On this date… 26 January 1547
First “Tsar of All Russia” Crowned
The Tsar – related to Czar and Kaiser, all from the Latin “Caesar” the honorific eventually used for Emperor – of All Russia sounds like an impressive, fancy title. After all, Russia is now the largest country in the world by size, spanning more than 6,600,000 square miles from the Baltic Sea in the west to Siberia and the Pacific Ocean in the east, from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Black Sea in the south. This encompasses more than one-eighth of Earth's inhabited land area. Russia is bigger than the entire continent of Antarctica, and nearly double the size of the second largest country by area, Canada, which spans roughly 3,500,000 square miles. Being the emperor of that vast territory should be huge (pun fully intended).
But when Ivan IV Vasilyevich, known to history as Ivan the Terrible, was crowned “Tsar of all Russia” on this date, 26 January 1547, that impressive title and territory was rather lacking.
During the middle ages Russia was a collection of feudal principalities, republics, assorted states, khanates, and vast stretches of wilderness. In the north and west it comprised little more than Moscow and its surrounding areas, didn’t quite reach its current borders with Belarus and the Baltic States (Estonia and Latvia) or stretch as far as Finland. In the south and east it hadn’t reached Kazan or the Black Sea, instead only barely having an outpost on the Caspian Sea.
As seen in this map, when Ivan was crowned, Russia barely controlled the European side of the country, let alone its later Asian tracts.
This despite Russia having had historical connections with what are now Ukraine, the Baltic States including Lithuania, and Poland. Scandinavians – also known as Vikings to the West, or Varangians in the East – had established Kyiv (formerly known as Kiev) in the mid-9th century. They continued to trade, conquer, and intermarry with the local Slavic populations, such that by the mid-11th century, they controlled a state called the Kievan Rus’, from Finland down to the Black Sea. Under their leader Prince Vladimir I the Kievan Rus’ adopted Eastern Orthodox Christianity in 988, tying them close to the Byzantine Empire, who also practiced Eastern Orthodoxy (and distinct from the Western Catholics). Cementing these ties were the Varangian Guards, the Byzantine Emperor’s private, axe-wielding guards of Viking descent. Yes, Scandinavian Vikings were the personal guard of Byzantine emperors in Constantinople. Vikings didn’t just rape, pillage, plunder, and attack Britain (more on Vikings, Varangian Guards, and Constantinople in future posts).
Like all large states, Kievan Rus’ was eventually beset by infighting and disintegration. As was the case for most of Eurasia in the 13th century, the area was conquered by invading Mongols. The Mongol Empire was, at its height, the largest contiguous empire in history – a span of territory that will likely never be equaled again. Again due to infighting and power struggles, the Mongol Empire fractured into four separate empires or khanates. The Golden Horde, sometimes known as Tatars, ruled the northwest portion. By the early 16th century, the Tatars were just one of many competing petty kingdoms, city-states, and principalities vying for control.
The Grand Duchy of Moscow started to emerge as the leading political and cultural magnet under Ivan III “the Great,” Ivan IV’s grandfather. Ivan IV continued to solidify power, transforming Russia from a medieval collection of petty states to an empire and world power. Ivan began his rule as a reformer, ruling with a council of advisors, and introducing cultural improvements like the printing press. He ended his rule as a paranoid autocrat who controlled a vastly expanded territory. The “Tsar of All Russia” didn’t yet quite hold the significance it would under Ivan’s Romanov successors, but under him Russia did begin its long journey towards a continent-spanning empire.
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