1613Michael Romanov selected tsar
• He and successors moved Russia toward more
  autocracy
• Total enserfment of peasants by 1649
• Military service demands for boyars were relaxed
• Changes met with civil unrest, especially from
  cossacks (peasants recruited by Ivans to migrate
  to newly seized lands)

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Peter the Great 1672-1725

• Became tsar at 10, but did not really exercise
  power until 1689
• Grew up going to German Quarter and learned of
  new, Western technology
• Traveled widely
• Westernized
• Modernized army
• Table of Ranks position
• in government based upon merit

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Peter the Great 1672-1725

• Biggest problem was Russia had no warm water
  ports
• Battled with Ottoman Turks to try to control
  Black Sea
• Defeated Sweden for good cold water ports along
  Baltic Sea
• Built capital, St. Petersburg, on the Baltic Sea,
  gateway to the West.

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Built St. Petersburg on model of Western European
cities
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Russia Under Peter the Great
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Catherine the Great (1729-1796)

• Wife of Peter III (tsarina)
• Born in Prussia (Germany)
• Learned Russian
• Converted to Orthodox Christianity
• Embraced Peter the Greats ideas of
  westernization
• Let boyars not pay taxes
• Taxed peasants heavily

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Russia Under Catherine the Great

• Defeated Ottomans to gain land to Black Sea
• 1790s-partitioned Poland, eliminated Poland as
  state starting basis for further Russian
  involvement in European affairs

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Reform, then Repression

• Initially open to reform
• Art, literature and science
• Greater local self-government
• Legal reforms
• Pugachev Rebellion, French Revolution led her to
  become more oppressive

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Russian Serfdom

• Carried over from pre-Mongol rule
• Russia the West
• Europe, 1450-1750 rapid pop. growth
  urbanization
• Russia economically behind, sticks to
  agriculture
• Russian food imports to W. Europegtgtsolidifies
  ag. econ. and thus, serfdom

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• 1400-1800 half of pop. enserfed to boyars,
  another 40 owes some allegiance to state
• Similarities to Western Serfdom
• worked manor-like estates
• could form village govts.
• Contrasts to Western Serfdom
• could be bought and sold
• no legal protection against abuse
• Law Code of 1649abolished freedom for runaways

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Legacy

• Russian absolutism created environment of social
  and political tensions that lasted into 20th
  century
• Russia would continue to struggle with
  modernization
• Absolutism would eventually fail as Russia moved
  toward socialism and communism in late 19th and
  early 20th centuries