Chapter LVIII: Section 7 (15)

A people, counted among the Sarmatians, who occupied anciently
the region between the Don and the Dnieper, —afterwards
encroaching on Dacian territory. They were among the
barbarians who troubled the Roman frontier earliest, and were
prominent in the wars which disturbed the reign of Marcus
Aurelius. Later, they disappeared in the flood of Gothic and
Hunnish invasion, partly by absorption, it is supposed, and
partly by extermination.

ROYAL ROAD OF ANCIENT PERSIA, The.

"Herodotus describes the great road of the Persian period from
Ephesos by the Cilician Gates to Susa. It was called the
'Royal Road,' because the service of the Great King passed
along it; and it was, therefore, the direct path of
communication for all government business. … It is an accepted
fact that in several other cases roads of the Persian Empire
were used by the Assyrian kings long before the Persian time,
and, in particular, that the eastern part of the 'Royal Road,'
from Cilicia to Susa, is much older than the beginning of the
Persian power. … Herodotus represents it as known to
Aristagoras, and therefore, existing during the 6th century,
B. C., and the Persians had had no time to organise a great
road like this before 500; they only used the previously
existing road. Moreover, the Lydian kings seem to have paid
some attention to their roads, and perhaps even to have
measured them, as we may gather from Herodotus's account of
the roads in the Lycus valley, and of the boundary pillar
erected by Crœsus at Kydrara."

_W. M. Ramsay,
Historical Geography of Asia Minor,
part 1, chapter 2._

ROYAL TOUCH, The.

See MEDICAL SCIENCE: 12-17TH CENTURIES.

RUBICON, Cæsar's passage of the.

See ROME: B. C. 50-49.

RUCANAS, The.

See PERU: THE ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS.

RUDOLPH,
King of France, A. D. 923-936.

Rudolph I., King of Germany-called Emperor
(the first of the House of Hapsburg), 1273-1291.

Rudolph II., Archduke of Austria and King of Hungary, 1576-1606;
King of Bohemia and Germanic Emperor, 1576-1612.

{2755}

RUGBY SCHOOL.

See EDUCATION, MODERN: EUROPEAN COUNTRIES.—ENGLAND.

RUGII, The.

A coast tribe in ancient Germany who seem to have occupied the
extreme north of Pomerania and who probably gave their name to
the Isle of Rugen.

_Church and Brodribb,
Geographical Notes to the Germany of Tacitus._

In the fifth century, after the breaking up of the empire of
Attila, the Hun, a people called the Rugii, and supposed to be
the same, were occupying a region embraced in modern Austria.
There were many Rugians among the barbarian auxiliaries in the
Roman army, and some of the annalists place among the number
Odoacer, who gave the extinguishing blow to the empire.

_T. Hodgkin,
Italy and Her Invaders,
book 3, chapter 8._

RULE OF ST. BENEDICT.

See BENEDICTINE ORDERS.

RUMP, The.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1648 (NOVEMBER-DECEMBER).

RUNJIT SINGH, RANJIT SINGH, The conquests of.

See SIKHS.

RUNNYMEDE.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1215.

RUPERT, OR ROBERT (of the Palatine).

King of Germany, A. D. 1400-1410.

RUPERT'S LAND.

See CANADA: A. D. 1869-1873.

RUSCINO.

The ancient name of modern Roussillon.

RUSSELL, Lord John, Ministries of.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1846; 1851-1852; 1865-1868.

RUSSELL, Lord William, Execution of.

See ENGLAND: A. D. 1681-1683.

----------RUSSIA: Start--------

RUSSIA: A. D. 862.
Scandinavian Origin of the name and the National Organization.

"'In the year 859,' says Nestor [the oldest Russian
chronicler, a monk of Kiev, who wrote early in the 12th
century] 'came the Varangians from beyond the sea and demanded
tribute from the Chud and from the Slavonians, the Meria, the
Ves, and the Krivichi; but the Khazars took tribute of the
Polians, the Severians and of the Viatichi.' Then he
continues: 'In the year 862 they drove the Varangians over the
sea, and paid them no tribute, and they began to govern
themselves, and there was no justice among them, and clan rose
against clan, and there was internal strife between them, and
they begun to make war upon each other. And they said to each
other: Let us seek for a prince who can reign over us and
judge what is right. And they went over the sea to the
Varangians, to Rus, for so were these Varangians called: they
were called Rus as others are called Svie (Swedes), others
Nurmane (Northmen, Norwegians), others Angliane (English, or
Angles of Sleswick?), others Gote (probably the inhabitants
of the island of Gothland). The Chud, the Slavonians, the
Krivichi, and the Ves said to Rus: Our land is large and rich,
but there is no order in it; come ye and rule and reign over
us. And three brothers were chosen with their whole clan, and
they took with them all the Rus, and they came. And the
eldest, Rurik, settled in Novgorod, and the second, Sineus,
near Bielo-ozero, and the third, Truvor, in Izborsk. And the
Russian land, Novgorod, was called after these Varangians;
they are the Novgorodians of Varangian descent; previously the
Novgorodians were Slavonians. But after the lapse of two years
Sineus and his brother Truvor died and Rurik assumed the
government and divided the towns among his men, to one
Polotsk, to another Rostov, to another Bielo-ozero.' Such is
Nestor's naive description of the foundation of the Russian
state. If it be read without prejudice or sophistical comment,
it cannot be doubted that the word Varangians is used here as
a common term for the inhabitants of Scandinavia, and that Rus
was meant to be the name of a particular Scandinavian tribe;
this tribe, headed by Rurik and his brothers, is said to have
crossed the sea and founded a state whose capital, for a time,
was Novgorod, and this state was the nucleus of the present
Russian empire. Next, Nestor tells us that in the same year
two of Rurik's men, 'who were not of his family,' Askold and
Dir, separated themselves from him with the intention to go to
Constantinople. They went down the Dnieper; but when they
arrived at Kiev, the capital of the Polians, who at that time
were tributary to the Khazars, they preferred to stay there,
and founded in that town an independent principality. Twenty
years after, in 882, this principality was incorporated by
Rurik's successor, Oleg: by a stratagem he made himself master
of the town and killed Askold and Dir, and from this time
Kiev, 'the mother of all Russian towns,' as it was called,
remained the capital of the Russian state and the centre of
the Russian name. … From the time historical critics first
became acquainted with Nestor's account, that is to say from
the beginning of the last century, until about fifteen or
twenty years ago [written in 1877], scarcely anyone ventured
to doubt the accuracy of his statement. Plenty of evidence was
even gradually produced from other sources to corroborate in
the most striking manner the tradition of the Russian
chronicles."

_V. Thomsen,
Relations between Ancient Russia and Scandinavia,
lecture 1._

ALSO IN:
_E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 55._

_R. G. Latham,
The Germany of Tacitus; Epilegomena,
section 18._

RUSSIA: A. D. 865.
First attack of the Russians on Constantinople.

See CONSTANTINOPLE: A. D. 865.

RUSSIA: A. D. 865-900.
Early relations with the Byzantine Empire.

"The first Russian naval expedition against Constantinople in
865 would probably have been followed by a series of
plundering excursions, like those carried on by the Danes and
Normans on the coasts of England and France, had not the
Turkish tribe called the Patzinaks rendered themselves masters
of the lower course of the Dnieper, and become instruments in
the hands of the emperors to arrest the activity of the bold
Varangians. The northern rulers of Kief were the same rude
warriors that infested England and France, but the Russian
people was then in a more advanced state of society than the
mass of the population in Britain and Gaul. The majority of
the Russians were freemen; the majority of the inhabitants of
Britain and Gaul were serfs.
{2756}
The commerce of the Russians was already so extensive as to
influence the conduct of their government, and to modify the
military ardour of their Varangian masters. … After the defeat
in 865, the Russians induced their rulers to send envoys to
Constantinople to renew commercial intercourse, and invite
Christian missionaries to visit their country; and no
inconsiderable portion of the people embraced Christianity,
though the Christian religion continued long after better
known to the Russian merchants than to the Varangian warriors.
The commercial relations of the Russians with Cherson and
Constantinople were now carried on directly, and numbers of
Russian traders took up their residence in these cities. The
first commercial treaty between the Russians of Kief and the
Byzantine empire was concluded in the reign of Basil I. The
intercourse increased from that time."

_G. Finlay,
History of the Byzantine Empire, from 716 to 1057,
book 2, chapter 2, section 1._

RUSSIA: A. D. 907-1043.
Wars, commerce and church connection with the Byzantines.

See CONSTANTINOPLE: A. D. 907-1043.

RUSSIA: 10TH Century.
The introduction of Christianity.

See CHRISTIANITY: 10TH CENTURY.

RUSSIA: A. D. 980-1054.
Family divisions and their consequence.

"Under Wladimir I. (980-1015), and under Jaroslaf I.
(1019-1054), the power of the grand-duchy of Kiew was
respectable. But Jaroslaf having divided it between his sons
conduced to enfeeble it. In the 12th century, the supremacy
passed from the grand-duchy of Kiew to the grand-duchy of
Wladimir, without extricating Russia from division and
impotence. The law of primogeniture not existing in Russia,
where it was not introduced into the Czarean family until the
14th century, the principalities were incessantly divided."

_S. Menzies,
History of Europe,
chapter. 36._

RUSSIA: A. D. 988.
Acquisition of Cherson.

See CHERSON: A. D. 988.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1054-1237.
The early Russian territory and its divisions.

"It must not be forgotten that the oldest Russia was formed
mainly of lands which afterwards passed under the rule of
Poland and Lithuania. … The Dnieper, from which Russia was
afterwards cut off, was the great central river of the elder
Russia; of the Don and the Volga she held only the upper
course. The northern frontier barely passed the great lakes of
Ladoga and Onega, and the Gulf of Finland itself. It seems not
to have reached what was to be the Gulf of Riga, but some of
the Russian princes held a certain supremacy over the Finnish
and Lettish tribes of that region. In the course of the 11th
century, the Russian state, like that of Poland, was divided
among princes of the reigning family, acknowledging the
superiority of the great prince of Kief. In the next century
the chief power passed from Kief to the northern Vladimir on
the Kiasma. Thus the former Finnish land of Susdal on the
upper tributaries of the Volga became the cradle of the second
Russian power. Novgorod the Great, meanwhile, under elective
princes, claimed, like its neighbour Pskof, to rank among
commonwealths. Its dominion was spread far over the Finnish
tribes to the north and east; the White Sea, and, far more
precious, the Finnish Gulf, had now a Russian seaboard. It was
out of Vladimir and Novgorod that the Russia of the future was
to grow. Meanwhile a crowd of principalities, Polotsk,
Smolensk, the Severian Novgorod, Tchernigof, and others, arose
on the Duna and Dnieper. Far to the east arose the
commonwealth of Viatka, and on the frontiers of Poland and
Hungary arose the principality of Halicz or Galicia, which
afterwards grew for a while into a powerful kingdom. Meanwhile
in the lands on the Euxine the old enemies, Patzinaks and
Chazars, gave way to the Cumans, known in Russian history as
Polovtzi and Parthi. They spread themselves from the Ural
river to the borders of Servia and Danubian Bulgaria, cutting
off Russia from the Caspian. In the next century Russians and
Cumans—momentary allies—fell before the advance of the
Mongols, commonly known in European history as Tartars. Known
only as ravagers in the lands more to the west, over Russia
they become overlords for 250 years. All that escaped
absorption by the Lithuanian became tributary to the Mongol.
Still the relation was only a tributary one; Russia was never
incorporated in the Mongol dominion, as Servia and Bulgaria
were incorporated in the Ottoman dominion. But Kief was
overthrown; Vladimir became dependent; Novgorod remained the
true representative of free Russia in the Baltic lands."

_E. A. Freeman,
Historical Geography of Europe,
chapter 11, section 2._

RUSSIA: A. D. 1235.
Formation of the grand-duchy of Lithuania,
embracing a large area of Russian territory.

See LITHUANIA: A. D. 1235.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1237-1239.
Mongol conquest.

See MONGOLS: A. D. 1229-1294.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1237-1480.
Prosperity and greatness of Novgorod as a commercial republic.
Two centuries of Tartar domination.
Growing power of Lithuania and Poland.
Rise of the Duchy of Moscow,
the nucleus of the future Russian Empire.

"Alone among the cities the ancient Novgorod has boasted its
exemption from plunder [at the hands of the Tartars]. The
great city, though fallen since the days of Rurik from being
the capital of an Empire, had risen to the dignity of a
Republic. It had found wealth in trade; and at successive
epochs had introduced the riches of Constantinople to the
North, the merchandise of the great Hanse Towns to the South.
It had profited by the example, and had emulated the
prosperity, of the rich cities of Germany. It had striven also
to attain their freedom; and, though still continuing to
acknowledge a vague allegiance to the Russian Princes, it had
been able, by its wealth and its remoteness from control, to
win or to assume privileges, until it had resembled Bremen or
Lubeck in the sovereignty of its assemblies, and had surpassed
those cities by the assumption of a style declaratory of its
independence. It boasted further of a prince, St. Alexander
Nevsky, to whom a glorious victory over the Swedes had already
given a name, and whose virtues were hereafter to enrol him
among the Saints; and it had a defence in the marshes and
forests which surrounded it and which had already once
deterred the invaders. But even the great city could not
continue to defy the Tartar horde, and its submission is at
once the last and most conclusive proof of the supremacy of
their power. Thenceforth the nation felt the bitterness of
servitude. The Tartars did not occupy the country they had
conquered; they retired to establish their settlements upon
the Volga, where they became known as the Golden Horde: but
they exacted the tribute and the homage of the Russian
Princes. …
{2757}
Five centuries have been unable to obliterate the traces which
this period has imprinted upon the national character. The
Tartars oppressed and extorted tribute from the Russian
princes; the princes in their turn became the oppressors and
extortioners of their people. Deceit and lying, the refuge of
the weak, became habitual. Increasing crime and increasing
punishments combined to brutalise the people. The vice of
drunkenness was universal. Trade indeed was not extinguished;
and religion prospered so abundantly that of all the many
monasteries of Russia there are but few that do not owe their
origin to this time. … Meanwhile the provinces of the West
were falling into the hands of other enemies. The Tartar wave
had swept as far as Poland, but it had then recoiled, and had
left the countries westward of the Dnieper to their fate. All
links of the connection that had bound these regions to the
Princes of Vladimir, were now broken. Vitepsk, Polotsk,
Smolensk, and even provinces still nearer Moscow, were
gradually absorbed by the growing power of Lithuania, which,
starting from narrow limits between the Dwina and the Niemen,
was destined to overshadow Russia.

See LITHUANIA: A. D. 1235.

The provinces of the South for a time maintained a certain
unity and independence under the name of the Duchy of Halicz
or Kief; but these also, through claims of inheritance or
feudal right, became eventually merged in the dominions of
their neighbours. Poland obtained Black Russia, which has
never since returned to its earlier masters. Lithuania
acquired Volhynia and Red Russia, and thus extended her wide
empire from the Baltic as far as the Red Sea. Then came the
union of these powers by the acceptance in 1383 of the Grand
Duke Jagellon as King of Poland; and all hopes for the Russian
princes of recovering their possessions seemed lost. The
ancient empire of Yaroslaf was thus ended; and its history is
parted from that of mediæval Russia by the dark curtain of two
centuries in which the Russian people were a race but not a
nation. The obscure descendants of Rurik still occupied his
throne, and ruled with some appearance of hereditary
succession. They even chose this period of their weakness to
solace their vanity by the adoption of the style of Sovereigns
of All the Russias. But they were the mere vassals of the
Golden Horde. … It was not until the reign of Dimitry IV.,
that any sign was shown of reviving independence. Time, by
weakening the Tartars, had then brought freedom nearer to the
Russians. The Horde, which had been united under Bati, when it
had first precipitated itself upon Europe, had become divided
by the ambition of rebellious Khans, who had aspired to
establish their independent power; and the Russians had at
length a prince who was able to profit by the weakness of his
enemies. Dimitry, who reigned from 1362 to 1389, is celebrated
as having checked the divisions which civil strife and
appanages had inflicted upon his country, and as having also
gloriously repulsed the Lithuanians from the walls of Moscow,
now rising to be his capital. But his greatest deed, and that
by which he lives in the remembrance of every Russian, is his
victory upon the Don, which gave to him thenceforth the name
of Donskoi. The Tartars, indignant at his prominence, had
united with the Lithuanians. For the first time the Russians
turned against their tyrants, and found upon the field of
Khoulikof [1383] that their freedom was still possible. They
did not achieve indeed for many years what they now began to
hope. Their strength was crippled by renewed attacks of
Tartars from the south and of Lithuanians from the west; and
they could not dare to brave the revengeful enmity of the
Horde. For a hundred years they still paid tribute, and the
successors of Dimitry still renewed their homage at the camp
upon the Volga. But progress gradually was made. The Grand
Prince Vassili Dimitrievitch [1389-1425] was able to extend
his rule over a territory that occupied the space of six or
seven of the modern governments round Moscow; and though the
country, under Vassili Vassilievitch [1425-1462], became
enfeebled by a renewal of civil strife, the increasing
weakness of the Tartar power continued to prepare the way for
the final independence that was accomplished by the close of
the 15th century. The reign of Ivan III. became the opening of
a new epoch in Russian history. He restored his people, long
sunk out of the gaze of Europe, to a place among its nations,
and recalled them in some degree from the barbarism of the
East to the intercourse and civilization of the West. The
Russia of old time was now no more; but the Grand Prince, or
Duke of Moscow, as he was called, was still the heir of Rurik
and of Yaroslaf, and in the growth of his Duchy their Empire
reappeared. … Without the fame of a warrior, but with the
wisdom of a statesman, with a strong hand and by the help of a
long reign, he built up out of the fragments that surrounded
Him an Empire that exceeded vastly that of his immediate
predecessor. … The fall of the republic of Novgorod [1478] and
the final extinction of the Golden Horde, are the events which
are most prominent. Riches had been the bane of the great
city. They had fostered insolence, but they had given a
distaste for war. The citizens had often rebelled; they had
accepted the protection of Lithuania, and had later meditated,
and even for a time accomplished, a union with Poland. But
they had had no strength to defend the liberty to which they
had aspired. … When Ivan advanced, determined, as he said, to
reign at Novgorod as he reigned at Moscow, they were unable to
repel or to endure a siege, and they surrendered themselves
into his hand. Once he had pardoned them; now their
independence was taken from them. Their assembly was
dissolved; their great bell, the emblem of their freedom, was
carried to Moscow. The extinction of the Golden Horde was due
to time and policy, rather than to any deeds which have
brought glory to the Russian people.

See MONGOLS: A. D. 1238-1391.

Released in this manner from the most dangerous both of
domestic and of foreign foes the power of Ivan rapidly
advanced. The broad province of Penn, that had begun to boast
a half accomplished independence, had been early forced to
acknowledge her subjection. The Khan of Kazan was now made
tributary; and the rule of Ivan was extended from the Oural to
the Neva. Provinces, as important, though less extensive, were
acquired in the south. The Russian princes and cities that had
preserved their independence were all, with the one exception of
Riazan, compelled to acknowledge the sovereignty of Moscow. …
{2758}
At the same time the Lithuanians were thrust back. Their
greatness had gone by; and the territories of Tula, Kalouga,
and Orel now ceasing to own allegiance to a declining power,
were incorporated with the rising Empire. That Empire had
already reached the Dnieper, and was already scheming to
recover the ancient capital of its princes."

_C. F. Johnstone,
Historical Abstracts,
chapter 6._

ALSO IN:
_A. Rambaud,
History of Russia,
chapters 8-14 (volume 1)._

RUSSIA: 15th Century.
Effects of the Tartar domination.
Sources of autocracy.

"The invasion of the Mongols, in the beginning of the 13th
century, snapped the thread of Russia's destinies. … Nature,
after preparing the invasion, herself marked its bounds. The
Tatars, now masters of the steppes in the southeast, which
felt to them very much like home, grew ill at ease as soon as
they began to lose themselves in the forests of the north.
They did not settle there. These regions were too European to
suit their half-nomadic habits, and they cared more for
tribute-payers than for subjects. So the 'kniazes' received
their principalities back from the hands of the Mongols—as
fiefs. They had to submit to the presence near their person of
a sort of Tatar 'residents,'—the 'baskàks,' whose duty it was
to take the census and to collect the taxes. They were
compelled to take the long, long journey to the 'Horde,' often
encamped in the heart of Asia, in order to receive their
investiture from the successors of Djinghiz, and ended by
becoming the vassals of a vassal of the 'Great-Khan.' At this
price Russia retained her religion, her dynasties, and—thanks
to her clergy and her princes—her nationality. Never yet was
nation put through such a school of patience and abject
submission. … Under this humiliating and impoverishing
domination the germs of culture laid in the old principalities
withered up. … The Tatar domination developed in the Russians
faults and faculties of which their intercourse with Byzance
had already brought them the germs, and which, tempered by
time, have since contributed to develop their diplomatic
gifts. … The oppression by man, added to the oppression by the
climate, deepened certain traits already sketched in by nature
in the Great-Russian's soul. Nature inclined him to
submission, to endurance, to resignation; history confirmed
these inclinations. Hardened by nature, he was steeled by
history. One of the chief effects of the Tatar domination and
all that makes up Russian history, is the importance given to
the national worship. … The domination of an enemy who was a
stranger to Christianity fortified the sufferers' attachment
to their worship. Religion and native land were merged into
one faith, took the place of nationality and kept it alive. It
was then that the conception sprang up which still links the
quality of Russian to the profession of Greek orthodoxy, and
makes of the latter the chief pledge of patriotism. … Upon
Russia's political sovereignty the Tatar domination had two
parallel effects: it hastened national unity and it
strengthened autocracy. The country which, under the appanage
system, was falling to pieces, was bound together by foreign
oppression as by a chain of iron. Having constituted himself
suzerain of the 'Grand-Kniazes,' whom he appointed and
dethroned at will, the Khan conferred on them his authority.
The Asiatic tyranny of which they were the delegates empowered
them to govern tyrannically. Their despotism over the Russians
was derived from their servitude under the Tatars. … Every
germ of free government, whether aristocratic or democratic,
was stifled. Nothing remained but one power, the
'Velíki-Kniaz,' the autocrat,—and such now, after more than
500 years, still is the basis of the state."

_A. Leroy-Beaulieu,
The Empire of the Tsars and the Russians,
part 1, book 4, chapter 3._

RUSSIA: A. D. 1533-1682.
From Ivan the Terrible to Peter the Great.
The Poles at Moscow.
Origin of the dynasty of the Romanoffs.

"Apart from the striking and appalling character of Ivan
himself, whom Mickiewicz, the Polish poet, calls, in his
lectures on the Slavonians, 'the most finished tyrant known in
history—frivolous and debauched like Nero, stupid and
ferocious like Caligula, full of dissimulation like Tiberius
or Louis XI.,' the reign of Ivan the Terrible is interesting
as marking the beginning of the intercourse between Russia and
Western Europe, and especially between Russia and England. The
natural approach to Russia from the west was, of course,
through Poland; but the Poles impeded systematically, and for
political reasons, the introduction of arts and artificers
into Russia, and Sigismund wrote a letter to Elizabeth,
warning her against the Muscovite power as a danger to
civilization, only not formidable for the moment because it
was still semi-barbarous. Ivan the Terrible was the third of
the independent Tsars; and already under Ivan, sometimes
called the 'Great'—to whom indeed belongs the honour of having
finally liberated Russia from the Tartar yoke—endeavours had
been made to enter into relations with various European
nations. Foreigners, too, were encouraged to visit Russia and
settle there. The movement of foreigners towards Russia
increased with each succeeding reign; and beginning with the
first Tsar of Muscovy it became much more marked under the
third, that Ivan the Terrible, under whose reign the mariners
in the service of the English company of 'merchant
adventurers' entered the White Sea, and, in their own
language, 'discovered' Russia. Russia was, indeed, until that
time, so far as Western Europe was concerned, an unknown land,
cut off from Western civilization for political and warlike
reasons by the Poles, and for religious reasons by the
Catholic Church. On the 18th of March, 1584, Ivan was sitting
half dressed, after his bath, 'solacing himself and making
merie with pleasant songs, as he used to doe.' He called for
his chess-board, had placed the men, and was just setting up
the king, when he fell back in a swoon and died. … The death
of Ivan was followed by strong dislike against the English at
Moscow; and the English diplomatist and match-maker, Sir
Jerome Bowes, after being ironically informed that 'the
English king was dead,' found himself seized and thrown into
prison. He was liberated through the representations of
another envoy, who pointed out that it would be imprudent to
excite Elizabeth's wrath; and though for a time intercourse
between Russia and Western Europe was threatened, through the
national hatred of foreigners as manifested by the councillors
of the Tsar, yet when the weak-minded Feodor fell beneath the
influence of his brother-in-law Boris Godounoff, the previous
policy, soon to become traditional, of cultivating relations
with Western Europe, was resumed. …
{2759}
Nineteen years have yet to pass before the election of the
first of the Romanoffs to the throne; for strange as it may
seem, the first member of the dynasty of the Romanoffs was
chosen and appointed to the imperial rule by an assembly
representing the various estates. Meanwhile the order of
succession had been broken. Several pretenders to the throne
had appeared, one of whom, Demetrius, distinctively known as
the 'Imposter,' attained for a time supreme power. Demetrius,
married to a Polish lady, Marina Mniszek, was aided by her
powerful family to maintain his position in Moscow; for the
Mniszeks assembled and sent to the Russian capital a body of
4,000 men. Then Ladislas [son of the king] of Poland
interfered, and after a time [1610] Moscow fell beneath the
power of the Poles.

See POLAND: A. D. 1590-1648.

Soon, however, the national feeling of Russia was aroused. A
butcher, or cattle dealer of Nijni Novgorod, named Minin,
whose patriotism has made him one of the most popular figures
in Russian history, got together the nucleus of a national
army, and called upon the patriotic nobleman, Prince Pojarski,
to place himself at its head. Pojarski and Minin marched
together to Moscow, and their success in clearing the capital
of the foreign invaders [1612] is commemorated by a group of
statuary which stands in the principal square of Moscow. …
Among the tombs of the metropolitans buried in … [the
cathedral of the Assumption at Moscow] are those of Philaret
and Hermogenes, who were thrown into prison by the Poles for
refusing to consent to the accession of Ladislas, the Polish
prince, to the Russian throne. Hermogenes died soon after his
arrest. Philaret, at the expulsion of the Poles, was carried
away captive by them in their retreat from Moscow (1612), and
was kept nine years a prisoner in Poland. On his return to
Russia, he found his son, Michael Feodorovitch, elected to the
throne. The belief, then, of the Russian people in Michael's
patriotism, seems to have been founded on a knowledge of the
patriotism of his father. The surname of the metropolitan who
had defied the Polish power and had suffered nine years'
imprisonment in Poland was Romanoff; Philaret was the name he
had adopted on becoming a monk. His baptismal name was Feodor,
and hence the patronymic Feodorovitch attached to the name of
Michael, the first of the Romanoffs. There is little to say
about the reign of Michael Feodorovitch, the circumstances
having once been set forth under which he was elected to the
vacant throne; and his son and successor, Alexis
Michailovitch, is chiefly remembered as father of Peter the
Great."

_H. S. Edwards,
The Romanoffs,
chapters 1-2._

ALSO IN:
_W. K. Kelly,
History of Russia,
chapters 13-19 (volume 1)._

_P. Mérimée,
Demetrius the Imposter._

RUSSIA: A. D. 1547.
Assumption of the title, Czar, or Tzar,
by the Grand Prince of Moscow.

"In January 1547, Ivan [IV., known as Ivan the Terrible]
ordered the Metropolitan Macarius to proceed with his
coronation. He assumed at the ceremony not only the title of
Grand Prince, but that of Tzar. The first title no longer
answered to the new power of the sovereign of Moscow, who
counted among his domestics, princes and even Grand Princes.
The name of Tzar is that which the books in the Slavonic
language, ordinarily read by Ivan, give to the kings of Judæa,
Assyria, Egypt, Babylon, and to the emperors of Rome and
Constantinople. Now, was not Ivan in some sort the heir of the
Tzar Nebuchadnezzar, the Tzar Pharaoh, the Tzar Ahasuerus, and
the Tzar David, since Russia was the sixth empire spoken of in
the Apocalypse? Through his grandmother Sophia Palæologus, he
was connected with the family of the Tzars of Byzantium;
through his ancestor Vladimir Monomachus, he belonged to the
Porphyrogeniti; and through Constantine the Great, to Cæsar. …
We may imagine what prestige was added to the dignity of the
Russian sovereign by this dazzling title, borrowed from
Biblical antiquity, from Roman majesty, from the orthodox
sovereigns of Byzantium."

_A. Rambaud,
History of Russia,
volume 1, chapter 15._

"This title [Czar] … is not a corruption of the word 'Cæsar,'
as many have supposed [see CÆSAR, THE TITLE], but is an old
Oriental word which the Russians acquired through the Slavonic
translation of the Bible, and which they bestowed at first on
the Greek emperors, and afterwards on the Tartar Khans. In
Persia it signifies throne, supreme authority; and we find it
in the termination of the names of the kings of Assyria and
Babylon, such as Phalassar, Nabonasser, &c.—Karamsin."

_W. K. Kelly,
History of Russia,
volume 1, page 125, foot-note._

"Von Hammer, in his last note to his 31st book, says, 'The
title Czar or Tzar is an ancient title of Asiatic sovereigns.
We find an instance of it in the title 'The Schar,' of the
sovereign of Gurdistan; and in that of Tzarina … of the
Scythians.'"

_Sir E. S. Creasy,
History of the Ottoman Turks,
page 213, foot-note._

RUSSIA: A. D. 1569-1571.
First collision with the Turks.
Their repulse from Astrakhan.-
Moscow stormed and sacked by the Crim Tartars.
Peace with the Porte.

At the time (1566) of the accession of Selim II. to the
Ottoman throne, the Russians "had been involved in fierce and
frequent wars with the Sultan's vassals, the Crim Tartars; but
the Porte had taken no part in these contests. But the bold
genius of the Vizier Sokolli now attempted the realisation of
a project, which, if successful, would have barred the
southern progress of Russia, by firmly planting the Ottoman
power on the banks of the Don and the Volga, and along the
shores of the Caspian Sea. … Sokclli proposed to unite the
rivers Don and Volga by a canal, and then send a Turkish
armament up the sea of Azoph and the Don, thence across by the
intended channel to the Volga, and then down the latter river
into the Caspian; from the southern shores of which sea the
Ottomans might strike at Tabriz and the heart of the Persian
power. … Azoph already belonged to the Turks, but in order to
realise the great project entertained it was necessary to
occupy Astrakhan also. Accordingly, 3,000 Janissaries and
20,000 horse were sent [1569] to besiege Astrakhan, and a
cooperative force of 30,000 Tartars was ordered to join them,
and to aid in making the canal. 5,000 Janissaries and 3,000
pioneers were at the same time sent to Azoph to commence and
secure the great work at its western extremity. But the
generals of Ivan the Terrible did their duty to their stern
master ably in this emergency. The Russian garrison of
Astrakhan sallied on its besiegers, and repulsed them with
considerable loss.
{2760}
And a Russian army, 15,000 strong, under Prince Serebinoff,
came suddenly on the workmen and Janissaries near Azoph, and
put them to head-long flight. It was upon this occasion that
the first trophies won from the Turks came into Russian hands.
An army of Tartars, which marched to succour the Turks, was
also entirely defeated by Ivan's forces; and the Ottomans,
dispirited by their losses and reverses, withdrew altogether
from the enterprise. … Russia was yet far too weak to enter on
a war of retaliation with the Turks. She had subdued the
Tartar Khanates of Kasan and Astrakhan; but their kinsmen of
the Crimea were still formidable enemies to the Russians, even
without Turkish aid. It was only two years after the Ottoman
expedition to the Don and Volga that the Khan of the Crimea
made a victorious inroad into Russia, took Moscow by storm,
and sacked the city (1571). The Czar Ivan had, in 1570, sent
an ambassador, named Nossolitof, to Constantinople, to
complain of the Turkish attack on Astrakhan, and to propose
that there should be peace, friendship, and alliance between
the two empires. … The Russian ambassador was favourably
received at the Sublime Porte, and no further hostilities
between the Turks and Russians took place for nearly a
century."

_Sir E. S. Creasy,
History of the Ottoman Turks,
chapter 11._

RUSSIA: A. D. 1577-1580.
Conquests by the Poles.

See POLAND: A. D. 1574-1590.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1578-1579.
Yermac's conquest of Siberia.

See SIBERIA.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1613-1617.
War with Sweden.
Cession of territory, including the site of St. Petersburg.

See SCANDINAVIAN STATES (SWEDEN): A. D. 1611-1629.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1652.
Allegiance of the Cossacks of the Ukraine transferred from the
King of Poland to the Czar.

See POLAND: A. D. 1648-1654.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1655-1659.
The great schism, known as the Rascol.

"In the reign of Alexis took place the great revision of the
Bible, carried out by the energy of Nicon, the Patriarch, who,
finding that the church-books were full of ridiculous blunders
caused by ignorant copyists, procured a quantity of the best
Greek manuscripts from Mount Athos, and other places. In 1655,
and the following year, he summoned two councils of the
church, at which the newly translated service-books were
promulgated and the old ones called in. In consequence of this
change, a great schism took place in the Russian Church, a
number of people attaching a superstitious veneration to the
old books, errors and all. Thus was formed the large sect of
the Staro-obriadtsi or Raskolniks, still existing in Russia,
who have suffered great persecutions at many periods of her
history."

_W. R. Morfill,
The Story of Russia,
chapter 6._

"The most important innovation, which afterwards became the
symbol and the war-cry of the religious rebellion, referred to
the position of the fingers in making the sign of the cross.
The Russians of Nicon's time when they crossed themselves held
two fingers together, while the Oriental churches and the
Greeks enjoined their adherents to cross themselves with three
fingers united into one point. The two-fingered cross of the
Muscovites was used in the Orient only for giving the priestly
benediction. … Patriarch Nicon was anxious to return to
ancient traditions. Reserving the two-fingered cross for
priestly benedictions only, he re-established the
three-fingered Greek cross, or, as his opponents called it,
'the pinch-of-snuff cross,' for the private act of devotion.
Then, too, in certain cases, for instance in stamping the
round wafers, he introduced the use of the equilateral,
four-sided cross. … The Russians celebrated the mass on seven
wafers, while the Greeks and Orientals used only five. In the
processions of the Church the Russians were in the habit of
first turning their steps westward—going with the sun; the
Greeks marched eastward—against the sun. In all these points
Patriarch Nicon conformed to the traditions of the Greek
mother-church. In conformity with this rule, moreover, he
directed that the hallelujahs should be 'trebled,' or sung
thrice, as with the Greeks, the Russians having up till then
only 'doubled' it—singing, instead of the third hallelujah,
its Russian equivalent, 'God be praised.' Finally, or we
should rather say above all, Nicon introduced a fresh spelling
of the name of Jesus. The fact is that, probably in
consequence of the Russian habit of abbreviating some of the
commonest scriptural names, the second letter in the name
Jesus had been dropped altogether; it was simply spelt Jsus,
without any sign of abbreviation. Patriarch Nicon corrected
this orthographical error, replacing the missing letter. Was
this all? Yes, this was all. As far as doctrinal matters were
concerned, nothing more serious was at stake in the great
religious schism of the 17th century, known by the name of the
Rascol. And yet it was for these trifles—a letter less in a
name, a finger more in a cross, the doubling instead of the
trebling of a word—that thousands of people, both men and
women, encountered death on the scaffold or at the stake. It
was for these things that other scores of thousands underwent
the horrible tortures of the knout, the strappado, the rack,
or had their bodies mutilated, their tongues cut, their hands
chopped off."

_Stepniak,
The Russian Peasantry
(American edition),
pages 237-239._

RUSSIA: A. D. 1686-1696.
War of the Holy League against the Turks.
Capture of Azov.
First foothold on the Black Sea acquired.

See TURKS: A. D. 1684-1696.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1689.
Accession of Peter the Great.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1697-1704.
Peter the Great: his travels in pursuit of knowledge;
his apprenticeship to the useful arts;
his civilizing work in Muscovy.

"Many princes before [Peter the Great] had renounced crowns,
wearied out with the intolerable load of public affairs; but
no man had ever divested himself of the royal character, in
order to learn the art of governing better: this was a stretch
of heroism which was reserved for Peter the Great alone. He
left Russia in [1697], having reigned as yet but [a few]
years, and went to Holland disguised under a common name, as
if he had been a menial servant of that same Lefort, whom he
sent in quality of ambassador-extraordinary to the
States-General. As soon as he arrived at Amsterdam, he
enrolled his name among the shipwrights of the admiralty of
the Indies, and wrought in the yard like the other mechanics.
At his leisure hours he learned such parts of the mathematics
as are useful to a prince,—fortification, navigation, and the
art of drawing plans. He went into the workmen's shops, and
examined all their manufactures: nothing could escape his
observation.
{2761}
From thence he passed over into England, where having
perfected himself in the art of ship-building, he returned to
Holland, carefully observing every thing that might turn to
the advantage of his country. At last, after two years of
travel and labor, to which no man but himself would have
willingly submitted, he again made his appearance in Russia,
with all the arts of Europe in his train. Artists of every
kind followed him in abundance. Then were seen, for the first
time, large Russian ships in the Baltic, and on the Black Sea
and the ocean. Stately buildings, of a regular architecture,
were raised among the Russian huts. He founded colleges;
academies, printing-houses, and libraries. The cities were
brought under a regular police. The dress and customs of the
people were gradually changed, though not without some
difficulty; and the Muscovites learned by degrees the true
nature of a social state. Even their superstitious rites were
abolished; the dignity of the patriarch was suppressed; and
the czar declared himself the head of the Church. This last
enterprise, which would have cost a prince less absolute than
Peter both his throne and his life, succeeded almost without
opposition, and insured to him the success of all his other
innovations. After having humbled an ignorant and a barbarous
clergy, he ventured to make a trial of instructing them,
though, by that means, he ran the risk of rendering them
formidable. … The czar not only subjected the Church to the
State, after the example of the Turkish emperors, but, what
was a more masterly stroke of policy, he dissolved a militia
of much the same nature with that of the janizaries: and what
the sultans had attempted in vain, he accomplished in a short
time: he disbanded the Russian janizaries, who were called
Strelitz, and who kept the czars in subjection. These troops,
more formidable to their masters than to their neighbors,
consisted of about 30,000 foot, one half of which remained at
Moscow, while the other was stationed upon the frontiers. The
pay of a Strelitz was no more than four roubles a year; but
this deficiency was amply compensated by privileges and
extortions. Peter at first formed a company of foreigners,
among whom he enrolled his own name, and did not think it
below him to begin the service in the character of a drummer,
and to perform the duties of that mean office; so much did the
nation stand in need of examples! By degrees he became an
officer. He gradually raised new regiments; and, at last,
finding himself master of a well-disciplined army, he broke
the Strelitz, who durst not disobey. The cavalry were nearly
the same with that of Poland, or France, when this last
kingdom was no more than an assemblage of fiefs. The Russian
gentlemen were mounted at their own expense, and fought
without discipline, and sometimes without any other arms than
a sabre or a bow, incapable of obeying, and consequently of
conquering. Peter the Great taught them to obey, both by the
example he set them and by the punishments he inflicted; for
he served in the quality of a soldier and subaltern officer,
and as czar he severely punished the Boyards, that is, the
gentlemen, who pretended that it was the privilege of their
order not to serve but by their own consent. He established a
regular body to serve the artillery, and took 500 bells from
the churches to found cannon. … He was himself a good
engineer; but his chief excellence lay in his knowledge of
naval affairs: he was an able sea-captain, a skilful pilot, a
good sailor, an expert shipwright, and his knowledge of these
arts was the more meritorious, as he was born with a great
dread of the water. In his youth he could not pass over a
bridge without trembling. … He caused a beautiful harbor to be
built at the mouth of the Don, near Azof, in which he proposed
to keep a number of galleys; and some time after, thinking
that these vessels, so long, light, and flat, would probably
succeed in the Baltic, he had upwards of 300 of them built at
his favorite city of Petersburg. He showed his subjects the
method of building ships with fir only, and taught them the
art of navigation. He had even learned surgery, and, in a case
of necessity, has been known to tap a dropsical person. He was
well versed in mechanics, and instructed the artists. … He was
always travelling up and down his dominions, as much as his
wars would allow him; but he travelled like a legislator and
natural philosopher, examining nature everywhere, endeavoring
to correct or perfect her; sounding with his own hands the
depths of seas and rivers, repairing sluices, visiting docks,
causing mines to be searched for, assaying metals, ordering
accurate plans to be drawn, in the execution of which he
himself assisted. He built, upon a wild and uncultivated spot,
the imperial city of Petersburg. … He built the harbor of
Cronstadt, on the Neva, and Sainte-Croix, on the frontiers of
Persia; erected forts in the Ukraine and Siberia; established
offices of admiralty at Archangel, Petersburg, Astrakhan, and
Azof; founded arsenals, and built and endowed hospitals. All
his own houses were mean, and executed in a bad taste; but he
spared no expenses in rendering the public buildings grand and
magnificent. The sciences, which in other countries have been
the slow product of so many ages, were, by his care and
industry, imported into Russia in full perfection. He
established an academy on the plan of the famous societies of
Paris and London. … Thus it was that a single man changed the
face of the greatest empire in the universe. It is however a
shocking reflection, that this reformer of mankind should have
been deficient in that first of all virtues, the virtue of
humanity. Brutality in his pleasures, ferocity in his manners,
and cruelty in his punishments, sullied the lustre of so many
virtues. He civilized his subjects, and yet remained himself a
barbarian. He would sometimes with his own hands execute
sentences of death upon the unhappy criminals; and, in the
midst of a revel, would show his dexterity in cutting off
heads."

_Voltaire,
History of Charles XII., King of Sweden,
book 1._

ALSO IN:
_J. L. Motley,
Peter the Great._

_E. Schuyler,
Peter the Great,
volume 1._

_A. Leroy-Beaulieu,
The Empire of the Tsars,
part 1, book 4, chapter 4._

RUSSIA: A. D. 1699.
The Peace of Carlowitz with the Sultan.
Possession of Azov confirmed.

See HUNGARY: A. D. 1683-1699.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1700.
Aggressive league with Poland and Denmark
against Charles XII. of Sweden.
Defeat at Narva.

See SCANDINAVIAN STATES (SWEDEN): A. D. 1697-1700.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1701-1706.
War with Charles XII. of Sweden in Poland and Livonia.

See SCANDINAVIAN STATES (SWEDEN): A. D. 1701-1707.

{2762}

RUSSIA: A. D. 1703-1718.
The founding of St. Petersburg.

"Immediately after the capture of Nyenskanz [1703], a council
of war was convened to consider the question of defending and
utilising the mouth of the Neva, and whether it would be
better to strengthen the little fort which had just been
taken, or to seek a fit site for a commercial town nearer the
sea. The latter course was decided upon. Near its mouth the
Neva takes a sharp turn and divides into three or four
branches, which by subsequent redivision form a number of
islands, large and small. These marshy islands, overgrown with
forests and thickets, and liable to be covered with water
during the westerly winds, were inhabited by a few Finnish
fishermen, who were accustomed to abandon their mud huts at
the approach of high water, and seek a refuge on the higher
ground beyond. It was on the first of these islands, called by
the Finns Yanni-Saari, or Hare Island, where the river was
still broad and deep, that Peter laid the foundation of a
fortress and a city, named St. Petersburg, after his patron
saint. … For this work many carpenters and masons were sent
from the district of Novgorod, who were aided by the soldiers.
Wheelbarrows were unknown (they are still little used in
Russia), and in default of better implements the men scraped
up the earth with their hands, and carried it to the ramparts
on pieces of matting or in their shirts. Peter wrote to
Ramodanofsky, asking him to send the next summer at least
2,000 thieves and criminals destined for Siberia, to do the
heavy work under the direction of the Novgorod carpenters. At
the same time with the construction of the bastions, a church
was built in the fortress and dedicated to St. Peter and St.
Paul. … Just outside of the fortress Peter built for himself a
small hut, which he called his palace. It was about fifty-five
feet long by twenty wide, built of logs roofed with shingles,
and contained only three rooms, lighted by little windows set
in leaden frames. In respect for this, his earliest residence
in St. Petersburg, Peter subsequently had another building
erected outside of it to preserve it from the weather, and in
this state it still remains, an object of pilgrimage to the
curious and devout. … In spite of disease and mortality among
the men, in spite of the floods, which even in the first year
covered nearly the whole place and drowned some who were too
ill to move, the work went on. But in its infancy St.
Petersburg was constantly in danger from the Swedes, both by
sea and land. … St. Petersburg was the apple of Peter's eye.
It was his 'paradise,' as he often calls it in his letters. It
was always an obstacle, and sometimes the sole obstacle, to
the conclusion of peace. Peter was willing to give up all he
had conquered in Livonia and Esthonia, and even Narva, but he
would not yield the mouth of the Neva. Nevertheless, until the
war with Sweden had been practically decided by the battle of
Poltava, and the position of St. Petersburg had been thus
secured, although it had a certain importance as a commercial
port, and as the fortress which commanded the mouth of the
Neva, it remained but a village. The walls of the fortress
were finally laid with stone, but the houses were built of
logs at the best, and for many years, in spite of the marshy
soil, the streets remained unpaved. If fate had compelled the
surrender of the city, there would not have been much to
regret. Gradually the idea came to Peter to make it his
capital. In 1714 the Senate was transported thither from
Moscow, but wars and foreign enterprises occupied the Tsar's
attention, and it was not until 1718 that the colleges or
ministries were fully installed there, and St. Petersburg
became in fact the capital of the Empire."

_E. Schuyler,
Peter the Great,
chapter 46 (volume 2)._

RUSSIA: A. D. 1707-1718.
Invasion by Charles XII. of Sweden.
His ruinous defeat at Pultowa.
His intrigues with the Turks.
Unlucky expedition of the Czar into Moldavia.
Russian conquests in the north.

See SCANDINAVIAN STATES (SWEDEN): A. D. 1707-1718.

RUSSIA: A. D. 1721.
The Peace of Nystad with Sweden.
Livonia and other conquests of Peter the Great secured.
Finland given up.

See SCANDINAVIAN STATES (SWEDEN): A. D. 1719-1721.

[IMAGE: CENTRAL EUROPE IN 1715 AFTER THE TREATIES OF UTRECHT AND RASTADT.

FRANCE.[IN 1643] ACQUIRED BY FRANCE UNDER LOUIS XIV. HABSBURG POSSESSIONS. HOHENZOLLERN POSSESSIONS. DANISH POSSESSIONS. HOUSE OF HOLSTEEN-GOTTORP. ECCLESIASTICAL STATES OF THE EMPIRE. STATES OF THE CHURCH. THE BOUNDARY OF THE EMPIRE IS SHOWN BY THE HEAVY RED LINE.]

[IMAGE: EASTERN EUROPE IN 1715. SHOWING SOME PRIOR AND SUBSEQUENT CHANGES. HABSBURG POSSESSIONS. HOHENZOLLERN POSSESSIONS. VENETIAN POSSESSIONS. DANISH AND NORWEGIAN POSSESSIONS. SWEDISH POSSESSIONS. RUSSIA. POLAND. THE EASTERN BOUNDARY UP THE EMPIRE IS SHOWN BY THE HEAVY RED LINE.]

RUSSIA: A. D. 1725-1739.
The reigns of Catherine I., Peter II., and Anne Ivanovna.
Fruitless war with Turkey.
Depredations in the Crimea.