Customs in the 16th - 17th centuries. Customs in the 16th - 17th centuries Russia in the 16th century

A single Russian state was formed by the end of the 15th century, simultaneously with England and France. If in the West the folding of the state proceeded simultaneously with the folding of the market and the separation of powers, then in Russia this was dictated exclusively by external factors: the Horde, the development of trade, etc.

Ivan the Terrible believed that all his subjects were slaves, considering only the Turkish sultan to be his equal. Ivan the Terrible considered the European tsars to be sergeants. Russia is the tsar's largest patrimony.

Ivan the Terrible in his reign relied on a group of nobility and governors.

In the 50s of the 16th century, Ivan the Terrible tried to introduce local government bodies, at the head of which he put zemstvo elders. At the same time, sectoral bodies were established in the center. But since there was no experience of self-government, the ventures failed.

Ivan the Terrible suspected that he would be demoted to the rank of Queen of England. The essence of despotism and the emergence of Oprichnina is the feeling of being a dictator.

Ref. * In Russia, there were 3 nobles per boyar, the same number of officials and 10-15 commoners. *

Under Ivan the Terrible, Tver and Novgorod were defeated.

As a result of the Oprichnina, the most active part of the country was destroyed. The dire consequences of the Oprichnina are the joining of many to the guardsmen. Due to the weakening of the country's forces due to the Oprichnina, Russia lost the Levonian War in 1549. In 1551. raid of the Crimean Khan.

Autocracy was the only construction of the country.

In 1598. after the death of his son Ivan the Terrible, the disintegration of the country begins. Boris Godunov tried to stop this process.

In 1601-604 in Russia there was famine due to crop failures due to continuous rains; these disasters marked the beginning of the Time of Troubles. After the death of Boris Godunov in 1605. the turmoil is intensifying.

In 1610. Polish prince Vladislav was called to the kingdom, but he refused to accept Christianity.

in 1612 2 militias were created and the interventionists were expelled from Moscow. Then Mikhail Romanov would be elected to the kingdom, which marked the beginning of the reign of the Romanov dynasty on the Russian throne.

In 1550. military reform was carried out. In Russia, the control system of all the armed forces was centralized. Localism was limited. Streltsy troops were created. The Cossack units that formed on the Don were supposed to obey the supreme power. In Russia, the Cossacks were legally free to make decisions, but in fact were dependent on Moscow.

Under the young tsar, a circle of especially close ones formed (Chosen Rada). For 13 years, the Chosen Rada ruled the country. The elected Council testified to the compromise between the layers of the state.

1 Zemsky Sobor was convened in 1549. The fact of the convocation testified that Russia was turning from an early feudal monarchy into a representative estate. Ivan the Terrible needed the support of various estates, especially in the fight against boyar tyranny. The Zemsky Sobor helped maneuver state power between the nobility and the boyars. The Zemsky Sobor was convened as needed by the tsar and did not limit his power.

Many of the tsar's enterprises provoked resistance from the large nobility. It was against the large nobility that the first blow of the king fell. To defeat the opposition, Ivan the Terrible in 1564. left Moscow for the Aleksandrovskaya Sloboda, where he began to create Oprichnina (oprich (old Russian) - in addition).

In January 1565. two tsar's messengers arrived in Moscow, who read out two of his decrees. In the first, Ivan the Terrible accused the boyars of treason; he is loyal to the townspeople. As a result of the enemies' gozen, Ivan the Terrible relieves the power rigals, as stated in the document.

Moscow residents demanded that the boyars and clergy persuade the tsar to return to the throne. A little later, the Moscow delegation arrived at the Aleksandrovskaya Sloboda. Ivan the Terrible set a condition: he would execute the traitors at his own discretion. Russia will be divided into two parts: the oprichnina (personal territory of Ivan the Terrible) and the zemstvo part.

Everyone who lived on the territory of the Oprichnina, but were not the guardsmen, were evicted.

In 1570. Novgorod suffered as a victim of terror.

Oprichnina brought serfdom closer.

Many of the guardsmen, who received enormous wealth, began to feel burdened by the policies of Ivan the Terrible, but the detective and denunciation apparatus did its job - many guardsmen were also executed. During the Oprichnina, according to the researchers, 2000-3000 people were killed. The guardsmen, who had been plundering their own people for several years, could not protect them from the raid of Khan Davlet Giray in 1571, who burned Moscow.

Ivan the Terrible urgently strengthened the southern borders with zemstvo troops, which in 1572. They defeated the superior forces of Davlet Giray, who made a second attempt to raid the Russian lands. In 1552. the Kazan Khanate was conquered, and in 1556. - Astrakhan. Voluntarily in those years, it became part of the Russian state. Also voluntarily entered the territory of the North. Caucasus.

In 1558. the Levonian War for access to the Baltic Sea began (it was fought for 25 years, being lost by Russia). Only the heroic defense of Pskov, which fettered and inflicted huge losses on the Polish troops, led to a softening of the military treaty. During the defense, 30,000 inhabitants of Pskov opposed 150,000 of the Polish army.

Since 1582 the conquest of Siberia begins, starting with the campaign of Ermak, which lasted 70 years. If the Americans, when expanding the territory of their country, destroyed the indigenous population of America - the Indians, then the Russian conquerors of Siberia, apart from a few clashes, peacefully coexisted with the indigenous inhabitants of Siberia, passing on their knowledge to them, including the culture of agriculture, since they still lived in a primitive system.

In the 16th century, the progressive development of feudalism took place in Russia: it was both extensive and intensive at the same time. There is a tenfold increase in Russian territory. Kazan, Astrakhan, Siberian Khanates, Bashkiria join Russia. The development of the Wild Field (its southern outskirts) is underway. Attempts are being made to reach the Baltic coast.

Agriculture is taking a step forward in socio-economic development. In the second half of the XVI century. there is an expansion of local land tenure. A state local system is being created. There is a reduction in the black-moored peasantry, which remains only in the north, as well as in Karelia, the Volga region and Siberia. Threefields are widely spread. At the same time, slash-and-burn farming is preserved.

From feudal oppression, there is a massive exodus of peasants to Wild Field, where they unite in paramilitary communities. Cossacks begin to appear in the south of the country. From the second half of the XVI century. it is actively used to protect the southern borders.

In industry, the process of strengthening the feudal mode of production is under way. At the same time, the growth of small-scale production in years, in contrast to Western Europe, did not lead to the creation of centers of commodity development.

Sources do not allow us to reconstruct the details of the political circumstances under which at the end of the 40s of the XVI century. a government was formed that took over the leadership of the country from the Boyar Duma, but we know the political figure who played a key role in the formation of the new ruling group. This figure was Metropolitan Macarius, a wise and calm politician who was surrounded by the tsar before and after the turbulent events of 1547.

With the participation of Macarius, the young tsar was surrounded by those persons who were destined in the eyes of contemporaries to symbolize the new government - the "Chosen Rada".

The elected council "began the creation of central government bodies - orders (until the mid-60s they were called" huts "). One of the first orders was the petition hut, headed by Adashev. to investigate them.

Strengthening the new state (monarchy) required a decisive replacement of the predatory local power apparatus that had developed under the boyar rule. On the order of the day was the creation of a bureaucratic apparatus. The most effective form of creating an executive apparatus was the election of officials locally by the subjects themselves to carry out state functions. The kiselists elected in the cities and volosts (they kissed the cross for allegiance to the king) and the elders became the "ruling people" of the state. The election and turnover of these persons put their activities (in favor of the state and controlled by the state) also under the control of their subjects.

The reforms also affected the organization of the upper echelon of management. Localism was somewhat limited. Its essence consisted in the fact that when appointing service people to certain positions, first of all, their "breed" - origin, and not personal merits, was taken into account. The descendants had to be with each other in the same service relationships - leadership, equality, subordination - as the ancestors.

In 1550 a new code of law was adopted. The Code of Law enshrined the creation of a "righteous" (fair) court in the Moscow state, controlled by the "best people" from this class on the ground. However, the matter did not come to the creation of permanent supreme estate-representative institutions.

The reform of the church was to serve the purpose of strengthening state power. The tsar wanted to get the approval of the church for state reforms and at the same time take measures to subjugate the church and limit its privileges and lands.

An all-Russian church reform was carried out at the Stoglav Cathedral, named after the collection of its decrees, which consisted of one hundred chapters ("Stoglav").

Thus, the system of reforms undertaken by the de facto government in the late 40-50s. XVI century, by its very essence, was originally associated with the idea of limiting the royal power by "wise advice", that is, this or that form of representation, expressing, in contrast to the caste Boyar Duma, the interests of the serving masses and the top of the posad.

Under Ivan the Terrible, Russia initially achieved major military and foreign policy successes.

The first success was the conquest (or annexation) of the Kazan Khanate. It took several years later for the peoples subject to Kazan to be conquered (Cheremis, Mordovians, Chuvash, Bashkirs). In 1556 Astrakhan was annexed; thus, the entire middle and lower Volga region (as well as the entire region on the Kama River) became part of the Moscow state. These military successes opened up vast expanses of fertile and sparsely populated lands for colonization. In the 80s. In the 16th century, new cities appeared here - Samara, Saratov, Tsaritsyn, Ufa.

Having achieved brilliant success in the east, Ivan IV turned his attention to the west. Here he set a goal: to break through to the coast of the Baltic Sea to establish direct communication between Russia and the countries of Central and Western Europe. An obstacle on this path was the possession of the Livonian Order. In 1558, the king sent his troops to Livonia. The war was successful at first (they took Narva, Yuryev and about 20 Livonian cities), but then led to serious military-political complications and setbacks. Not wishing to submit to the Moscow Tsar, the master of the Livonian Order, Kettler, surrendered under the patronage and protection of the Grand Duke of Lithuania, and Revel and Estland recognized the power of Sweden. Thus, the Livonian War led to a war with Lithuania and Sweden. Tsar Ivan, however, decided to continue the struggle, and in 1563 his troops devastated the Lithuanian possessions and took the ancient city of Polotsk.

Foreign policy in the last period of Grozny's reign presents a series of setbacks. The forces of the country, exhausted by the long war and the oprichnina terror, were weakening and depleted. In 1571, the Crimean Khan Devlet-Girey with his cavalry broke through to Moscow itself, took the city, burned it and plundered it (only the Kremlin survived) and, taking a huge number of prisoners, went to Crimea.

The protracted Livonian War continued, but without success for Russian weapons. In 1576 Stefan Batory was elected to the Polish-Lithuanian throne - an energetic, courageous, talented commander. Going on the offensive, he took Polotsk back in 1579; all conquests of Ivan the Terrible in Livonia were also lost. In 1582, a 10-year truce was finally concluded, according to which Grozny renounced all his conquests in Lithuania and Livonia. The war, which lasted a quarter of a century, was lost by Russia. The Swedes also launched an offensive in the north and took the cities of Ivangorod, Yam and Koporye, located on the southern coast of the Gulf of Finland. In 1583, an armistice was concluded with the Swedes, according to which they retained the last conquests, and Grozny lost even that piece of the Baltic coast, which was in the old Novgorod the Great. During continuous failures in the west, an event happened in the east that was the beginning of the conquest of Siberia. In 1581-1582. Ataman of the Don Cossacks Yermak Timofeevich with a small detachment (about 800 people) crossed the Ural Mountains and conquered the "Siberian kingdom" - the region of the Siberian Khan Kuchum, located along the Irtysh and Ob rivers.

2. Russia at the turn of the XVI - XVII centuries. Time of Troubles

In the times following the reign of Ivan the Terrible, the enslavement of the Russian peasantry takes place.

During the reign of Boris Godunov, there is a gradual attachment of the peasants to the land, the prohibition of the peasant exit. One of the reasons for this prohibition was the desire to prevent the desolation of the central districts of the country due to the expanding colonization and the outflow of the population to the outskirts. On the other hand, the ban was a manifestation of the class policy that protected the interests of the landowners and did not take into account the interests of the peasants. On the whole, the introduction of serfdom has undoubtedly increased social tension in the country. Together with dynastic problems, boyar willfulness, foreign interference in Russian affairs, it contributed to the ripening of that socio-political crisis, which was later called the Troubles.

Ivan the Terrible died in March 1584. His second son Fyodor, a weak, sickly man frightened by his father's terror, became the heir to the throne. As always in such cases, a struggle began between those close to the throne for power and for influence over the weak king. After the death (in 1586) of the tsar's maternal uncle, boyar Nikita Romanovich Zakharyin, the tsar's brother-in-law Boris Fedorovich Godunov, an intelligent, capable, energetic and ambitious boyar, was promoted to the first place.

The reign of Fyodor Ioannovich, son of the Terrible, was a time of political caution and the calming down of the people after the oprichnina. Behind the dependent Fedor, his brother-in-law Boris Godunov, performing regency functions, managed to become the de facto ruler of the state. In January 1598, after the death of Fyodor, there were no legitimate heirs to the throne. The Zemsky Sobor elected Godunov to the kingdom, but the position of the new tsar was fragile, the boyars wove backstage intrigues against him. Being the first elected monarch in Russian history, Godunov established himself not so much as an autocrat, but as a populist temporary worker, not self-confident and afraid of open actions. Godunov sought the favor of the nobility, giving away undeserved privileges and making the loudest promises, at the same time stubbornly strengthening in power through secret surveillance and denunciation, as well as unreported repression, that is, through the same iniquities that were inherent in the oprichnina.

False Dmitry I was the Tsar of Moscow in 1605-1606. The origin of this person, as well as the history of his appearance and his adoption of the name of Tsarevich Dimitri, the son of Ivan the Terrible, remain unclear to this day. It can only be considered almost proven that he was not a deliberate deceiver and was only a tool in the hands of others, aimed at overthrowing Tsar Boris. Even Shcherbatov considered the boyars who were dissatisfied with Boris to be the real culprits for the appearance of the impostor; This opinion is shared by the majority of historians, and some of them assign a significant role in the preparation of the impostor to the Poles and, in particular, the Jesuits.

The peculiarity of Russian trade during this period was that, on the one hand, the state had huge reserves of raw materials, on the other hand, even a meager industry was absent.

The main circumstance that determined the development of the customs system during this period was the formation of a single Russian (Moscow) state with its vast state economy, an intricate financial system that included many different taxes and fees, cash and in kind, external and internal, from sold or only from imported goods.

With the creation and strengthening of the Moscow state, with the expansion of the territory, wider opportunities for the development of trade relations with the West and the East opened up.

The peculiarity of Russian trade during this period was that, on the one hand, the state had huge reserves of raw materials, on the other hand, even a meager industry was absent. The country had a developed network of roads, there were few people experienced in the conduct of trade, that is, merchants.

However, the Moscow government conducted extensive foreign trade operations. An important subject of this trade was, in particular, Siberian furs, which were collected in huge quantities in the form of taxes from Siberian foreigners, then sorted and sold abroad. Other items of state trade were at different times bread, fish, salt, resin, flax, hemp. Moreover, sometimes trade in this or that product was declared a state monopoly.

With the formation of the Russian centralized state and the development of its economy, customs protection was strengthened, the main task of which was the collection of duties and replenishment of the state treasury. In the 17th century, there were customs offices in all cities and towns, and in large cities there were several of them. So, for example, in Moscow there was a Big Customs House, a Pomerna Hut, where duties were collected on grain products, and a Mytnaya Hut, in which duties were paid on timber, firewood, and livestock.

In addition, customs duties were collected at rural marketplaces and fairs. For this purpose, the customs heads and their assistants, the kissers, were sent there.

Customs heads were elected for terms of one year. At large customs offices, “comrades” were appointed - deputy heads. The largest customs offices were headed by representatives of the merchants. The appointment of the customs head was formalized by a tsarist decree. Based on the results of work at the end of the year, if the amount of duties exceeded the previously planned amount, customs heads were encouraged. Awards, and these were, as a rule, valuable gifts, were presented in the presence of the king.

In 1636, the Kazan customs exceeded the collection of duties of the previous year by 4271 rubles, and the Astrakhan one by 4462 rubles. The customs heads received a silver scoop of scales in the shooting range of a dime, 10 yards of atlas and 40 sables each worth 60 rubles. The work of the Moscow Big Customs office can also serve as an example of large fees. In 1640, the profit here amounted to 8314 rubles. The awards were given not only to the customs heads, but also to the kissers.

However, the time for deep reforms in the field of customs has not yet come. Only in a few customs offices were customs duties directly levied in favor of the treasury. In most cases, they were farmed out. The essence of the buyout was that the interested person (the tax farmer) contributed a certain amount of money to the state treasury, not less than the average collection of customs duties for the past year, and collected duties in their favor. At the beginning of the 17th century, many customs offices were on a lease: in Kursk, Belgorod, Putivl, Orel, Ryazan, etc. The lease was preserved not only in the 17th century, but also in the 18th century and was canceled by the Highest decree only in 1807.

Speaking about the foreign trade of Russia in the 16-17 centuries, it is necessary to emphasize the importance of the city of Arkhangelsk, where fairs were held that had the character of all-Russian ones. By a certain date, so many merchants gathered here that the activity of the trading life of Moscow itself for a time weakened. Not only private merchants, but also the tsar himself sent to Arkhangelsk a huge amount of furs, soap, hemp, flax, which were exchanged there for silk fabrics, brocade, satins, velvets, cloth and other goods.

The bulk of Russia's imports at that time consisted of the following goods: cloth, yacht, turquoise, emery, pearls, spices (anise, rhubarb, cloves, cardamom, pepper, saffron, nutmeg, incense, caraway seeds), vitriol, arsenic, ammonia, metals ( copper, iron, lead), salts, paints, paper, soap, threads, lace, wine, as well as lemons, prunes, walnuts. As you can see, most of these products are luxury items other than metals, salt and paints. Soap and writing paper were considered luxury goods in those days.

Russian exports consisted of leather, lard, furs (these goods accounted for 61% of exports), as well as bread, flaxseed, meat, caviar, pork bristles, wax, fish, fish oil, tar, and resin. Thus, raw materials predominated in the structure of exports. Finished products: boot nails, iron, ropes and mittens constituted a small part of it.

The main countries with which Russia traded at that time were Holland, England, France and Sweden, the goods from which were delivered to Russia by sea vessels through Arkhangelsk and from there the purchased Russian goods were exported.

By the end of the 17th and the beginning of the 18th centuries, the customs system in the Russian state met the needs of foreign trade and the solution of problems of tax policy. A centralized body was formed, which received customs duties - the Order of the Big Treasury. Various customs structures existed in the trading cities. However, the process of improving customs was slow due to the country's economic backwardness, imperfect monetary system and poorly developed foreign trade.

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“Muscovy in the 16th - 1st half. XVII centuries. Formation and development of the estate-representative monarchy "

Mine 2010

For many centuries, Russia was based on three fundamental foundations: community (peace), autocracy and Orthodoxy. The absolute leader in this triad in relation to the Russian history of the 16th century should be considered the autocracy with its national characteristics and patterns of folding. In the system of ideas about monarchical power in Russia, the question of its emergence and conditions of formation is essential, however, much more doubts and disputes among historians are caused by an additional element of the political system of Russia in the 16th century - the institution of the zemstvo estate representation and other bodies of state power of the Russian centralized state. The purpose of this work is to characterize the form of government that took shape in Russia by the middle of the 16th century, in particular as a result of the reforms of public administration carried out under Ivan the Terrible. Can Russia be called an estate-representative monarchy? Did the estates take shape in Russia during the period under study and what were the reforms of public administration? We will try to elucidate these issues, taking into account, if possible, those historical studies that have appeared in recent years. Political history of the 16th century attracts the attention of many researchers, but there is no consensus among them on the issues of the form of government that developed in Russia in the process of liquidating feudal fragmentation. Pre-revolutionary historians, as a rule, denied the existence of estate-representative statehood in our country in the 16th century. The opinions of historians of the Soviet period on this issue differ, and there is a noticeable tendency - from a skeptical attitude towards the recognition of Russian estate representation in pre-revolutionary Russia - to cautious statements about it in the period 30-40 management similar to similar bodies in Western European countries - to a complete denial of such in recent years. Some of the Soviet historians define the form of Russian statehood during the time of Ivan the Terrible as autocracy with a boyar duma and a boyar aristocracy. It was this concept in the 30-40s. suggested Smirnov II .. The main features of the development of the monarchy in Russia, he considered the struggle of the feudal nobility, defending the political order and traditions of the period of feudal fragmentation "against the tsarist power and the centralized state", and the most progressive form of centralization - "the creation of a bourgeois system based on bureaucratic principles ”and relying on the local nobility -“ the main support of power ”. In the opinion of another Soviet historian, N.E. Nosov, any positive role of the zemstvo estate bodies, and even more so of the boyar duma, is completely excluded in such a formulation of the question. Other researchers believe that the Russian state of the 16th century. was an autocratic monarchy with an aristocratic boyar duma only up to a certain time - in particular, before the Zemsky Sobor in 1566, and then followed the path of transformation into an estate-representative monarchy. According to A.A. Zimin, for example, Russia in the first half of the 16th century was an estate monarchy, and since 1549, when the so-called "Council of Reconciliation" was convened, it turned into an estate-representative monarchy. According to the concept of N.E. Nosov, in the 50s of the 16th century - during the period of the elected council - the foundations of an estate-representative monarchy were formed in Russia, and during the years of the oprichnina, a regime of a military-feudal dictatorship of serf-nobles was established in the country. S.O. Schmidt believes that the first estate institutions in Russia in the 16th century. (zemstvo councils) are formed at the same time when the first signs of absolutism become noticeable. In such a course of events, he sees an analogy with the history of Western European countries, where the strengthening of absolutist principles in the state system was accompanied by the development of parliamentarism. At the same time, Schmidt notes the strength of the traditions of "estate representation in Russia", the distant predecessor of which he considers the ancient Russian princely "dream". L.V. Cherepnin is also a supporter of the theory of the formation of an estate-representative monarchy in Russia, who also believes that the process of formation of an estate-representative monarchy begins long before the middle of the 16th century, when the first cathedrals appeared. He has been leading this process since the end of the 15th century, pointing to the genetic connection between the Zemstvo Councils and the institutions of the preceding time. Among historians, there are also very different opinions regarding the timing of the formation of the monarchical system in Russia. Some researchers associate its origin with the personality of Ivan III (and there are most of them), others lead monarchical principles in Russia from the time of Rurik, still others - from his descendants, in particular - from Dmitry Donskoy, fourth - from the time of Ivan IV, when “instead of the fragmented masses "A single" state body "was created. In more detail, the positions of Russian historians - both the Soviet period and modern ones - will be considered directly in the text of the work. The status of the monarch: Strengthening the princely power and the transformation of the Moscow prince into the sovereign of “All Russia” is a long process. It was started by Dmitry Donskoy, who completed the elimination of social institutions that opposed the unifying tendencies of the Moscow rulers. Already Dmitry's successor to the Moscow throne, Prince Vasily, tried to link his power with "God's mercy", but this formula acquires a special political meaning only in the title of Ivan III - after the overthrow of the Tatar yoke. As noted by Froyanov I.Ya., the term "autocracy" in the meaning of the prerogatives of tsarist power appeared in the language of the time of Vasily the Dark. As for Ivan III, then in his title there are definitions "sovereign", "autocrat", "tsar". The power of the Moscow Grand Duke was significantly strengthened under Ivan III. In his second marriage, he married the niece of the last Byzantine emperor Sophia Palaeologus, thereby emphasizing the independence of his power from the Moscow boyars. At the same time, the main attributes of the tsarist power were formed: the Byzantine coat of arms - a two-headed eagle - became the coat of arms of Moscow Russia. On ceremonial occasions, Ivan III put on the Monomakh hat and mantles (barmas). His line on strengthening the power of the Grand Duke was then continued by Vasily III and Ivan IV (the Terrible). In January 1547, using his majority as an excuse, Ivan IV officially “was married to the kingdom”. Ivan IV received the Monomakh hat and other regalia of the tsarist power from the hands of the Moscow Metropolitan Macarius, who was, if not the initiator, then the leader of this event. Thus, the Church, as it were, affirmed the divine origin of the royal power, simultaneously strengthening its authority. From that time on, the Grand Duke of Moscow officially began to be called tsar. In the time of Ivan IV, of course, the "autocrat" was understood as a monarch with unlimited power. Ivan IV himself hardly doubted this. At the turn of the XV-XVI centuries. the titles "autocrat", "sovereign" and "tsar" really meant the monarch who independently "held" the Russian land and owned it individually, who had in his hands all the fullness of state power. According to the observations of historians of the Russian state and law, the use of the word "sovereign" means the establishment of unlimited power. That is why Novgorodians at one time long and stubbornly resisted calling Ivan III with this title instead of “lord”: they knew that with the recognition of the sovereign power over Novgorod, expressed in the new title, they would have to say goodbye to the democratic traditions of veche independence from the center. In the historical conditions of the late 15th - early 16th centuries. Such power, according to Froyanov, could only be despotic, that is, the unrestricted power of the monarch. Boyar Duma: During the formation of the centralized Russian state, as well as during interregnum and internal strife, the role of the legislative and deliberative body under the Grand Duke, and later under the tsar, was played by the Boyar Duma. It consisted of noble Moscow boyars, as well as appanage princes with some of their boyars. Sessions of the Boyar Duma took place, as a rule, in the Faceted Chamber of the Moscow Kremlin. According to L.V. Cherepnin, with the formation of a single state, the Duma - the council under the Moscow Grand Duke - becomes a national body. He connects the process of separating the institute of the boyar duma with the decline of the institute of the princely-boyar court of arbitration - a system for resolving princely disputes in times of fragmentation by transferring them to a judge chosen by both sides: the metropolitan, the prince, the boyars. The disappearance of the institution of the princely-boyar court, according to the researcher, led to the strengthening of the autocracy of the Grand Duke (Tsar), who stood at the head of the state. Incidentally, with this statement, Cherepnin undermines his own conclusions about the existence in Russia of bodies of estate representation, which actually limited the tsar's power. (This will be discussed below.) Members of the Boyar Duma were appointed by the Grand Duke (“introduced”). However, according to N.E. Nosov, this fact does not deprive this body of its estate-representative character, since the local principle was strictly observed when it was appointed to the Duma. The Grand Duke could betray disgrace, even execute his boyar, but he could not introduce into the Duma a person who did not have the right to do so due to his low birth and the merits of his ancestors in the Moscow service. In our opinion, there are contradictions in this statement. As the same author writes further, the boyar class, which took part in the Duma, was formed as a result of the merger of the Russian nobility who had gathered in Moscow and in this sense, as it were, consolidated the “government position” of the boyars in the new state order and played an important role in limiting the Moscow autocracy. Apparently, in this view, the Boyar Duma can in no way be called a representative body, since the more it approaches the tsarist power, the more it becomes dependent on it, which was proved during the oprichnina period. In accordance with the Code of Law of 1497 (Article 1), the supreme court was entrusted to the boyars and okolnichy, as members of the boyar duma, and, consequently, judicial and administrative supervision over the activities of the entire system of central and local judicial proceedings. On this basis, Nosov concludes that already at the end of the 15th century, the Duma acts as a rather constructive supreme council under the Grand Duke, sharing legislative and judicial powers with him. However, in our opinion, the sources of the XVI century. do not allow to interpret about any serious limitation of the sovereign's power. Boyars under Ivan III or Vasily III did not form any independent state institution; there is no information about the full meeting of the Duma at that time, as well as about the decisions it made. Boyars, by tradition, were only advisers to the sovereign (this is how they are called in a number of sources), and he himself decided who exactly to call to the meeting. In particular, Article 98 of the Code of Laws of 1550 deals with the procedure for adopting laws - "from the sovereign to the report and from all Boar to the verdict." However, the law does not say that decisions can only be made in this way: naturally, as before, the sovereign could decide any matter without advice from the boyars. In principle, almost all the laws of the second half of the 16th century. were formalized either as royal decrees, or as a sentence of the tsar and the boyars - there was no strict system. The appearance of the term "boyar sentence", which came into use in the 40s of the 16th century, according to the Russian historian M. Krom, testifies not to an attempt by the boyars on the prerogatives of monarchical power, but to the transformation of the Duma into a central government institution coordinating the work of the state apparatus. The Duma assumed these functions during the childhood of Ivan IV, when the monarch was essentially incapacitated. But the boyar duma retained the same functions later, throughout the second half of the 16th century, because the management of a huge country required the creation of such a higher body that would control the activities of central institutions. Consequently, when the noble “Muscovites” called themselves the sovereign's slaves, it was not an exaggeration like the European “your humble servant”. The boyars with all their property and families were entirely in the tsar's power. Having liquidated or subjugated the local political elite, as happened in Novgorod, Moscow could do whatever it wanted with the conquered region: resettle its inhabitants, introduce any taxes and duties, and redraw land holdings. If only on this basis, the Boyar Duma cannot be equated, as some Soviet historians do with the parliament in Great Britain or with the General States in France: no forms of self-organization of boyars in individual lands of Russia already existed during the formation of the centralized state. The significance of the boyar duma during the time of Ivan IV began to decline precisely because the Russian nobility was not united into any corporations, and separately the boyars and princes were powerless before the supreme power. Zemsky Sobor: A new level of political organization of the country, which took shape by the middle of the 15th century. - a single state, and new social institutions had to correspond - estates and representative institutions that defended the interests of large regions. O.I. Chistyakov writes that Zemsky Sobors were a characteristic organ of the estate-representative monarchy in Russia. Zemsky councils met irregularly. The first of them, convened in 1549 and held in session until 1550, adopted the Code of Laws in 1550 and formed a reform program for the middle of the 16th century. The last Zemsky Sobor took place in 1653 in connection with the decision of the question of including Ukraine in Russia. The Zemsky Sobor included, first of all, the boyar duma - the boyars and appanage princes, and the Illuminated Cathedral - the upper strata of the clergy. Representatives of the nobility and the top of the posad were also present at many meetings of the Zemsky Councils. Schematically, the system of government and government bodies in Russia in the middle of the 16th century can be represented as follows: In the history of the development of Zemsky Councils as a whole, councils of 3 groups can be distinguished: 1) elective; 2) councils of the last years of Troubles and 1648; 3) all others. At the same time, the first councils can be ignored, since they were convened mainly to “hear government declarations” (for example, the council of 1549) and to authorize legislative and other measures (council of 1551). During the election of the first Romanov in 1613, cathedrals also did not play a significant role, since all influential boyars decided. And after the Troubles, autocracy was restored in its full meaning, that is, a monarchy without any restrictions. In the middle of the 17th century, when the first signs of absolutism began to appear, cathedrals served the government mainly as a place for making statements, including internal political ones. The councils of 1611-1613 and 1648, in contrast to everyone else, really made at least some decisions: in particular, the councils of 1648 succeeded in predetermining the Code of 1649. As Torke notes, the influence of the population on legislation is felt here much more than the influence even the French General States in the 15th and 16th centuries, but this was more likely due to the periods of “anarchy” and “militias” in Russia than to the actually operating system of legislative representative power. The episodic phenomena of the active work of the zemstvo assemblies in Russia very quickly passed. As mentioned above, the assessment of the role and political influence of zemstvo councils in historical literature is extremely ambiguous. But before dwelling on it, one should recall the origin of the very phrase "Zemsky Sobor". It was first introduced by K.S.Aksakov in 1850 by analogy with the expression “zemstvo duma” used by N.M. Karamzin. Later, S.M. Solovyov introduced this term into his “History of Russia”, and since then the “Zemsky Sobor” has become entrenched in the scientific language. Russian Slavophiles saw in him a sign of the "strength of the people" opposing the tsar; in accordance with the really existing expression “the cathedral of all the earth”, “land” meant for them the whole people, although as you know, the peasants, who made up almost 90% of the population of Rus, did not participate in the work of cathedrals, with a few exceptions. According to L.V. Cherepnin's definition, the Zemsky Sobor was the estate-representative body of a single state; a meeting of the government of united Russia with the estate representatives, created in opposition to the arbitrariness of feudal law. Some modern historians have expressed the opposite point of view. The German scientist Torke H.-J., for example, examines the essence of the zemstvo councils from the point of view of the etymology of the word "zemstvo". "Zemsky affairs" - in his understanding - these are the tasks and needs of local self-government, created under Ivan IV, in contrast to the central, government, ie. - "sovereign affairs". “Zemsky people” or “land”, in contrast to service people, are elected local officials who belong (with the exception of, for example, noble laborers) to the townspeople. On this basis, Torke concludes that the expression "Zemsky Sobor" cannot mean an institution as a whole, which included the tsar, the consecrated cathedral, the council, the servants and, finally, the zemstvo people. Cherepnin interprets the term “zemstvo” in a completely different way, who believes that the zemstvo in relation to the 16th century. - this is precisely "the whole land", the state: "zemstvo affairs" - state affairs, "zemstvo organization" - state building, structure. Apparently, those historians are right who believe that the local electoral administration and its representatives in Moscow are not the same as the estate: the townspeople, although they should have chosen only the “best” (i.e., the rich ) people did not have the qualities of a citizen in the Western European sense - their dependence on the government and political powerlessness were too great. At the height of the oprichnina, the participants in the council of 1566 begged the tsar to stop repressions: for such insolence, the petitioners lost their tongues. Torke, for example, talking about the essence of the estate, points to two meanings of this concept: professional and territorial. In his opinion, when it comes to class representation, one should take into account not so much the social or professional significance of the estates, but the composition of the territories they represent. The Russian townspeople and merchants did not find this “territorial dependence”; in Russia at this time there was still no institution of citizenship - the main prerequisite for the creation of estate representation. The Western estates were a political force, because they drew it in local interests - in provincial separatism (for example, seimiks in Poland or Landtags in Germany). Estates in Western countries, if they did not legislate, then at least ruled at the local level. This was not the case in Russia. The Russian nobility could not develop a real estate consciousness, not only because of the lack of historical prerequisites, but also because it was obliged to serve, that is, until 1762 the nobility was not free in relation to the sovereign. In general, it should be noted that in Western literature there is an opinion that there was no developed feudalism in Russia, if by it we understand not only the nature of the relationship between feudal lords and serfs, but also, first of all, participation in government power. The estates that arose in different countries and at different times had different influences on the management of public affairs. According to Torke, with regard to the middle of the 16th century, only in England, Sweden, Poland and Hungary were the estates on the way to “legislative authority”. This point of view can be supported by the statement of A.M. Sakharov, who remarked: “It should be borne in mind that the estate-representative organization in Russia did not receive such a great development as in some countries of Western Europe, and the autocratic power did not experience any serious restrictions on the part of estate representation. Zemsky sobor more and more became an advisory body, without definite functions, permanent representation, norms and terms of election of representatives ”. Thus, we can conclude that the system of “zemstvo councils” that has developed in Russia can only be considered a political representation capable of really influencing the authorities with a very big stretch. Orders in Russia:

Even before the reforms of the mid-16th century, certain branches of government and the administration of individual territories of the country began to be entrusted ("ordered") to the boyars. This is how the first orders appeared - institutions in charge of branches of government or individual regions of the country. According to some assumptions, the first orders began to take shape as early as 1511, and in the middle of the 16th century there were already several dozen of them. However, according to the Soviet historian A.K. Leontiev, orders began to emerge from other departments only in the second half of the 16th century. From the very beginning, the orders acquired the character of permanent institutions with a permanent staffing and management area. Military affairs - the local army - was led by a discharge order, artillery - by Pushkarsky, archers - by Streletsky, arsenal - by the Armory. There were also the Ambassadors' Prikaz, which was in charge of foreign affairs, and the Order of the Big Treasury, which controlled public finances. The local order dealt with the issues of state lands, of which the nobility was endowed, and lackeys - the Kholopiy order. There was even a special order to resolve the problems of popular demonstrations (Rogue Order), as well as orders in charge of individual territories - the Siberian order, the order of the Kazan Palace. At the head of the orders, whose powers extended to administration, tax collection and courts, were boyars or clerks - major government officials. As Leontyev notes, one of the distinguishing features of this authority was that, as a rule, they were headed by several judges, and not one, although there were exceptions. Collegial management in those conditions meant obligatory discussion of cases to be considered by all judges of the order, and the consent of all was considered a necessary “sentence” passed on the case under consideration. With the complication of the state administration system, the number of orders grew. By the time of Peter's reforms in the early 18th century, there were more than 50 of them. The formation of the order system, in the opinion of Soviet historians, was a further improvement of the feudal superstructure. As A.K. Leontiev writes, "the appearance of orders signified the transfer of most of the affairs from the jurisdiction of the boyar duma and palace bodies to institutions that should become exclusively executive bodies." Church reform Prosperous and the Church, which at that time (metropolitan, bishops and monasteries) owned a third of the entire non-state land fund. Defending the foundations of Orthodoxy as a symbol of national unity, the Church tried to take a leading place in the process of uniting the country, and at the same time - to strengthen and expand its material well-being through new land acquisitions, and political and ideological weight - due to its influence on the new state and social order. The fact that the Church played not only a spiritual role in the construction of the Russian centralized state is evidenced in particular by the fact that since the beginning of the 16th century, extended sessions of the Boyar Duma with church councils were widely practiced. One of the attempts to regulate the relationship between Church and state in the middle of the 16th century was made at the Stoglav Cathedral of 1551, at which the militant churchmen - “Josephians” - managed to defend their enormous land wealth from the secularistic aspirations of Tsar Ivan IV. The monarch wanted to get the approval of the church for state reforms and at the same time take measures to subordinate the Church and limit its privileges. The work of the cathedral proceeded mainly as follows: the tsar asked questions prepared in advance by his entourage, the cathedral, headed by Metropolitan Macarius, gave answers to them. Ivan IV's questions related to the purely ecclesiastical area. The council was to generally discuss measures to strengthen discipline among the clergy, the unification of rituals, the morale of the ministers of the church, the position of the lower clergy. As a result, a certain compromise was nevertheless reached: the growth of church land tenure was limited, the provisions of the tsar's Code of Laws extended to the "hierarchical" court, monasteries were deprived of awards from the tsarist treasury - "swears", but the main positions of the Russian clergy remained unshakable. According to N.E. Nosov, in Russia, as in Germany or Spain in the 15th - 16th centuries, the Church was a great power in the state. The weakness of the Russian city, and with it the nascent Russian bourgeoisie, as Nosov writes, did not create the necessary social ground for anti-clericalism and reformation ideas, the main stronghold of which in the West was precisely the urban community. The assertion about the power and influence of the Church in the Russian state of the 16th century is beyond doubt, but the above justification for this conclusion seems to be very controversial. Firstly, it is hardly possible to speak of the real existence of the “Russian bourgeoisie” in the 16th century, when even feudal relations in Russia were not yet finalized. Secondly, even in the later period of the already established bourgeois relations, Russian social thought did not allow any significant attacks on Orthodoxy. The undeveloped civic consciousness that distinguished Russian society both in the 16th and in later centuries, in itself, cannot serve as a justification for the strength and power of the church organization. Reforms of Local Self-Government: Labial and Zemstvo Reforms The first major step in the creation of estate-representative institutions at the local level was the lip reform of the late 1930s and 1940s. XVI century., Carried out by the Moscow boyar government. Prior to that, there was no unified management system at the local level. Before the reforms of the middle of the XVI century. the collection of taxes on the ground was entrusted to the boyars who were feeding, who were in fact the rulers of individual lands. At their disposal were all the funds collected in excess of the necessary taxes to the treasury, that is, due to the uncontrolled management of the land, they “fed”. The reforms canceled feeding. The collection of taxes, taxes and local courts were transferred to the hands of “lip chiefs,” who were elected from local nobles (in the countryside) and “beloved heads” (in cities). According to N.E. Nosov, the reforms of local self-government were carried out under the influence of the Novgorod-Pskov, and possibly the Polish-Lithuanian order of “gentry and city self-government”. According to him, the term “lip” itself is of Western Russian origin, it is borrowed from the Pskov territorial-administrative terminology and denotes according to the Pskov scribal books of the 16th century. “Rural districts stretching towards the city”. The news of the introduction of labial institutions was preserved by the Pskov chronicle, dated 1540-1541. The election of the labial organs was carried out at the general county congresses of princes, children of boyar and volost judges (taxy worlds). The elections were held strictly according to the estate curiae and were sealed by the handwritten notes of the electors. The swearing-in (kissing of the cross) of the labial elders was carried out in Moscow - in the Robber Order. The main duty of the laborers was the search and reprisals against thieves and robbers - "led by dashing people." Accordingly, the power of the governors and volostels was limited: they retained only the court and the collection of court fees in cases of murder. The order established as a result of the reforms of local self-government was guarded very severely: the means of inquiry - torture and general search, the punishment for robbery - the death penalty (gallows), for the first theft - whipping, for the second - chopping off a hand, for the third - execution. Based on all of the above, N.E. Nosov concludes that the lip reform was aimed at protecting the interests of feudal lords, merchants and the most prosperous strata of the urban and volost population from attempts on their lives and private property. He draws an analogy between the Russian “bloody legislation” of the 16th century. and similar phenomena in European countries, characteristic of the period of initial accumulation, undermining the feudal foundations. Later - in the 2nd half of the 16th century. - lip appearances, as well as the accompanying obligatory worldly bail, became one of the means of detecting and capturing fugitive serfs and slaves. Conclusion Thus, we can conclude that the definition of the Russian state in the second half of the 16th century as a class-representative monarchy, established in the scientific and educational literature, is very conditional. Firstly, estates had not yet formed in Russia by this time. Secondly, the zemstvo assemblies were nothing more than “informational and declarative meetings, and in extreme cases - the representation of interests that sometimes coincided with the interests of the government.” It cannot be said that zemstvo councils really represented the interests of the territories; they were not elected according to any principle by the population, did not have definite powers. It is not possible to speak of the final formation of estates in Russia until the 17th century, when various social groups begin to realize their special interests and fight for their implementation. However, even then a somewhat complete system of representation did not take shape, at the cathedrals predominantly Moscow ranks prevailed, but most importantly, they did not become a legislative body, did not share power with the tsar, and did not even try to do this: during the Time of Troubles, when real power fell upon themselves took the "Council of All the Land", representatives of the zemstvos, as if burdened by government duties, hastened to elect a tsar in order to transfer the burden of power to him. This self-elimination of the Zemshchyna became the main reason for the restoration of autocracy after the Troubles. At the same time, in relation to the 16th century, it can be said that, although there were no estates similar to the Western ones in Muscovite Russia, individual ranks contained the class qualities that later - in the 18th century. - manifested themselves, finally revealing themselves under Catherine II. This at least applies to the nobility, which received legal confirmation of their estate privileges.

Ivan IV focused his foreign policy activities on solving two major tasks:

1) In the west, he intended to establish himself on the shores of the Baltic Sea in order to provide direct sea communication with the countries of Western Europe.

2) In the east, the tsar wanted to unite around Moscow the fragments of the disintegrated “Golden Horde”.

The last stage of the military and political rivalry between the Moscow kingdom and the Kazan khanate began in 1545. Several trips to Kazan ended in failure. But in 1552, a huge Moscow army, led by the tsar himself, supported by detachments of the Mordovians and Chuvash, besieged and stormed Kazan. In 1556 the Astrakhan Khanate was conquered relatively easily. Merchants from Central Asia came to trade in Astrakhan, which passed to Russia. The most important waterway, the Volga, has become Russian along its entire length. Having achieved success in the east, Ivan IV turned to the west. Here the path to the Baltic was controlled by the Levonian Order. It was weakened by the internal sections, and Ivan IV decided to take advantage of this. In 1558 the Russian army entered the borders of Livonia. The Levonian War began. In the beginning, the hostilities were successful - the Russian army captured more than 20 cities. But the Levonians recognized the patronage of Lithuania and Sweden. However, Russia, weakened by the oprichnina, could not stand the long war with the two strongest states. The dispute over the lands of the disintegrated Levonian Order was lost. In 1583 the war ended. Russia has lost its fortresses in the Baltics. Arkhangelsk on the White Sea became the most important seaport for communication with Europe. Starting the Levonian War, Russia with its developing trade and economy needed sea routes to the West. The folding of the territory of the Russian state in the XVI-XVII centuries.

By the end of the sixteenth century. the territory of Russia has almost doubled in comparison with the middle of the century. It included the lands of the Kazan, Astrakhan and Siberian Khanates, Bashkiria. The development of fertile lands in the south of the country, Wild Field (south of the Oka River), was under way. Attempts were made to access the Baltic Sea. Compared to the middle of the fifteenth century. the territory of Russia under the rule of Ivan IV increased more than 10 times. With the entry of the lands of the Volga region, the Urals, Western Siberia, the multinational composition of the country increased even more.

The Kazan and Astrakhan kingdoms constantly threatened the Russian lands. They held the Volga trade route in their hands. These lands were fertile, the Russian nobility dreamed of them. The peoples of the Volga region - the Mari, Mordovians, Chuvash - strove for liberation from the Khan's dependence. After a series of unsuccessful diplomatic and military attempts to subjugate the Kazan kingdom, 150 thousand BC the Russian army laid siege to Kazan. Kazan was taken by storm on October 1, 1552.

4 years later, in 1556 Astrakhan was annexed, in 1557 - Chuvashia and most of Bashkiria. Dependence on Russia was recognized by the Nogai Horde (a state of nomads who lived on the territory from the Volga to the Irtysh). Those. new fertile lands and the entire Volga trade route appeared in Russia. Ties with the peoples of the Caucasus and Central Asia expanded.

The annexation of Kazan and Astrakhan opened the way to Siberia. Wealthy merchants-industrialists Stroganovs received letters from the tsar to own lands along the Tobol River. A detachment was formed, headed by Yermak Timofeevich. In 1558 Yermak entered the territory of the Siberian Khanate and defeated Khan Kuchum. In the ХУ1 century. the development of the territory of the Wild Field (fertile lands south of Tula) began. The Russian state began to strengthen the southern borders from the raids of the Crimean Khan. The state interests of Russia demanded close ties with Western Europe, which were easiest to implement through the seas, as well as ensuring the defense of the western borders of Russia, where the Levonian Order was its adversary. And in case of success, the opportunity opened up for the acquisition of new developed lands. The Levonian War lasted 25 years and was initially accompanied by victories of the Russian troops. In total, 20 cities were taken. The order fell apart. His lands passed to Poland, Denmark and Sweden. The failure of the Levonian War was a consequence of the economic backwardness of Russia. A truce was concluded

In the seventeenth century. the territory of Russia has expanded due to the inclusion of new lands in Siberia, the Southern Urals and Left-Bank Ukraine, the further development of the Wild Field. The borders of Russia - from the Dnieper to the Pacific Ocean and from the White Sea to the possessions of the Crimean Khan, the North Caucasus and the Kazakh steppes. The geographical discoveries of Russian researchers have also expanded the borders of Russia. In 1643-45. Poyarkov went along the Amur River to the Sea of Okhotsk. In 1648 Dezhnev discovered the strait between Alaska and Chukotka. In the middle of the century, Khabarov subjugated the lands along the Amur River to Russia. Many Siberian cities were founded: Yeniseisk, Krasnoyarsk, Bratsk, Yakutsk, Irkutsk.

The term "Time of Troubles" (1598 -1613) was adopted by historians of the 18th-19th centuries. In the Soviet period, historians rejected it as "noble-bourgeois", proposing instead "peasant war and foreign intervention", which, of course, does not fully correspond to the definition of this period. Now the concept of "Troubles" is returning, and at the same time it is proposed to call the events of the beginning of the 17th century. in Russia by the civil war, because practically all social groups and strata were involved in them.

The Age of Troubles was accompanied by popular demonstrations and revolts; reigns of impostors (False Dmitry I, False Dmitry II), Polish and Swedish interventions, the destruction of state power and the ruin of the country.

The prerequisite for the crisis of Russian statehood - the Time of Troubles - was the instability of power generated by the oprichnina and the Livonian war. Destabilization at the end of the sixteenth century. - the beginning of the seventeenth century. contributed and such facts as the reign of Fedor, his death and others.

The dynastic crisis was the driving force behind the beginning of the Troubles: the dynasty of Ivan Kalita ended.

In 1598, after the death of the childless Tsar Fyodor Ivanovich, the last of Rurikovich, the son of Ivan IV, the question of a successor to the Moscow throne arose. The Zemsky Sobor elected Boris Godunov, the brother of Tsar Fyodor's wife Irina, to the throne. Not being the most noble, Godunov could not claim the throne. But even during the life of Fyodor Ivanovich, he was able to concentrate all power in his hands.

The rise of Godunov is the fruit of a historical accident and, at the same time, a manifestation of the general pattern of self-development of Russian society. So Boris would have remained in history as one of the many Godunovs, if on November 9, 1581, in the Aleksandrovskaya Sloboda, there had not been a quarrel between the tsar and his son Ivan. Terrible struck him with a staff and hit him in the temple, and ten days later (November 19) the prince died. With the death of Ivan Ivanovich Fyodor became the heir to the throne. The new king was incapable of running the country and needed an intelligent advisor. A bitter struggle broke out for the right to be the spokesman for the interests of the new monarch, and Boris emerged victorious from it. Fyodor occupied the throne for 14 years; at least 13 of them were actually ruled by Godunov.

The activities of the Godunov government were aimed at the comprehensive strengthening of statehood. Thanks to his efforts, in 1588 the first Russian patriarch was elected, who became Metropolitan Job. The establishment of the patriarchate testified to the increased prestige of Russia.

Common sense and prudence prevailed in the internal policy of the Godunov government. An unprecedented construction of cities and fortifications unfolded. Church building was also carried out on a grand scale. Godunov sought to alleviate the plight of the townspeople. Previously, large service people kept merchants and artisans in their "white settlements", exempted from paying state taxes. Now, everyone who was engaged in trade and crafts had to become part of the posad communities and participate in the payment of duties to the treasury - "to pull the tax." Thus, the number of taxable people increased, and the severity of fees from each payer decreased, since the total amount remained unchanged.

The economic crisis of the 1570s - early 1580s. forced to go for the establishment of serfdom. In 1597, a decree was issued on "fixed years", according to which the peasants who fled from the masters "until the present ... year for five years" were subject to search, trial and return "back to where who lived." The decree did not apply to those who fled six years ago and earlier, and they were not returned to their previous owners.

Despite reasonable measures in the social sphere and a cautious, peaceful foreign policy, Boris Godunov still failed to prevent a crisis. Erupted in 1601 - 1602. a terrible famine led to an explosion of social discontent and a decline in Godunov's prestige. In 1603, a powerful uprising of serfs began, engulfing the central districts. The uprising was suppressed. But the situation in the country has not stabilized.

Back in 1601, the fugitive monk Grigory Otrepiev appeared in the Commonwealth - a former slave of the Romanov boyars, posing as a miracle of the escaped Tsarevich Dmitry. Converting to Catholicism and promising the Polish king Sigismund III Smolensk and the Chernigov-Seversk land, and the voivode Y. Mnishek (whose daughter Marina Otrepiev fell in love) - Pskov and Novgorod, he managed to get the right to recruit volunteers in Poland for the campaign against Moscow. In 1604 False Dmitry crossed the Dnieper from 400 thousand Poles, Russian noblemen-emigrants, Zaporozhye and Don Cossacks. He chose a roundabout way to Moscow, since a powerful peasant movement began in the southwestern outskirts of the state (in the terminology of Soviet historiography - "peasant war"). Here False Dmitry received the necessary reinforcements and supplies. The peasantry, confident that a "good tsar" had finally appeared, supported the impostor. After the sudden death of Godunov in April 1605, the Moscow governors began to go over to the side of False Dmitry. On June 20, 1605, the impostor solemnly entered Moscow and became Tsar of Russia.

However, despite some strong personal qualities and a certain popularity among the troops and the population, False Dmitry failed to gain a foothold on the throne. He failed to enlist the support of any of the real socio-political forces. The impostor did not fulfill his promises, which he made to the Poles (promises to give Pskov, Novgorod, Smolensk). Having converted to Catholicism in Poland, he did not allow the construction of Catholic churches in Russia. Wishing to win over the Russian nobility to his side, False Dmitry generously distributed land and money, but their reserves were not unlimited. He did not dare to restore St. George's Day, which was so expected by the peasants. The Orthodox Church was wary of the Catholic Tsar, denying him a credit of trust. The atrocities of the Poles in Moscow aroused acute discontent among the townspeople and servicemen. As a result of the boyar conspiracy and the uprising of Muscovites on May 17, 1606, False Dmitry I was killed.

The improvised Zemsky Sobor, hastily assembled by the boyars, chose Vasily Shuisky (1606-1610), an experienced intriguer and courtier, for the kingdom. Ascending the throne, he was the first of the Russian rulers to give a “kissing record”, took an oath to “all the land”: not to execute anyone without trial, not to take property from the relatives of convicts, and not to listen to false denunciations. However, this fundamentally important treaty was often ignored by the king. Political squabbles in the Russian "top" also did not contribute to the normalization of the situation.

The peasantry continued to actively oppose serfdom and the deterioration of their position. Some of the feudal lords who supported False Dmitry I were unhappy with the election of Shuisky to the kingdom, fearing reprisals. The population of the southwestern outskirts, exempted by the impostor from taxes for 10 years, protested against their restoration. In the summer of 1606, I. Bolotnikov stood at the head of the peasant uprising, calling himself "the governor of Tsar Dmitry Ivanovich." In the fall of 1606, Bolotnikov's troops besieged Moscow and tried to take it for more than a month. However, in November, the noble detachments led by P. Lyapunov and I. Pashkov, who joined the rebels, went over to the side of Shuisky, and in the fall of 1607 the tsarist troops managed to defeat Bolotnikov.

The suppression of the peasant uprising did not change the situation in the country. Shuisky's government tried to maneuver, on the one hand, improving the position of slaves, and on the other, establishing a 15-year term for detecting fugitive peasants. The maneuvers of the "top" led to the fact that both landowners and peasants became dissatisfied with them. In such a situation, in 1607, a young man appeared in the Bryansk region, declaring himself the escaped Tsar Dmitry. Unlike the first impostor, from the very beginning False Dmitry II was a protege of the Polish feudal lords. Not having time to unite with Bolotnikov, he nevertheless managed to gain strength both in Poland and in Russia, and in 1608 moved to the capital.

Having reached Moscow, the impostor did not dare to immediately occupy it, but settled in Tushino, where his own Boyar Duma and his "patriarch" - the Rostov Metropolitan Filaret (Fyodor Romanov) - began to operate. The main role in the Tushino camp was played by detachments of gentry from the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (Lisovsky, Rizhinsky, Sapezh), who were engaged in robbery and robbery throughout the country. For 16 months they unsuccessfully tried to capture a strong fortress - the Trinity-Sergius Monastery.

In February 1609, the Shuisky government concluded an alliance agreement with Sweden, hoping for her help in the fight against the Tushins. However, the Swedes immediately tried to capture Novgorod. At the same time, this treaty gave Poland a reason to start open intervention. On July 17, 1610, the boyars demanded that Shuisky abdicate the throne. The participants in the conspiracy promised to elect the tsar later, but in the meantime, 7 boyars began to rule in Moscow - "seven-boyars". Frightened by the scale of the peasant movement and the growth of anarchy in the country, the Moscow boyars, despite the protests of Patriarch Hermogenes, concluded an agreement with the Polish prince Vladislav "on his recognition as king." The agreement repeated the oath of Shuisky, but the question of Vladislav's conversion to Orthodoxy remained unclear. On the basis of the concluded treaty, Polish troops entered Moscow, and the governor of Vladislav (he was only 15 years old) A. Gonsevsky began to rule in the country.

Foreign oppression did not suit either the peasantry, or the townspeople, or the nobility. The idea of a national militia to save Russia was ripening in the country.

By February-March 1611, the first militia was formed. Its leader was the Ryazan governor Procopius Lyapunov. Soon the militias besieged Moscow, and on March 19 a decisive battle took place, in which the insurgent Muscovites took part. It was not possible to free the city. Remaining at the city walls, the militia created the highest authority - the Council of All Lands. On June 30, 1611, the "Verdict of the whole land" was adopted, which provided for the future structure of Russia, but infringed upon the rights of the Cossacks and had, moreover, a serfdom in nature. After the murder of Lyapunov by the Cossacks, the first militia broke up. By this time, the Swedes captured Novgorod, and the Poles, after a siege of many months, captured Smolensk.

The second militia began to be created in one of the largest cities in the country - Nizhny Novgorod. It was headed by the Nizhny Novgorod headman Kuzma Minin and Prince Dmitry Pozharsky. With the help of the population of many cities, material resources were collected. In the spring of 1612, the militia moved to Yaroslavl, where the government and orders were created. In August, the militias entered Moscow. After eliminating the attempts of the Polish detachment of Chodkiewicz to penetrate the Kremlin to help the Polish garrison located there, he surrendered. On October 26, 1612, Moscow was liberated. “Contrary to all the consequences of the oprichnina,” notes the modern historian NN Pokrovsky, “the significance of the zemshchina, which saved the fatherland from foreign robbery, was confirmed on a national scale.”

In January 1613, a crowded (about 700 people) Zemsky Sobor gathered in Moscow, in which electives from boyars, noblemen, clergy, townspeople, Cossacks, archers and, apparently, black-haired peasants took part. The most acceptable candidate for election as tsar was the candidacy of 16-year-old Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov (1613-1645), the son of Metropolitan Philaret.

The government of the new Russian Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich in January 1616 in the village of Dederino began negotiations with the Swedes to conclude a peace treaty. The Russian delegation at the negotiations was headed by Prince D. I. Mezetskiy, the Swedish - by the commander of the Swedish troops in Russia, Count Jacob De la Gardie.

The final round of negotiations took place from December 1616 in the village of Stolbovo near Tikhvin. On February 27, 1617, the parties accepted the final peace terms. Sweden returned to Russia the Novgorod, Starorussky, Porkhovsky, Ladoga, Gdovsky districts and the Sumerian volost, but retained the Izhora land with the cities of Koporye, Oreshek, Yam, Ivangorod, as well as the city of Korela (Kexholm) with the district. Russia was cut off from the Baltic Sea. In addition, the Swedes received an indemnity of 20 thousand rubles.

The Russian population of the lands ceded to Sweden (with the exception of the peasants and parish clergy) received the right to leave for Russia within two weeks. The Stolbovo world recognized the right of free trade for the merchants of both countries, both in Sweden and in Russia, but prohibited the passage of Swedish merchants with goods through Russia to the East and Russian merchants through Swedish possessions to Western Europe. The borders established by the Stolbovskiy Peace were preserved until the Great Northern War of 1700-1721.

It turned out to be more difficult to achieve peace with the Commonwealth. Having parried the weak attempts of Mikhail Fedorovich to return Smolensk in 1615, the Polish troops under the nominal command of the prince Vladislav went on the offensive in 1617-1618. However, they failed to take the capital by storm. With limited funds and a Sejm bound by a promise to end hostilities in 1618, Sigismund III Vasa agreed to negotiations.

The truce was concluded on December 1, 1618 in the village of Deulino (near the Trinity-Sergius Lavra) for a period of 14.5 years. The Russian delegation included the boyars F.I.Sheremetev, D.I. The Polish embassy was headed by A. Novodvorsky, L. Sapega, J. Gonsevsky. Russia, weakened during the Time of Troubles, was forced to cede the Commonwealth of Smolensk (with the exception of Vyazma), Chernigov and Novgorod-Seversk lands - only 29 cities. Despite the conclusion of an armistice, the prince Vladislav did not abandon his claims to the Russian throne. After the Deulinsky truce, an exchange of prisoners was made, and Filaret, the father of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich, who was in Polish captivity, returned to his homeland.

The consequences of the Troubles were very difficult for the progressive development of the country: a long-term, powerful rollback in economic development; territorial losses (Russia lost access to the Baltic Sea - the Neva River, Izhora land, the cities of Karela, Oreshek and others were withdrawn to Sweden. Poland retained the Smolensk and Seversk lands). The split in society opened the way for social upheaval.

At the same time, the most important result of this difficult period was the restoration of political independence. After the expulsion of foreigners and the end of the Troubles, the most pressing issue for the Russian people was the restoration of their statehood - the election of a new tsar.

Overcoming the consequences of the turmoil in the economy, internal development, foreign policy, took the lives of two or three generations.

Literature

History of Russia from ancient times to the end of the 17th century. / Ed. A.N. Sakharova, A.P. Novoseltsev. - M., 1997. Ch. 16, 18, 19.

Klyuchevsky V.O. Works: In 9 volumes - M., 1988. T. 2, 3.

Kobrin V.B. Ivan groznyj. - M., 1989.

Skrynnikov R.G. Russia at the beginning of the 17th century. Troubles. - M., 1991.

Skrynnikov R.G. The kingdom of terror. - SPb., 1992.

Platonov S.F. Essays on the Troubles in the Moscow State in the 16th-17th centuries. - M., 1995.

L.V. Cherepnin Zemsky Sobors of the Russian State of the 16th-17th centuries - M., 1978.

Russia in the 16th century

XVII century in the history of Russia

9.1. Russia in the 16th century

Completion of the merger

In the XVI century. Basil III(1505-1533) completed the unification of the Russian principalities-lands around Moscow.

In 1510 Pskov was annexed to the Russian state, in 1514. Smolensk, which had previously been captured by the Lithuanian feudal lords, was returned; in 1521 the Ryazan principality was annexed, which in fact had long been subordinate to Moscow. Thus, all the principalities and lands of Russia were united into one state, which, in addition to the Russians, included other peoples: Udmurts, Mordovians, Karelians, Komi, etc. In terms of the composition of the population, the Russian centralized state was multinational.

The international importance of the Russian state has grown, its defense capacity has strengthened. Moscow during the reign of Ivan III and Vasily III received numerous ambassadors from foreign states and sovereigns - the German emperor, the Hungarian king, the king of Denmark, the Venetian doge, the Turkish sultan, etc.

Elena Glinskaya's Board

After the death of Vasily III, Ivan IV (1530-1584) took the grand throne. But since he was only three years old, the state was ruled by his mother - the Grand Duchess Elena Glinskaya. She did not rule for long, but under her certain reforms were carried out aimed at centralizing the state, including a ban on the purchase of land from servants, strengthening control over the growth of monastic land tenure and reducing tax and judicial immunity of the church. The monetary reform of 1535 was of great importance. Its need was ripe in connection with the appearance in circulation of counterfeit, defective money. The silver ruble was recognized as the monetary unit, minting was unified, and a single monetary system was established for all cities. Mints were left only in Moscow and Novgorod. At the local level, lip chiefs were introduced - elected from among the service people. The kisselovers were elected as their assistants from among the black-nosed peasants. The functions of the labial wardens included the right of independent judicial proceedings in robbery cases.

The beginning of the reign

After the death of Elena Glinskaya in 1538, her eight-year-old son Ivan IV was left an orphan. During this period, the struggle for power resumed, in which the princes Volsky, Shuisky, Glinsky took part; she was distinguished by cruelty, violence, which, of course, influenced the formation of the character of the future ruler of the Russian state, called by the people Terrible! He passed his first death sentence in his life in 1543, when he was only 13 years old. In 1547 Ivan IV took the title of tsar and was the first of the Russian rulers to be crowned tsar in the Assumption Cathedral. From that year on, he publicly declared himself the king of all Russia.

In the context of the struggle for the throne, the exorbitant growth of extortions from the urban population, as well as the intensification of the exploitation of the peasants in the country, the social situation aggravated: the peasants fled from the feudal lords, unauthorizedly plowed their lands, destroyed documents on the rights of landowners to peasants.

In 1547, an uprising of the townspeople broke out in Moscow, which was triggered by an extensive fire that destroyed the property of the townspeople. The injured and indignant people demanded that the young tsar extradite especially hated boyars. The Moscow revolt was not the only one - unrest also took place in Pskov, Opochka, Ustyug. The demonstrations of the people were suppressed. However, Ivan IV was forced to make concessions - some boyars were removed from the government, the feeding system was gradually eliminated.

In 1547, under Ivan the Terrible, a new government was created - The chosen one is glad. The Rada consisted of representatives of various strata of the ruling class - princes D. Kurlyatev, A. Kurbsky (1528-1583), M. Vorotynsky, N. Odoevsky, V. Serebryany, A. Gorbaty-Shuisky, boyars Sheremetevs. Metropolitan Macarius and the priest of the Kremlin's Annunciation Cathedral played an important role in the Rada Sylvester(? -c. 1566), clerk of the Ambassadorial Prikaz I. Viskovaty. Led by the king's sleeping bag A.F. Adashev(? -1561). He was a serviceman of a not very distinguished family. Contemporaries considered him knowledgeable and intelligent. Thus, the composition of the Rada testified to the compromise nature of the domestic policy pursued at this stage by Ivan IV.

The elected council was not an official state institution, but it ruled on behalf of the king for 13 years and was in fact the government.

The members of the Chosen Rada set their task to streamline the laws and government of the country, to find an expansion of sources of income for the treasury, taking into account the interests of both the serving nobility and the boyars.

Reforms of the 50s

When developing the reforms, the requirements of petitions addressed to the king and written in 1549 by a nobleman and a writer were taken into account. I.S. Peresvetov.

The reforms included the creation of a new system of central government - orders. In the middle of the XVI century. in Russia, there were about 20 orders, each of which was in charge of certain affairs. So, the Ambassadorial Prikaz regulated relations with foreign countries, the Pushkar Prikaz - with artillery, the Robber - with cases of the protection of feudal property, the Big Prikaz - with public finances, the Yamskaya Prikaz - with postal communications and post stations. (pits), Pomestny - state lands distributed to the nobles. At the head of the order was a noble boyar, a major government official, clerks and clerks obeyed him. Orders were in charge of tax collection and courts. Orders in charge of certain territories were in force - the Order of the Siberian Palace, the Order of the Kazan Palace.

The composition of the Boyar Duma was expanded by Ivan IV three times. To solve the most important state affairs, Ivan IV began to convene a special meeting - Zemsky Cathedral. V it included representatives of the boyars, service nobility, clergy, merchants, townspeople. This testified to the creation of an estate-representative institution and the transformation of Russia into an estate-representative monarchy. The Zemsky Sobor discussed issues of foreign policy and finance, as well as the election of new tsars. The first Zemsky Sobor was convened in 1549, he decided to draw up a new Code of Law and formulated a reform program of the XVI century. The Zemsky Sobor in 1550 adopted a new Code of Laws, which confirmed the right of the peasants to move only on St. George's Day and increased the payment for the "elderly".

Zemsky sobors were of a deliberative nature and did not limit the power of the tsar, but, of course, thanks to them, political measures of the supreme power were carried out locally. However, Zemsky Councils in Russia were held only out of necessity, i.e. irregularly.

In the XV-XVI centuries. in Russia, local government bodies were also created - system of governorship. The governors were sent by the sovereign and the Boyar Duma to cities and lands. The functions of the governors included the collection of taxes from the population, control over the use of the decrees of the Grand Duke, the implementation of the court and reprisals. For the performance of these duties, they did not receive salaries, but were supported by extortions from the local population. This procedure for paying for their services was called feeding. Since the governors were left to their own devices, they abused their powers, from which the population suffered.

Reforms of the 50s XVI century also affected local government - the feeding system was canceled. According to the lip reform in the localities, special positions were established for lip chiefs (uyezd, district), elected from the nobility. The functions of lip institutions were transferred to the conduct of cases of robbers and thieves removed from the court of governors. Thus, the laborers gained great power over the local population, which also testified to the strengthening of the central authority. This reform provided an inflow of additional funds to the treasury (taxes previously appropriated by the breeders), strengthened the position of the nobility in the local administrative apparatus, and helped to eliminate the remnants of feudal fragmentation in the local government apparatus. On the other hand, she strengthened the resistance of the boyars. "

In 1550, a military reform was carried out aimed at strengthening the country's armed forces. A new permanent army was created, armed with firearms (squeaks) and melee weapons (berdysh and swords). Such an army began to be called Strelets. The personal protection of the king was provided by a special detachment of 3 thousand people. At the end of the XVI century. the number of rifle troops reached 25 thousand people. The service of the archers was held in Moscow and in almost all major cities. The standing streltsy army became a powerful fighting force of the Muscovite state. The Code was drawn up about. service (published in

1556), in accordance with which two forms of military service were established: by country (i.e. by origin) and by device (i.e. by recruitment).

Noblemen and boyar children served in the fatherland. The service began at the age of 15, continued throughout his life and was inherited. Such service people made up the bulk of the armed forces - the mounted militia of the feudal lords, were provided with a salary and land.

The archers passed the service on the device.

The Cossacks who lived on the Don also poured into the Vtsysko. In 1571, the first Charter was drawn up for the organization of a guard and village service at the borders.

By the end of the XVI century. the composition of the Russian troops exceeded 100 thousand people. In addition, there were 2,500 hired Poles, Germans and other foreigners.

Agrarian coup. Oprichnina

The agrarian reform of Ivan the Terrible was extremely important. By this time, a large feudal patrimony with developed immunity, which asserted the independence of its owner from the central government, began to interfere more and more with the socio-economic development of the Russian centralized state. The boyar nobility competed with the princes, and the princes, in the fight against the boyars, began to rely on the landowners - the nobles.

The state, in the face of a lack of funds for the creation of a mercenary army, wishing to subjugate the boyars-votchinniki and appanage princes, took the path of creating a state local system. The final blow to the feudal patrimony was dealt by Ivan the Terrible in 1565, when he established oprichnina, representing a system of measures aimed at strengthening the autocracy and further enslavement of the peasants. Large territories were allocated from the state land fund, the income from which was to go to the state treasury. "The rest of the territory was Zemshchina, remaining in the management of old institutions. The oprichnina included lands with the most developed level of specific-princely land tenure and the most developed cities, i.e. the better half of the country. In these areas, the princely and boyar estates were confiscated, their previous owners were "taken out" to other areas, mainly outlying areas, where they received land on the basis of local law. In the old districts, the land was given to the guardsmen. This reform represented an agrarian revolution, the essence of which is the redistribution of lands from the boyars in favor of the nobility. The result of the agrarian coup is the weakening of large feudal-patrimonial land tenure and the elimination of its independence from the central government; the establishment of local land ownership and the associated nobility, who supported state power. In economic terms, this gradually led to the predominance of corvee over quitrent exploitation.

Ivan the Terrible carried out these transformations with incredible cruelty. He attacked Novgorod with an army of guardsmen, as he considered the Novgorodians to be opponents of his power. Thousands of innocent people died, many were drowned in the river. Volkhov, the surrounding villages were plundered. Upon his return from this campaign to Moscow, Ivan IV continued numerous executions of boyars and service people. In the hands of the tsar, the oprichnina was a powerful military punitive organization. She very soon aroused discontent and anger against the tsar both in the feudal elite and among the people.

In the life of the country, the oprichnina ominously intertwined the old and the new.

In an effort to strengthen the central government, the elimination of the last appanage possessions, Grozny created a new sovereign destiny - the oprichnina, which led to a system of duplicating orders and thoughts and the isolation of the zemstvo. The measures of the oprichnina, aimed at strengthening the personal power of Grozny, were carried out by barbaric methods. Ultimately eliminating political fragmentation, the oprichnina caused an extreme aggravation of contradictions. In addition, the oprichnina army was unable to protect the capital from the Tatars, and in 1571 it was plundered.

In 1572 Ivan the Terrible canceled the oprichnina and forbade even mentioning this hated word. This was followed by the unification of the oprichnina and zemstvo territories, the oprichnina and zemstvo troops, service people, the unity of the Boyar Duma was restored. Thus ended the story of the most mysterious, according to V.O. Klyuchevsky, institutions in the history of Russia.

At the beginning of the XVI century. an attempt was made to limit church land tenure, but then the supporters of the rich church, the so-called "money-grubbers", won. In 1551, at the Stoglav Cathedral (its decisions were summarized in 100 chapters), the line on limiting monastic land tenure and establishing control over it by the tsar won; monasteries pledged to participate in the collection of tax for the ransom of prisoners (polyanny money).

Foreign policy

Under Ivan the Terrible, changes were made in the financial and tax system: a reform of the "tax letter" was carried out, according to which a unit of taxation common for the whole state was introduced - a large plow (a plot of land of 400-600 hectares), which was subject to "tax" (natural and monetary duty). The range of monetary taxes was expanded, monetary rent was expanded, and financial and tax centralization was strengthened.

These reforms helped to strengthen the Russian centralized multinational state. This can be judged by the transfer of the right to collect trade duties to the state. The foreign policy of Ivan IV was carried out in three directions: in the west - the struggle for access to the Baltic Sea; in the southeast and east - the fight against the Kazan and Astrakhan khanates and the beginning of the development of Siberia; in the south - the protection of Russian lands from the raids of the Crimean Khanate. The Tatar khans made predatory raids on the Russian lands. In the territories of the Kazan and Astrakhan khanates, there were thousands of Russian people in captivity, captured during the raids. The local population was cruelly exploited - Chuvash, Mari, Udmurts, Mordovians, Tatars, Bashkirs. The Volga route ran through the territories of the khanates, but the Volga could not be used by the Russian people along its entire length. Russian landowners were also attracted by the fertile sparsely populated lands of these regions.

At first, Ivan the Terrible took diplomatic steps to subjugate the Kazan Khanate, but they did not bring good luck. In 1552, the 100,000-strong army of the Russian tsar laid siege to Kazan. It was better armed than the Tatar one. Ivan IV's artillery had 150 large guns. Using a tunnel and barrels of gunpowder, the Russians blew up the walls of Kazan. The Kazan Khanate declared itself defeated. The peoples of the Middle Volga region became part of the Russian state. In 1556 Ivan the Terrible conquered the Astrakhan Khanate. From this period, the entire Volga region was the territory of Russia. The free Volga trade route significantly improved the terms of trade with the East.

In the middle of the XVI century. Russia included Bashkiria, Chuvashia, Kabarda. The annexation of the Kazan and Astrakhan khanates opened up new perspectives, access to the basins of the great Siberian rivers became possible. Siberian khan Ediger in 1556 recognized vassal dependence on Moscow, but the khan who replaced him Kuchum(? - c. 1598) refused to recognize the power of Moscow (oppressed local residents, killed the Russian ambassador).

The Stroganov merchants, who had a letter from the tsar granting lands to the east of the Urals, with the permission of Moscow, hired a large detachment of Cossacks to fight Khan Kuchum. Cossack chieftain became the leader of the detachment Ermak(? -1585). In 1581, Ermak's detachment defeated Kuchum's troops, and a year later occupied the capital of the Siberian Khanate, Kashlyk.

Kuchum was finally defeated in 1598, and Western Siberia was annexed to the Russian state. All-Russian laws were approved in the annexed territories. The development of Siberia by Russian industrialists, peasants and artisans began.

Russia's foreign policy actions in the West are a struggle for access to the Baltic Sea, for the Baltic lands captured by the Livonian Order. Many Baltic lands have long belonged to Novgorod Rus. The banks of the Neva River and the Gulf of Finland were formerly part of the lands of Veliky Novgorod. In 1558 Russian troops moved to the West, Livonian War, lasted until 1583 the rulers of the Livonian Order obstructed the ties of the Russian state with Western European countries.

The Livonian War is divided into three stages: until 1561 - Russian troops completed the defeat of the Livonian Order, took Narva, Tartu (Dorpat), approached Tallinn (Revel) and Riga; until 1578 - the war with Livonia turned for Russia into a war against Poland, Lithuania, Sweden, Denmark. The hostilities have become protracted. Russian troops fought with varying success, occupying a number of Baltic fortresses in the summer of 1577.

The situation was complicated by the weakening of the country's economy as a result of the ruin of the guardsmen. The attitude of the local population towards the Russian troops changed as a result of military extortions.

During this period, Prince Kurbsky, one of the most prominent Russian military leaders, who also knew the military plans of Ivan the Terrible, went over to the side of the enemy. The situation was complicated by the devastating raids on the Russian lands of the Crimean Tatars.

In 1569, Poland and Lithuania were united into a single state - the Rzeczpospolita. Chosen to the throne Stefan Bathory(1533-1586) went on the offensive; from 1579 Russian troops fought defensive battles. In 1579 Polotsk was taken, in 1581 - Velikiye Luki, the Poles besieged Pskov. The heroic defense of Pskov began (led by the governor I.P. Shuisky), lasting five months. The courage of the defenders of the city prompted Stefan Batory to abandon the further siege.

However, the Livonian War ended with the signing of armistice Yam-Zapolsky (with Poland) and Plyussky (with Sweden) unprofitable for Russia. The Russians had to abandon the conquered lands and cities. The Baltic lands were seized by Poland and Sweden. The war has drained the strength of Russia. The main task - the conquest of the outlet to the Baltic Sea - was not solved.

Russian economy

By the end of the XVI century. the territory of Russia has almost doubled in comparison with the middle of the century, and the population was up to 7 million people.

The main branch of the Russian economy in the XVI century. agriculture remained. Hunting and fur trades are pushed back to the outskirts and retain their importance only in Siberia and the North. Fishery and beekeeping continued to develop, which during this period passed from primitive beekeeping to apiary (organized) beekeeping.

Agriculture developed in an extensive way - through the development of new areas and increased deforestation and clearing of land for arable land in the central regions of the country.

The main agricultural tool was the wooden plow; in forest areas, a two-toothed and three-toothed plow was used. In the central regions, they began to cultivate the land with roe deer, which is a plow-type tool.

The progress of the productive forces of agriculture in the conditions of the invariability of the instruments of labor was manifested mainly in the advancement of agriculture to new regions and in the spread of the three-field system. In the central regions of the country in the XVI century. three-field with the correct alternation of winter, spring and fallow fields has become dominant.

To cultivate the land with primitive implements, draft animals were required; two or three horses pulled a trident plow and a roe plow. Therefore, the development of arable farming was accompanied by the growth of cattle breeding.

In the second half of the XVI century. the process of colonization of the outskirts began. There were two main directions; south and southeast from Moscow and east - Trans-Urals and Siberia. The empty lands of the southeast were called the wild field; since these outskirts of the Muscovite state were constantly raided by the Nogai and Crimean Tatars, in order to strengthen the defense, measures were taken to settle and develop them. Fortified posts and fortresses were built along the southern border - a notch line, where people were resettled, carrying the border service, for which they were given small plots of land. In the 60-70s of the XVI century. peasant colonization of the southern lands intensified. Landowners also rushed to the rich black earth lands. The government granted them huge estates in these areas. The eastern lands of Western and Central Siberia were inhabited mainly by peasants.

The process of uniting disparate territories into a single state was accompanied by the development of cities, where handicrafts and trade were concentrated. Cities overgrown posadi, in which settled free artisans. In favor of the prince, the population of the posad bore duties - the posad tax. By the end of the XVI century. There were about 220 cities in Russia. The largest city was Moscow with a population of 100 thousand people, in other cities of Russia there were 3-8 thousand people. The largest Russian cities were Novgorod, Pskov, Vologda, Veliky Ustyug, Kazan, Yaroslavl, Sol Kamskaya, Kaluga, Nizhny Novgorod, Tula, Astrakhan.

In the XVI century. the rise of handicraft production was observed, which was expressed in the differentiation of its types, the number of industries and new specialties increased, which contributed to the development of exchange, although the links of urban handicraft with the market were still weak.

Large industries that work for the market stand out: salt production, extraction and smelting of iron ore, construction of stone buildings, forestry, potash production. The specialization of production was closely related to the availability of local raw materials and had an exclusively natural geographical character.

Trade is developing. If in the XV century. trade was carried out in local markets, then in the XVI century. - at the county. Along with merchants, secular and spiritual feudal lords, especially monasteries, were engaged in trade. Trade flows were formed - from the center and southern regions to the north they brought bread, from the Volga region - leather, from Pomorie and Siberia - furs, fish, salt; Tula and Serpukhov sent metal.

In the XVI century. trade relations between the Russian state and England were established through Arkhangelsk, founded in 1584. In the age of the formation of the world market and the great geographical discoveries, Russia traded with Poland, the Lithuanian principality, the Tatar Khanate, the Caucasus, Central Asia, Turkey, Persia. Russia exported mainly raw materials to the western countries, and handicraft products to the eastern countries.

9.2. XVII century in the history of Russia

Time of Troubles

The 17th century brought numerous trials to Russia and its statehood. After the death of Ivan the Terrible in 1584, a weak and sickly one became his heir and tsar. Fedor Ivanovich(1584-1598). The struggle for power within the country began. This situation caused not only internal contradictions, but also intensified attempts by external forces to eliminate the state independence of Russia. For almost the entire century, she had to fight off the Commonwealth, Sweden, the raids of the Crimean Tatars - vassals of the Ottoman Empire, to resist the Catholic Church, which sought to turn Russia away from Orthodoxy.

At the beginning of the 17th century. Russia has gone through a period called Time of Troubles. XVII century initiated the peasant wars; this century saw the revolts of the cities, the famous deed of Patriarch Nikon and the schism of the Orthodox Church. Therefore, this century B.0. Klyuchevsky named rebellious.

The Time of Troubles covers 1598-1613. Over the years, the tsar's brother-in-law has visited the Russian throne Boris Godunov (1598- 1605), Fedor Godunov(from April to June 1605), False Dmitry I (June 1605-May 1606), Vasily Shuisky (1606-1610), False Dmitry II (1607-1610), Semboyarshina (1610-1613).

Boris Godunov won a difficult struggle for the throne between representatives of the highest nobility and was the first Russian tsar to receive the throne not by inheritance, but by way of elections at the Zemsky Sobor. During his short reign, he pursued a peaceful foreign policy, resolving controversial issues with Poland and Sweden for 20 years; encouraged economic and cultural ties with Western Europe. Under him, Russia advanced to Siberia, finally defeating Kuchum. In 1601-1603 to Russia about

collapsed "great smooth" caused by crop failures. Godunov took certain measures to organize public works, allowed the slaves to leave their masters, and distributed bread from the state storehouses to the starving. However, it was not possible to improve the situation. The relationship between the authorities and the peasants was aggravated by the annulment in 1603 of the law on the temporary restoration of St. George's Day, which meant an increase in serfdom. The discontent of the masses resulted in an uprising of slaves, which was led by Cotton Kosolap. This uprising is considered by many historians to be the beginning of the Peasant War.

The highest stage of the Peasant War at the beginning of the 17th century. (1606-1607) was the uprising of Ivan Bolotnikov, in which was attended by slaves, peasants, townspeople, archers, Cossacks, as well as the nobles who joined them. The war covered the Southwest and South of Russia (about 70 cities), the Lower and Middle Volga regions. The rebels defeated the troops Vasily Shuisky(the new Russian tsar) near Kromy, Yelets, on the rivers Ugra and Lopasnya, etc. In October-December 1606, the rebels laid siege to Moscow, but because of the disagreements that began, the betrayal of the nobles were defeated and retreated to Kaluga, and then to Tula. In the summer-autumn of 1607. together with the serf detachments Ilya Gorchakov(Ileyki Muromets,? - c. 1608) the rebels fought near Tula. The siege of Tula lasted four months, after which the city was surrendered, the uprising was suppressed. Bolotnikov was exiled to Kargopol, blinded and drowned.

At such a critical moment, an attempt was made to Polish intervention. The ruling circles of the Commonwealth and the Catholic Church intended to dismember Russia and eliminate its state independence. In a latent form, the intervention was expressed in support of False Dmitry I and False Dmitry II. An open intervention led by Sigismund III began under Vasily Shuisky, when in September 1609 Smolensk was besieged and in 1610 a campaign against Moscow and its capture took place. By this time, Vasily Shuisky was overthrown by the nobles from the throne, and an interregnum began in Russia - Seven Boyars. The Boyar Duma made a deal with the Polish interventionists and was inclined to call on the Russian throne the Polish king - the young Vladislav, a Catholic, which was a direct betrayal of the national interests of Russia. In addition, in the summer of 1610, a Swedish intervention began with the aim of seizing Pskov, Novgorod, and the northwestern and north-Russian regions from Russia.

End of the intervention. The fight for Smolensk

In such conditions, only the entire people could defend the independence of the Russian state and expel the invaders. This task was completed by the people's militia led by the Nizhny Novgorod head Kuzma Minin and the prince Dmitry Pozharsky. After the liberation of Moscow in October 1612, the failure of two attempts by Sigismund (1612, 1617) to seize the Russian capital again, the Polish intervention ended with the Deulinsky "truce with the Commonwealth in 1618, already under the new tsar from the new Romanov dynasty - Mikhail Romanov(1596-1645). Under this agreement, Poland received the Smolensk (except Vyazma), Chernigov and Novgorod Seversk lands. In total, 19 Russian cities, including Smolensk, went to the Poles.

In the years of Michael's reign, in addition to the end of the Polish intervention, the end of the Swedish intervention took place, when in 1617 the "Eternal Peace" was concluded in Stolbovo (near Tikhvin). Sweden returned to Russia Novgorod, Staraya Russa, Porkhov, Ladoga, Gdov with districts. However, many Russian cities remained with Sweden. In addition, Russia pledged to pay the Swedes 20 thousand rubles. and remained without access to the Baltic Sea.

In the years 1632-1634. the Russian-Polish (Smolensk) war was fought for the return of the Smolensk and Chernigov lands captured during the years of the Polish intervention. It ended with the surrender of the Russian army, surrounded by Smolensk. Her commander M. Shein(? -1634) was accused of treason by the boyars and hanged. According to the Polyanovsky world, Smolensk and the Seversky lands remained with Poland. Russia paid her an indemnity of 20 thousand rubles, although from that moment the Polish king renounced his claims to the Moscow throne.

Russia was worried about the Crimean Khanate, a vassal of Turkey, which was at that time a strong state. In 1637, the Don Cossacks captured Azov, which belonged to Turkey, which they held for five years. By the decision of the Zemsky Sobor in 1642, the Cossacks were asked to leave this port in order to avoid complications.

"A village near the Trinity-Sergius Monastery.

Despite numerous wars under the first Romanov, Russia expanded its ties with the West; foreigners came to Russia, especially Germans. The West sold firearms to Russia, and recruited mercenary officers and soldiers served in the Russian army. The Dutch merchant A. Vinius founded the first factory near Tula for the production of iron and cast iron products. During these years the traveler A. Olearius (1603-1671) visited Russia, leaving a description of his trip to Muscovy.

Cathedral Code of 1649 and the strengthening of autocracy

The reign of the one who came to the throne after the death of Michael Alexey Mikhailovich(1629-1676) was marked by extremely important domestic and foreign political events for Russia.

Under Alexei Mikhailovich, nicknamed The quietest, were measures were taken to strengthen the autocracy. The Order of Secret Affairs was created, the administrative apparatus was strengthened - the number of orders increased.

The largest event in the social and political life of Russia was the compilation and adoption in 1649 of the Cathedral Code - the first Russian legislative monument, published by typographic method in the amount of 2 thousand copies. It was sent out for guidance to all voivods in cities and in all Moscow orders, and translated into almost all European languages. The Cathedral Code contains about a thousand articles, grouped into 25 chapters. In the first nine chapters, the penalties for crimes against the church and royal power are recorded. Burning at the stake was envisaged if God and the church were criticized. A person accused of treason and insulting the honor of the sovereign, as well as boyars and governors, was subjected to execution. Anyone who bared a weapon in the presence of the king was punished by cutting off his hand. Thus, in the Cathedral Code, the personality of the sovereign, the honor of the sovereign's court was protected, Orthodoxy, the feudal system were defended. Land tenure was consolidated as a privilege of the ruling feudal class, and ecclesiastical land tenure was limited. Serfdom received legislative registration: St. George's Day was canceled altogether, the feudal lords could completely dispose of the property, labor and personality of the peasant. On the whole, the Sobornoye Ulozhenie testified to the centralization of state power, the increased role of the nobility in strengthening the state and the movement of Russia towards an absolute monarchy. Soon the Zemsky Councils lost their role.

External politics

In the XVII century. the liberation war of the Ukrainian people against the Polish-gentry oppression began. It lasted from 1648 to 1654, headed by the hetman of Ukraine Bohdan Khmelnytsky(c. 1595-1657). In October 1653, at the Zemsky Sobor, the proposal of the government of Tsar Alexei was approved to accept Ukraine "under the hand of the high state." In 1654 the Pereyaslavl Rada unanimously spoke in favor of the reunification of Ukraine with Russia, which has a progressive meaning for the fate of the Ukrainian and Russian peoples. Ukraine retained a special state and political structure - the hetmanate.

This decision caused the disagreement of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and the war with Russia continued in 1654-1667. Russia fought for the return of the Smolensk and Chernigov lands, Belarus and the reunification of Ukraine with Russia. In the years 1654-1655. Russian troops defeated the main forces of the Commonwealth, liberated Smolensk region and most of Belarus. The hostilities, resumed in 1658, proceeded with varying degrees of success. From 1660 the Polish troops seized the initiative. In 1667, the Andrusov truce was concluded, according to which Poland returned the Smolensk and Chernigov lands to Russia and recognized the reunification of the Left-Bank Ukraine with Russia.

Simultaneously with the Commonwealth, Russia in 1656-1658. fought a war with Sweden for access to the Baltic Sea. At the initial stage, Russian troops won major victories, in 1657-1658. hostilities proceeded with varying degrees of success. This war ended with the signing of the Kardis Peace Treaty in 1661, according to which Russia did not receive access to the Baltic Sea.

Throughout the 17th century. a great danger for Russia in the south was the Crimean Khanate (remember the siege of Azov). In 1681 the Peace of Bakhchisarai was concluded. According to this agreement, the Dnieper was recognized as the border between Crimea and Russia; for 20 years, the Crimean Khanate pledged not to support the enemy of the Russian state. But in 1686 Russia terminated this treaty, since according to the "Eternal Peace" concluded with the Commonwealth, Russia and Poland united to fight against the Turkish-Tatar aggression.

Internal political situation

The internal political situation in the country was difficult under the first Romanovs.

From 1630 to 1650 Inhabitants of 30 cities revolted - Veliky Ustyug, Novgorod, Voronezh, Kursk, Vladimir, cities of Siberia, etc. The largest uprisings were in Moscow (1648), Pskov and Novgorod (1650), They were suppressed, and their active participants were executed.

XVII century brought serious shocks to the Russian Church. By the middle of this century, dissatisfaction with the church was growing in Russian society, which maintained order, increasing the oppression of the common people, as well as with the unseemly behavior of many clergymen, the lack of uniformity in church services. Significant discrepancies have accumulated in religious books and church rites; the sacred canons were interpreted in contradictory ways. Each locality had its own traditions of worship. The order of the divine service was at odds with the Greek order. Thus, the need for a reform of the church was ripe. In the years 1653-1660. patriarch Nikon(1605-1681) carried out a church reform. She unified church rituals and established uniformity of worship for all Orthodox churches. The Greek rite was adopted as a model, all sacred and liturgical books were corrected according to Greek models, only icons of Greek writing were allowed for divine services.

Despite the fact that the reform of Patriarch Nikon was supported by the sovereign Alexei Mikhailovich, his closest entourage and the higher clergy, there was split of the Russian Church. The church reform was opposed by the priests and archpriests in Moscow (I. Neropov, S. Vnifatiev), in Suzdal (N. Pustosvyat), in Yuryevets - Avvakum Petrov and other cities. They began to be called schismatics.

Archpriest Avvakum(1620-1682) was the ideologue of the Old Believers, Old Believers. They demanded a return to the old rituals and traditions: read and sing during the service at the same time, different things in several voices (the reform established one voice); to produce the sign of the cross with two fingers, and not three, as the reform believed; bows during worship should remain waist-length, and not earthly, as the reform introduced; they demanded a return to the procession by salting, and not the procession of the cross towards the sun, as the reform envisaged.

On the side of the Old Believers were many townspeople, peasants, archers. The split of the church became a form of social protest of the masses.

All provisions of the reform were approved by the Zemsky Sobors

1654-1656; schismatics were condemned and excommunicated. Priest Avvakum was exiled to Dauria (Transbaikalia), returned to Moscow, exiled again, then cut, cursed and burned.

The social protest of the schismatics was essentially directed towards fanaticism and asceticism, mysticism; supporters of the split denied everything new and foreign; hostile to secular culture and knowledge. Therefore, it is impossible to assess the schism as a truly progressive phenomenon, although thanks to the old beliefs, many written monuments of past centuries have survived.

Nikon's interference in the internal and foreign policy of the state, justified by the fact that "the priesthood is higher than the kingdom" (the church is higher than the monarch), led to the rupture between the patriarch and the tsar. Zemsky Sobor 1666-1667 deprived Nikon of the patriarchate and exiled.

During the reign of Alexei Mikhailovich, the largest Peasant War in the history of Russia in 1670-1671 took place. Her leader - Stepan Razin(c. 1630-1671) Don Cossack, chieftain, who first fought with the Crimean Tatars, then with the Turks. In 1667, with a detachment of the Cossack poor, he made a trip to the Volga and Yaik, then to Persia along the Caspian Sea. In the spring of 1670 he headed the Peasant War, in which he proved himself to be a capable organizer and military leader. He promised to abolish slavery, to free the peasants from the rule of the boyars and nobles. Along with the Cossacks, the peoples of the Volga region participated in the war. The rebels took Tsaritsyn, Astrakhan, Saratov, Samara, besieged Simbirsk, but Razin's troops were defeated. The ataman went to the Don, but was betrayed by the homely Cossacks, captured and executed in Moscow. After the execution of Razin, the war was still going on, individual detachments performed in many cities of the Volga region, Galitsky district, in the Solovetsky monastery.

From 1682 to 1696 the Russian throne was occupied by the sons of Tsar Alexei from different marriages - Peter(1672-1725) and Ivan(1666-1696). Since they were young, their sister was the ruler. Princess Sophia(1657-1704), who ruled from 1682 to 1689. During this period, the role of the prince increased. V. Golitsyna(1643-1714), the favorite of the princess.

In 1689, Peter I came of age, got married and showed a desire to fight the old outdated boyar traditions. Sophia made an attempt, with the help of the archers, who were dissatisfied with the creation of regiments of a new system, the loss of many of her privileges, to deprive Peter of power. However, she failed. Peter was supported by the Preobrazhensky and Semenovsky regiments, many boyars and nobles, the Moscow patriarch and even some rifle regiments. Peter retained the throne, punished the rebellious archers, disbanded the archery army, Sophia was tonsured into a monastery.

The beginning of the reign of Peter 1

Economy of Russia in the 17th century

In 1696 Ivan V died, Peter became the sovereign ruler. Peter's first task was to continue the struggle for the Crimea. He directed his actions towards the capture of Azov - a Turkish fortress at the mouth of the Don. But due to poorly prepared siege equipment and a lack of ships, the Russian troops failed. Then Peter began building a fleet on the river. Voronezh. Having built 30 large ships in one year, doubling the land army, Peter in 1696 blocked Azov from the sea and took possession of it. To anchor on the Sea of Azov, he built a fortress Taganrog.

V 1697 he went with the "Grand Embassy" to Europe, combining diplomatic. a mission with diverse cognitive tasks in shipbuilding, military affairs, craft.

In the XVII century. the productive forces of Russia as a whole have evolved. The population increased significantly, amounting to 10.5 million people by the end of the century. There were 335 cities in Russia. During this period, flaking hammers, boring machines, and paper mills are known in Russia. 55 manufactories, mainly metallurgical, were built. For the creation of industrial enterprises, foreign capital is attracted to Russia, and on preferential terms.

The process of social division of labor is gradually deepening, the specialization of agricultural and industrial areas is determined, handicrafts are transformed into small-scale production - all this leads to an increase in commodity exchange. The local form of land tenure contributes to the decomposition of the naturalness of the economy. Production is developing on the basis of processing agricultural raw materials: in the estates they are engaged in distilling, the production of cloth, linen, flour-grinding and tanning enterprises are created.

In Russia, the process of initial capital accumulation begins, although, unlike England, it proceeded in a feudal form - wealth accumulated from large landowners. Population differentiation took place, rich and poor appeared, "walking" people appeared, that is. deprived of the means of production. They become civilians. Hired workers could be otkhodniki peasants. The status of an employee receives legislative confirmation in the Cathedral Code. All this testifies to the emergence of capitalist relations. This is also facilitated by the systematic growth of trade with European and Asian countries. The Russian market is included in the system of the world market, world economic relations. Russia sells furs, timber, tar, potash, hemp, hemp, ropes, canvas to Western countries. If previously 20 ships arrived in Arkhangelsk annually, then in the 17th century. -80. Among the imported goods - consumer goods for the feudal elite and silver coins as raw materials for the manufacture of domestic money. Russia traded with the Eastern countries through Astrakhan. The cities of Dagestan and Azerbaijan played an important role. In the XVII century. began trade relations with China, India.

A new stage also begins in the development of domestic trade. Trade ties are acquiring a national character. In terms of trade turnover, Moscow ranked first - there were 120 specialized trade rows and 4 thousand retail premises.

In the XVII century. active development of Siberia continued. The Russians reached the shores of the Pacific Ocean, Kamchatka, and the Kuril Islands. In 1645, the pioneer Vasily Poyarkov went along the Amur to the Sea of Okhotsk. In 1648 g. Semyon Dezhnev(c. 1605-1673) discovered the strait separating Asia from North America. In 1649-1653 Erofey Khabarov (c. 1610-after 1667) from Yakutia made a trip to Dauria (Transbaikalia) and reached the Amur.

Pathfinders made maps of Siberia, drawings, surveys, paintings of cities, individual regions and the entire region as a whole. In 1672 the "Drawing of the Siberian lands" was drawn up. The settlement of Siberia, its colonization gradually took place, fortress cities were founded, which served as strong points for their further advance. They were called jails. So, in 1619, the Elysee prison appeared, in 1628 - the Krasnoyarsk prison, etc.

Trade of the central regions expanded with the Urals, Siberia, the Far East, and the southern outskirts. The centers of trade were large fairs of all-Russian importance - Makarievskaya from the 16th century, Irbitskaya from the first half of the 17th century, Svenskaya, Arkhangelskaya.

There have been shifts in the social structure of Russian society. Approval in the XV-XVI centuries. the local form of land tenure was put forward by the nobility, and in the 17th century. strengthened positions merchants. Domestic trade is turning into a sphere for the application of merchant capital. The merchant class is singled out into a special group and is subdivided into corporations: guests, living room hundred, cloth hundred.

The Russian government supported the merchants. In 1653, a law was passed on the internal and external trade of Russia: the Trade Charter, which replaced the plurality of trade fees with a single ruble trade duty, in the amount of 5% of the turnover. In 1667, the New Trade Charter was adopted, which has a protectionist character and protects the Russian merchants from foreign competition.

In the XVII century. in Russia, a reform of public finances was carried out, although it was still feudal in nature. Instead of the pososny tax in 1678, household taxation was introduced, which expanded the number of taxpayers. The system of other direct taxes was also changed.

In the years 1649-1652. In Russia, a reform was carried out, called the "Posad structure", according to which the white settlements were liquidated in the cities, they were merged with the settlements. Now the tax on the sovereign had to be borne by the entire urban population. The "Posad structure" was carried out on a national scale.

In 1679, various taxes collected from the artisan and merchant population of the townships were combined into a single tax - "streltsy money" or "streltsy tax". A system of lease payments was introduced - a form of tax collection. The "surplus" received by the tax farmer for the right to collect the tax was the source of the initial accumulation of capital.

Bodies of state control appeared: in 1655-1678. there was an Accounts Order, which at the end of the century was replaced by the Near Chancellery. In 1654, a monetary reform was carried out, according to which copper money was put into circulation with a compulsory exchange rate - a copper penny was equated with a silver one. The reform ended unsuccessfully. Copper money has depreciated. The response to this monetary policy was Copper riot in Moscow in 1652, the revolt was suppressed, but the government was forced to abolish the copper money, they were withdrawn from circulation.

“The white settlements belonged to private feudal lords; they were not taxed. The population of the townships opposed such an unjust distribution.

Epoch of the XVI-XVII centuries. was a turning point not only for Europe, but also for Russia. Here the process of the formation of a single state was completed and its type was determined as a multinational centralized state. The state system of serfdom was formed. At the same time, the tendency of decomposition of the natural economy of the economy has intensified in Russia, the formation of a single all-Russian market is beginning. The state increases its territory, actively participates in geographical discoveries and is more and more involved in the orbit of European politics and trade. Just as in the countries of Western Europe, in Russia in this era there was a tendency for the weakening of the church and the advancement of the state system from a state-representative monarchy to absolutism. The attempts of the papacy to drag Russia into the sphere of influence of Catholicism were also unsuccessful.

Self-test questions

1. Explain how the estate-representative monarchy developed in Russia in the 16th century. - XVII century. and how the transition to absolute monarchy took place in the second half of the 17th century.

2. What spheres of social, political and economic life affected the reforms of Ivan IV, what significance did they have?

3. How do you assess the oprichnina?

4. Tell us about the main events of Russian foreign policy in the XVI-XVII centuries. and their consequences.

5. What caused the Time of Troubles, what role did it play in awakening national consciousness?

6. Expand the main stages of enslavement of peasants in Russia, show the role of the state in this process.

7. Describe the content and significance of the Cathedral Code of 1649.

8. What caused the schism of the church in Russia in the 17th century, what did it lead to?

9. Expand the causes and nature of class and class contradictions in Russia in the XVI-XVII centuries, the forms of their resolution.