Ivan The Terrible Essay

Ivan the Terrible: First Tsar of Russia

Ivan Chetvyorty Vasilyevich, more famously known as Ivan the terrible or Ivan IV, was born August 30, 1530, to the then Grand Prince Vasily III of Moscow and his second wife, Yelena Glinskaya. When Ivan was three years old, his father died and he inherited the title of Grand Prince although his mother ruled as a regent for a few years until she died in 1538. Some believe that she may have been poisoned by rival noble classes but regardless of how she died, her death led to a lot of fighting among the nobles to gain control over young Ivan and in turn control over the power that he would inherit. It is theorized that it was these condition while growing up that led to Ivan’s paranoia concerning the noble

A month after he was crowned Tsar, Ivan married Anastasia Romanova who was an ancestor of the future Romanova dynasty. Once Ivan was crowned as Tsar, he went on to create a lot of reforms and reorganize both the central and local administration. A couple of the reforms were that he created a more detailed legal code that replaced the previous one and he improved the conditions of those who served in the military. It was all reorganized so that the new system of command appointed commanders on what their merits were rather than their social status. In regards to foreign policy, Ivan wanted to conquer all the independent regions that surrounded the land that he ruled and create a larger more centralized Russia while also resisting the Mongols and gaining access to the Baltic Sea. In the years 1552 and 1556, Ivan sent armies to crush Kazan and Astrakhan and succeeded creating a sort of buffer zone against Mongol invasion. His attempts at gaining access to the Baltic were less successful because one of his advisers defected to the state that was ruling there, Lithuania, and led to the defeat of Ivan’s invading army. In the beginning part of his reign, Ivan was successful in efforts but the way that he was accomplishing his goals was leading to a disruption in the economy and culture. He also created