the pale of humanity. But the Russian people share the guilt with him; more especially are the nobility and clergy to blame, since they did not support the efforts of the monarch in the cause of culture, but by cringing and immorality paved the way for his wicked propensities. The last liberties of the people were destroyed, and the omnipotence of the state established for all future time.

The foreign policy was successful in the East; the Cossack Jarmak laid the crown of Siberia at Ivan's feet. But in the contest with Poland he was worsted, notwithstanding that, under the pretext of wishing to receive the Roman faith, he humbly begged the Emperor and Pope to intervene. The Poles, who were ready to offer him the crown after the death of Sigismund Augustus, were deterred by his untrustworthiness and his avarice.

Fate brought grievous misfortunes on his own house. In a quarrel he struck his son Ivan such a blow with an iron rod that the prince died from it on the 19th of November, 1581. His third son, Feodor, was of weak intellect. Ivan's remorse hastened his end. This unconventional prince, whose crimes are not devoid of some greatness, but whose name must always be mentioned with a shudder, died on the 17th of March, 1584. Ivan IV holds a prominent place in Russian history both for good and for evil.

C. THE END OF THE HOUSE OF RURIK

IVAN'S Son Feodor mounted the throne in 1584; but his gentleness and piety would have been more suitable for a convent. The whole power thus lay in the hands of the privy councillors, amongst whom existed a dangerous rivalry between a Schujskij and a Bielskij. The reputation of Boris Godunov at the same time was slowly increasing, more especially since Nikita Romanov, Feodor's uncle, who was at first the most influential regent, had died in 1586, and Godunov had contrived a marriage between his sister and the young Czar; in fact, he aimed at the crown himself. Although he could neither read nor write, he skilfully conducted the business of the nation, won a great reputation for Russia in foreign countries, and appreciated the value of Western European culture. He proposed to found schools and in Moscow a university, and sent John Kramer to Germany to obtain professors for it. He sent young Russians abroad to study, and gladly employed foreigners in his service; began giving an excellent education to his children and supported art and industries. In a word, he was thoroughly capable of performing his task. His name, therefore, had a good reputation in foreign countries, but not so in Russia. There they regarded his innovations with disapproval. The clergy despised the acquisition of foreign languages as superfluous, confusing, and dangerous to the faith. The great nobles muttered against the upstart. Godunov found himself compelled to look for a support in the higher clergy and smaller nobility. Two important innovations owe their inception to this circumstance,the prohibition on freedom of movement of the peasants, and the founding of the Patriarchate. The Russian peasant had hitherto been allowed to change his master; that alone differentiated him from a slave. But this liberty of migration only benefited the owners of extensive properties, who held out enticing advantages to the peasant in order to be able to cultivate their broad plains. The peas

antry, therefore, deserted the small proprietors, whose lands became depopulated and depreciated; yet these latter sustained the chief state burdens. Thus in this case the interests of the state coincided with those of the lesser nobility. Godunov, by taking from the peasants the right of movement, saved the lesser nobility from misery and gained it for his purposes. That must have been far from his own. interest, since he was himself the owner of extensive landed estates.

What was really for his personal advantage was the founding of the Patriarchate. The Russian clergy had long complained that its supreme head, the Patriarch of Constantinople, was the servant of an infidel monarch and possessed no proper prestige. Moscow regarded herself as the third Rome, just as Byzantium had thought herself the second. Why should Moscow not obtain ecclesiastical independence, now that Constantinople had fallen so low, and Russia was reckoned the protector of Orthodox Christianity? Just then Jeremias, Patriarch of Constantinople, came to Moscow. Godunov seized the opportunity to win him over to his scheme. The other Patriarchs assented, and in 1598 was founded in Moscow the Patriarchate which continued until the end of 1700 (p. 581). The first Patriarch was Job, a favourite of Godunov.

Even now Godunov seems to have made all preparations for gaining the throne after the death of Feodor. But a brother of Feodor, Dmitrij, son of the seventh unlawful wife of Ivan the Terrible (see the genealogical table at page 452), was still living. Although he had been sent in good time to Uglitch with all his relations, there was no room for doubt that he would mount the throne after the death of Feodor. The news then arrived (1591) that the young Dmitrij was no more. Public opinion incriminated Godunov. It is true that he organised an investigation and executed the inhabitants of Uglitch; but the rumour persisted.

Nevertheless Boris Godunov mounted the throne of the Czar after the death of the childless Feodor (January 7, 1598), since the crown was offered him by the patriarch Job, and he had been elected in a sort of imperial assembly. In order to ensure his own safety, he threw Bielskij into prison and banished the Romanovs. One of them, Feodor Nikititsch, was compelled to become a monk under the name of Philaret; his wife, Xenia Schestov, took the veil as the nun Marfa, Boris was at first an admirable ruler. But soon he was overcome by fears; he, too, saw himself surrounded by traitors. He completely lost his balance of mind when the news spread that Dmitrij was still alive, and was preparing to recover the throne. Lithuanian magnates undertook to put a person who styled himself the miraculously rescued Dmitrij on the Russian throne by force of arms. The people believed that Dmitrij was the true Czarevitch. The troops wavered in their loyalty, and in spite of the reverse which was inflicted on the pretender, his adherents increased in numbers. Godunov died in 1605, in the middle of this movement, and the pseudo-Dmitrij became master of Russia. The whole nation shed tears of joy at seeing the son of their prince once more. His behaviour and sympathies showed that he was no Rurikovitch. He doted on the West and on the Roman Church, he associated with Jesuits, and wished to convert Russia to Catholicism. He ridiculed the native customs and the Boyars, and scorned the court ceremonial. The Polish nobles who came to Moscow with their retinue indulged in shameless behaviour toward the Russians. A month hardly had elapsed before Dmitrij fell victim to a conspiracy (May 17, 1606).

His

corpse was burnt, and a cannon loaded with the ashes, which were then scattered to the four winds.

The succeeding period was full of disturbances. In a new assembly, summoned by the Patriarch Vasilij Schujskij, who had conducted the inquiry in Uglitch, had struck the pretender, and had the courage to tell him he was an impostor, was elected Czar. Since a new Patriarch had been installed by the pseudo-Dmitrij, a change now took place in this office. The assembly imposed on the new Czar the condition that he was not to punish any offender by death without a trial, nor confiscate the property of criminals, and that false accusers should be liable to penalties. These were pacta conventa, such as the Slachta had extorted from the Polish king. Schujskij solemnly swore to it. But Russia saw in it a weakening of the royal dignity. The dominion of the nobility was feared more than the tyranny of the Czar.

Schujskij could not hold his own. Not merely were the nobility opposed to him from jealousy and envy, but new pretenders cropped up who professed to be Dmitrij, or Peter, Feodor's son. A more dangerous symptom was that the king of Poland came forward as a serious candidate for the Russian crown. In 1587 the Swedish house of Vasa reached the Polish throne in the person of Sigismund III. It was wished to procure the Russian crown for his son Vladislav; Sigismund would certainly have liked to have obtained it for himself. The Polish troops, which were already in the vicinity of Moscow, did not wish to leave Russia, since the new Czar had already been elected. Schujskij could not restore order, and was "humbly" begged by the assembly to vacate the throne, since he was unfortunate in his government and could not enforce any obedience to his rule. He abdicated and became a monk. The Council of Boyars now elected Vladislav to be Czar, on the condition that he would accept the Orthodox faith. The Polish troops were already allowed to enter Moscow and commanded the city.

D. THE RISE OF THE ROMANOVS

THEN the Russian people rose throughout the empire, the monasteries also, with the Troizko-Sergievsch at their head. Nobles, merchants, and peasants banded together to save Russia from the foreign yoke. In Nijni Novgorod many, following the example of a meat-seller Kusma Minin, sacrificed a third part of their property. The noble prince Posharskij took the lead, and the Poles were soon driven out of Moscow. In the year 1613 the new assembly was convened. The votes now fell on a step-grandson of Anastasia, wife of Ivan the Terrible, Michael III Romanov, the fifteen-year-old son of the above-mentioned Metropolitan Philaret, who had gone as ambassador to the Polish king and had been kept prisoner by him in Marienburg. Even in 1610 Michael found himself among the candidates for the throne, and had barely escaped Polish plots. With him a new dynasty mounted the Russian throne (see Figure 1 of plate at page 467 and the genealogical tree at page 583).

The state was impoverished and public affairs were in a bad condition. Many towns declared outright that they could pay no taxes. Michael, who had received a monastic education and was physically weak and of small intellectual endowments, was not the right man for Russia at this severe crisis. Even his father, Philaret,

who really governed in place of his son, possessed no talent as a ruler, while able monarchs were seated on the thrones of Sweden and Poland in the persons of Vladislav and Gustavus II Adolphus. Russia thus was forced to endure still longer to be cut off from the Baltic Sea by Poland and Sweden. In the treaties which she made with Sweden at Stolbovo in 1617, with Poland at Deulino in 1618, and then at Poljanovka in 1634, Russia was forced to relinquish all claim on Livonia, Smolensk, and a series of towns. "Russia now cannot launch a single boat on the Baltic without our consent," said Gustavus Adolphus in the Swedish Diet, "and it will be hard for the Russians to leap over this stream." Even against other enemies Russia felt her weakness. When the Cossacks had conquered Turkish Azov, the Czar ordered them to evacuate the fortress. The highest merits of Michael and his father were that they governed without harshness and endeavoured to raise the economic position of Russia. After centuries of oppression from Tartars and Czars the people once more enjoyed more humane treatment. Both rulers held frequent sessions of the Privy Council, which had long been in abeyance.

It was only under Michael's son Alexej (1645–1676) and under the children of Alexej, Feodor (1676–1682), Ivan (1682-1689), Sophia, and Peter the Great, that fortune once more smiled on Russia, first in consequence of the weakness of Poland under John Casimir, and then from her own increased strength. The Ukraine (pp. 162 and 564) then submitted to the Czar; in 1667 Poland in the treaty at Andrussov was obliged to cede the Ukraine, on the left bank of the Dnieper, with Kiev; this was finally ratified in 1686 in the peace of Grzymultovskij by Sobieski, when Sophia reigned in the name of her infant brother. Russia also in 1667 recovered Smolensk and other territories, which had been the cause of wars for centuries. Peter the Great first began the war with Sweden on account of Livonia. It was still more important for Russia that with the Romanovs Tartar Russia ceased and its Europeanising began.

9. THE RISE AND FALL OF THE POWER OF POLAND

A. THE FINAL DIRECTION OF THE POLISH POLICY IN 1515

WHEN Sigismund, Casimir's son, mounted the throne of Poland in 1506 (p. 512), Eastern Europe presented a very different political picture from that of a hundred years before. The hardest task of Poland in the course of the three last centuries, the suppression, that is, of the Teutonic Knights in order to occupy the coast of the Baltic, had been performed in 1466. It was high time for Poland to do so; a few decades later that would hardly have been possible.

Threatening clouds gathered in the east and west of Poland just at the close of the fifteenth century and the beginning of the sixteenth. On the one hand Moscow was arming for an attack on Poland-Lithuania, on the other side the Osmans were pressing with increasing power. Poland had long enjoyed tranquillity on the side of Moscow, which, groaning under the Tartar yoke, had been unable to move. But when Ivan III had shaken off the Tartar yoke and had his hands free, he formed comprehensive schemes. He worked for the unification of Russia with skill and good fortune. One district after another was brought over

to him. When he married in 1472 the Byzantine princess Sophia (Zoë), daughter of the despot Thomas of Morea, the last of the race of the Palæologi, he assumed the Byzantine imperial arms, the double-headed eagle, and claimed from Rome the title of Imperator Russia. He also laid claim to the Russian districts of Poland. The current of anti-Polish feeling in Lithuania was perceived by Ivan III. He therefore came forward as the champion of the Orthodox population of Poland. The Russian party in Lithuania was always strong; and capable men, such as Michael Glinskij, stood at its head. Even in Casimir's days the political conditions in Eastern Europe seemed to have shifted in favour of Moscow. Since the year 1481, after the Tartars had been beaten, the Lithuanian princes, hitherto friendly toward Poland, began one after the other to go over to the side of Moscow. Alexander, while Grand Duke of Lithuania, was openly pro-Russian. A rapprochement between him and Ivan took place in 1494. Alexander married the Princess Helene and waived his claim to a series of towns in favour of his fatherin-law. In the marriage contract he pledged himself not to force Helene to go over to the Catholic religion, and in fact not to allow her to do so "voluntarily." He built a chapel for her in Wilna, and surrounded her only with people of her own creed. We learn from these stipulations that the detrimental influence of the Roman Catholic Church on public policy, against which a stand was being made in Poland, was already recognised in Moscow. Alexander confirmed in 1499 the old rights of the Orthodox Church. Ivan also knew how to stir up hostility on every side against Poland, and to organise a menacing league against it. He married his son Vasilij to a daughter of Stephan the Great (p. 366) of Moldavia, and thus drew this country into the sphere of his interests. He was allied with the Teutonic Order and friendly with the Tartar Khan Mengli Giray I (1469-1474 and 1478-1515); he observed an amicable attitude toward Turkey, and would not entertain any notion of a league with Poland and Hungary against Turkey. His son Vasilij observed the same policy. In this attitude toward Poland the Russian princes were met by the German emperor Maximilian, who, as an opponent of the Jagellons in the contest for the crowns of Bohemia and Hungary, found a welcome ally in the Muscovite Grand Duke. This was the first time that Germany entered into relations with Moscow (cf. above, p. 265, etc.).

Equally threatening was the attitude of the Sublime Porte (cf. Vol. VII, pp. 216-219, 221 et seq.). It was the zenith of Osman power. Moldavia and Wallachia already wavered in their loyalty as allies of Poland; if they were lost, it would be the turn of the Dniester district. Finally, it lay with the Jagellons to defend the Hungarian crown. This state of things drove Poland also toward the south and provoked hostilities with Germany. The Hapsburgs, therefore, were eager, in league with Moscow and the Teutonic Order, to close the circle of the enemies of Poland; besides the above-named, Maximilian won over the Margrave of Brandenburg, the Duke of Saxony, and the king of Denmark for the combination against Poland, as well as a distinct party in Poland itself.

It thus was high time for Sigismund to act. He had concluded an alliance with Hungary in 1507, had renounced Moldavia in favour of Hungary, and married Barbara, sister of John Zapolya, besides winning over Mengli Giray, the Tartar Khan, by "yearly presents" of fifteen thousand gulden, - everything in order to show a bolder front to Maximilian and others, when he suddenly changed his views. Sigismund could not, of course, wage war with all his enemies at one and