Several reasons prompted Tsar Ivan IV to create this unprecedented political system. The first is a sharp aggravation of contradictions with the highest nobility after the issuance of a decree on the confiscation of escheat princely estates in 1562 (Previously, these estates went to the relatives of the deceased or went to the monastery "for the memory of the soul.") The second is the heavy defeat of the Russian army in the Livonian War in 1564, flight to Lithuania of Prince Andrey Kurbsky. Fear of the boyar conspiracy did not give the king peace. And then he decided to get ahead of the enemies.

The oprichnina had two purposes: undermining the economic power of the big aristocracy and physical extermination of its most prominent representatives.

The first goal of the oprichnina was achieved by the resettlement policy. Tsar Ivan the Terrible carefully thought out the list of areas included in the oprichnina. In addition to rich trading cities and areas of salt mines, there were counties in which the family estates of the old Rostov-Suzdal nobility, the core of the Moscow boyar corporation, were located. All these fiefdoms were immediately "subscribed to the sovereign" and distributed to the estates of the guardsmen. Their owners were forcibly sent to the zemshchina. There they were ordered to give small estates somewhere on the southern or eastern borders of the country. Settlers were forbidden to take property and valuables with them. All this became the prey of the new owners - guardsmen. And the recent owners of the golden-domed towers suddenly turned into beggars.

The second goal of the oprichnina - the physical destruction of a significant part of the aristocracy - was achieved with the help of terror. By order of the tsar, the guardsmen seized objectionable people, took them to Alexandrov Sloboda (the oprichnina capital of Ivan the Terrible) and there they killed them after severe torture. Sometimes executions were also carried out in Moscow, where, next to the Kremlin, on the other side of the Neglinka River, a gloomy castle grew up - “the sovereign's oprichny courtyard”. Tsar Ivan IV experienced sadistic pleasure, looking at the torment of the unfortunate, and personally took part in torture and executions. Some historians believe that he suffered from serious mental disorders since his youth.

Fall of the Chosen One

In 1560, relations between the tsar and the Chosen Rada suddenly deteriorated. The reason for the contention was the tsar's disagreements with Alexei Adashov in the field of foreign policy, and the real reason was Ivan's long overdue desire to rule independently. He believed that peaceful methods of dealing with the big aristocracy were insufficient, that for complete control over the ruling class one should resort to the sword. However, the advisers (people, as a rule, religious and virtuous) prevented the king from giving free rein to his base instincts, his innate tendency to cruelty and arbitrariness.

As a result, the main figures of the Chosen Rada - Adashev and Sylvester - lost their posts and went into exile. Prince Kurbsky was sent as governor to Livonia. The aged Metropolitan Macarius no longer had the strength for political struggle. On December 31, 1563, he died at the age of 82.

Boyar Duma

Having got rid of his advisers, the king still could not rule with autocracy. On his way stood the Boyar Duma with its traditional authority and deep ties in all sectors of society. It was customary to coordinate all the most important decisions of the sovereign with the Boyar Duma. Having dispersed this body of power of the highest aristocracy, the tsar could well have received the most severe internal turmoil. The only way out was to bring the aristocracy to its knees.

The beginning of the oprichnina

In 1564, Ivan IV unexpectedly left Moscow with his family and went to Aleksandrovskaya Sloboda (now the city of Aleksandrov, 100 km northeast of Moscow). From here he sent a letter to the boyars, the clergy and service people, where he accused them of treason. His message was read on Red Square. An unrest began in the city. They decided to persuade the king to return. He agreed, but on the condition that "he has the right to punish anyone he considers a traitor." For these punitive purposes, the oprichnina was created with its well-armed troops.

In 1565, Ivan IV allocated himself a special possession - oprichnina, and the territory not included in the oprichnina was called zemstvo.

The whole country was divided into two parts: oprichnina and zemshchina. Each had its own government, its own Boyar Duma. The landowners were led by the boyars. In the oprichnina, all power passed to the king.

The best lands with the most developed economy were taken into the oprichnina. When the guardsmen ravaged them, the king took new rich lands for himself. Oprichnina had its own treasury, its own army, its own administration. It was a "state within a state". The zemshchina turned out to be defenseless against the robbery raids of the guardsmen, who were supported by the tsar himself. In addition, she had to pay a ruinous tax on the maintenance of the oprichnina.

guardsmen

An oprichnik was a person who was in the ranks of the oprichnina. Among the people, the guardsmen were called "kromeshniks" - the black forces of the king.

Initially, the oprichnina army was one thousand people, and by the end of the oprichnina, it had grown to six thousand. These were carefully selected nobles who had no family ties with the zemstvo, ready to fulfill any order of the sovereign. Oprichniki dressed in all dark and wore a special uniform - black hoodies with a wide belt. They rode on black horses with black harness. The oprichniki attached a broom to the saddle of their horses, and a dog's head on the horse's neck - a sign of their readiness to sweep any treason out of the state and chop off the "dog heads" of the traitorous boyars. They had the right to break into any estate, to any courtyard to a person suspected of treason from the Zemstvo, ruin his house, expel his household (or even kill him). No one knew against whom the next wrath of the king would turn.

After the liquidation of the Chosen One, the goals of Ivan IV's domestic policy generally remain the same as before. However, the methods for achieving them are already different. Carefully thought-out, consistent reforms are a thing of the past. The executioner's ax becomes the main instrument of political struggle. Frightened by the massacres, the Boyar Duma is silent, and the governments that quickly succeed each other serve as an obedient tool in the hands of an autocrat drunk with unlimited power and sometimes losing his mind.

The oprichnina destroyed the normal order of governing the country. Fear and chaos reigned everywhere. No one - not even the closest henchmen of the king - was sure of the future. Having received the estates of the exiled and disgraced boyars, the guardsmen treated them as if they were enemy territories. In a short time, the previously prosperous, populous farms turned into wastelands. The peasants fled in horror in all directions. Frightened by the repression, the aristocracy was silent.

The fate of those who tried to resist the oprichnina was hard. Metropolitan Macarius had already died by this time, and the new one had retired to a monastery. Filipp Kolychev became metropolitan instead of him (1566-1568), who sought to stop the atrocities of the guardsmen: he alone dared to publicly speak out against the oprichnina. For this, the courageous hierarch was defrocked, deposed, imprisoned in a monastery and soon strangled by guardsmen on the royal order.

Then the executions of the guardsmen themselves, who stood at its origins, began. They were replaced by "particularly distinguished". Among them, history has preserved the name of guardsman Malyuta Skuratov. It became a household name. It is still used today in the sense of cruel and senseless reprisal against the innocent.

Suspicion and fear reigned in the country. The anger of the king turned not only against the rich boyar families, but also against entire cities.

Campaigns of Ivan the Terrible

At the end of 1569, the tsar accused the city of Novgorod of treason and went on a campaign against him. The campaign of Ivan the Terrible against Novgorod in 1570 became the largest massacre of the times of the oprichnina.

Suspecting the Novgorodians of treason, the tsar carried out a terrible pogrom in the city. The destruction of the city lasted six weeks. Many service people, townspeople, priests and monks were killed or drowned in the Volkhov River. The property of the Novgorodians, as well as the values ​​of the church, were looted. The outskirts of the city are devastated.

The cities of Tver, Torzhok and the villages and villages adjoining them were also defeated. Destroyed military garrisons and residents in Narva, Ivangorod and Pskov.

Famine and plague

Simultaneously with the oprichnina, two other disasters visited the central regions of the country: a terrible three-year famine and a plague epidemic in 1569-1571. To all this, heavy duties were added, imposed on the population in connection with the endless Livonian War. As a result, in the 70s. 16th century there is a sharp reduction in the population of Moscow lands. A significant part of the people died from natural disasters and oprichnina terror, and the rest rushed to the outskirts of the country, to the impenetrable forests of the Russian North or to the southern steppes. material from the site

Traveling in Russia, the Englishman D. Fletcher noted: “It happens to see many villages and cities, completely empty, the people all scattered to other places ... So, on the way to Moscow, between Vologda and Yaroslavl, there are up to fifty villages along at least completely abandoned, so that there is not a single inhabitant in them.

While the oprichnina army was cracking down on the cities and villages of their country, the Crimean Khan Girey approached Moscow and burned it. The Russian state was completely ruined. Its population has decreased several times. The fields were abandoned. The cities are deserted.

The guardsmen looked rather creepy: they dressed in dark robes, similar to monastic cassocks, and severed dog heads dangled from the necks of their horses. Another "brand name" of the devoted servants of Ivan the Terrible were brooms, mounted on a whip. Such symbolism was not accidental: the dog's head symbolized the dog's devotion to the sovereign and the ability to properly "bite" all objectionable subjects, while the metaphorical broom was supposed to sweep away unnecessary rubbish from the hut called "Rus".

Malyuta Skuratov

"Royal Decree. Malyuta Skuratov. painting by Pavel Ryzhenko

The name of this man has become a household name: this is still often called the most inveterate villains. Malyuta Skuratov was considered the chief guardsman of Ivan the Terrible, his most faithful servant, capable of committing any atrocities to the delight of the tsar-father. The real name of the famous murderer is Grigory Lukyanovich Skuratov-Belsky. The gentle nickname "Malyuta", according to one of the versions put forward by historians, he was awarded for his short stature.

The German Heinrich Staden, who by the will of fate became one of the guardsmen of Ivan the Terrible, spoke rather unflatteringly in his memories of both the state system in general and Malyuta in particular. “This one was the first in the chicken coop,” wrote a foreigner about Skuratov.

Afanasy Vyazemsky

"Oprichniks". Painting by Nikolai Nevrev

After the tsar's conflict with Archpriest Sylvester and the devious Alexei Adashev and the fall of the authority of the Chosen One, Vyazemsky quickly gained confidence in Grozny. Athanasius became so close to Ivan IV that the latter agreed to take medicines exclusively from his hands. However, the music did not play for long: Vyazemsky soon found himself at the center of court intrigues. In 1570 he was accused of treason and tortured mercilessly. It was during the cruel executions that yesterday's oprichnik died.

Alexey and Fedor Basmanov

Ambrose Buchma and Mikhail Kuznetsov as Alexei and Fyodor Basmanov in S. Eisenstein's film "Ivan the Terrible"

For some "sovereign people" oprichnina has become a family affair. For example, Alexei Basmanov and his son Fyodor worked together for the benefit of Ivan Vasilyevich. According to the memoirs of the aforementioned Heinrich Staden, Grozny even “indulged in debauchery” with the younger Basmanov. It is not known for certain whether all the words of the German can be trusted, but the evidence remains evidence, so such testimony cannot be ignored.

The opinions of other contemporaries about the Basmanovs were also quite peculiar. For example, Andrei Kurbsky, who is considered to be one of the first Russian emigrants, called Alexei "a maniac and the destroyer of both himself and the Holy Russian land."

Vasily Gryaznoy

"Oprichnina". Painting by Orest Betekhtin

"From rags to riches" - it was on this well-known principle that Gryaznoy's career developed. According to the tsar himself, Vasily was "little that is not in the kennels" with Prince Peninsky in the provincial Aleksin. However, Gryaznoy was surprisingly lucky: the town entered the oprichny possessions of Ivan IV, and the former servant of the lowest rank was able to enter the sovereign's service. Since then, the affairs of Vasily Gryaznoy have gone uphill. He became one of Grozny's favorite guardsmen and began to commit lawlessness along with Skuratov and Vyazemsky. But Ivan Vasilievich also quickly lost interest in Gryaznoy: when the former close associate was captured, the tsar did not even begin to ransom him.

The statehood of Russia went through many difficult stages, sometimes one was worse than the other. Most historians call the years of the oprichnina the most terrible and dark period in the history of Russia. Oprichnik - is it a myth, or did he really exist? There was a terrible rumor about these sovereign servants, they said that they were not human at all, real monsters, "demons in the flesh." So what can be said about the guardsmen, who they really were and why such really scary stories are told about them?

Forced measures

The appearance of the oprichnina is preceded by a series of negative events for Moscow. The Muscovite kingdom during this period waged a bloody Livonian war. The Livonian conflict is one of the largest military companies of the 16th century in the Baltic region, which was conducted by large, influential states in those regions - the Muscovite kingdom, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the Swedish kingdom, the Danish kingdom. In January 1558, Moscow attacked Livonia. At the beginning of the company, Russian troops brought Ivan the Terrible a number of significant victories, Narva, Dorpat and many other cities and villages of the Baltic were conquered.

Under the conditions of war

For seven years, the Russian state continued a bloody and difficult war with the Livonian state. Not only Emperor Peter I dreamed of "cutting a window to Europe." Ivan the Terrible also decided to dot the “and” in the seemingly eternal problem of the Russian economy. The beginning of the military campaign was quite successful for Russia. After a crushing defeat near Ulla, the commander-in-chief of the Russian troops fled to the Lithuanians. In connection with the situation that had arisen, Ivan the Terrible introduced martial law in the country, creating a guardianship structure in the state.

Strict selection

At that time, not only the king had power in the country, large feudal lords, who were divided into eight nests - according to the kinship and allotment principle, influenced foreign and domestic policy. None of them acted for the good of their country and, naturally, they put taxes in their pockets. For one slave sometimes there were two feudal lords. Only the Yaroslavl princes at that time numbered about eighty. All these princes did not put a penny into the treasury, which made the Russian Tsar very angry. Since the country already had enough problems, and especially during the war, the king needed to solve this feudal problem. On January 3, 1565, Ivan the Terrible announced that he was abdicating the throne due to anger at the nobles. After such a shocking announcement, thousands of people gathered and went to the king to beg him to return to the throne and lead the country again. Exactly one month later, the Russian tsar announced that he would return to rule, but with the right to execute the boyars without trial or investigation, tax them, and deprive them of their property. All the rest of the state had to give the zemshchina. To all this, he added that he was introducing oprichnina into the country. In it, he identified individual boyars, clerks and servicemen. Therefore, the guardsman is a person who has certain powers and carries out orders directly from the king himself. The tsar obliged certain cities to maintain the oprichnina: Veliky Ustyug, Vologda, Suzdal, Vyazma, Kozelsk, Medyn, etc.

The essence of the oprichnina

An oprichnik is a person who took on the function of a lightning rod, deprived the power of a prince, a feudal lord in a certain region. Ivan the Terrible acted very cunningly, thus killing two birds with one stone. Deprived the arbitrariness of the nobles and distributed the remaining lands conquered in the Baltic states. The meaning of the word oprichnik is "a person who is in the position of the king in the ranks of his supporters."

Black Guards

The oprichnik is the personal guard of the tsar, in which they recruited not only mature husbands, but also boyar children, and selected nobles. The main condition under which the selection was carried out was the absence of family, blood ties with noble persons of the nobility. All that Ivan the Terrible demanded from his people was unquestioning obedience. The most important for domestic politics was the oprichnik. Its meaning was narrowly focused and somewhat reminiscent of the function of special forces in our time.

Combat encounters

Since the princes had under their command combat serfs (a detachment of warriors who guarded the interests of their master), it was not an easy task to deprive this nobleman of the land. This is where the “black horseman” appeared - the guardsman. The definition of the word we gave a little higher. His occupation, in fact, was to strengthen the unified power of the king and kill those who did not agree with this. Often they are characterized as cowardly and mean people. But not everyone was like that, among the guardsmen there were good military leaders and field commanders. There was a case: during the capture of the Livonian city, the army under the command of Prince Tyufyakin stood near the fortress and began to “argue”, the unwillingness to go on the attack and constant excuses angered the king, and he sent a guardsman there, who, having shown the royal decree, removed Tyufyakin and him from command of the army assistants, and he himself undertook to lead the fighters to storm.

Dog head and broom

Modern historians describe the personal protection of the king as follows. A man dressed all in black, with a dog's head strapped to his saddle and a broom on his back. The head symbolized that the young oprichnik would sniff out treason and sweep it away with a broom. This was not entirely true. Yes, the oprichnik was dressed in a black caftan, as they were a kind of order and dressed accordingly. As for carrion - complete nonsense, on a hot day with a severed head, you can’t really clear up. For the first time, this information came from foreigners, who, most likely, drew an analogy with the Dominican monks, this order had a dog's head, which adorned the gates of the monastery, as a symbol. Why a dog's head? The Dominicans called themselves the dogs of the Lord. They, like the guardsmen, investigated crimes (against the faith), and perhaps this was the reason for the emergence of such an analogy. And the broom wasn't exactly a broom. As a sign of their belonging to the chosen caste of the king, the guardsmen wore a woolen brush on their belt - a broom sweeping treason.

hard facts

During the oprichnina, a lot of people died, it’s definitely not possible to say how many until now. Oprichnik is a murderer, through whose fault at least 6 thousand people died. It is this figure that the historian Skrynnikov calls.

guardsmen

Those terrible years are characterized by many as a period of repression and arbitrariness. And, of course, there are the most famous guardsmen who are most remembered for their deeds.

Fyodor Basmanov is the son of the guardsman Alexei Danilovich. There was a rumor about Fedor that he was the lover of Ivan the Terrible himself, in particular, they refer to the stories of foreigners. Reflected the Tatar attack on Ryazan. In 1569 he commanded the oprichnina troops in the south of the country. Was awarded an award.

Malyuta Skuratov is an oprichnik, the main villain who got his nickname because of his small stature. He was the head of the oprichnina. He started his way from the lowest position, but, thanks to his cruelty, he reached great heights. He became famous for the fact that he liked to conduct inquiries with predilection. He was more of an assassin than an oprichnik. Killed in battle in 1573.

Athanasius Vyazemsky is another famous guardsman. He had a special status with the tsar, they even said that he was the favorite of Ivan the Terrible and enjoyed unlimited confidence. It was so strong that the tsar took the medicines prepared by Grozny's personal doctor Lensey only from the hands of Athanasius Vyazemsky. During the time of cruel repressions, Vyazemsky, together with Malyuta Skuratov, was at the head of the guardsmen. Vyazemsky ended his earthly existence during torture, accused of collusion with Russian enemies and the desire to transfer Pskov to Lithuania.

Mikhail Temryukovich Cherkassky - Prince. He came to Muscovy in 1556. Obeying the will of his father, he was baptized and became one of the specific princes. Mikhail became an oprichnik thanks to his valiant company against the Tatars and his sister Maria, who made him related to Tsar Ivan the Terrible. After some time, Prince Cherkassky acquired sufficient influence at the court of the Moscow Tsar.

Officially, Mikhail Cherkassky was mentioned among the guardsmen from September 1567. He, like all significant figures of the tsar's personal guard, actively took part in the torture of gentlemen objectionable to the monarch. In May, Cherkassky was executed allegedly for treason, and one of the popular versions says that he was even impaled.

Text: Matvey Vologzhanin
Illustrations: Vlad Lesnikov

Historians are often tempted to pursue their science in the same way that, say, biologists, physicists, or mathematicians do. They want to create coherent systems, bloated general theories, and generally classify everything into shelves and drawers. Here you have the early formation of feudalism, here you have an ideal example of a tribal community, here you have land use structures and their influence on the historical process of passionarity ...

Historians do this not out of innate malice and not because they are tired of being in the eyes of society types who can tell a cool anecdote about Madame Sorel's garters, but are no longer suitable for anything. In fact, historians have a dream. They want to study the past of mankind in such a way that it is possible to predict its future. To create such a science, with the help of which every fifth grader would know how to effectively manage countries and peoples and, in general, the entire process of human existence.

So they are striving to make history a real science, which is why more than half of serious historical works are completely impossible to read. Although the best, the greatest historians just tell cool anecdotes about Madame Sorel's garters. They are great because they know that it is impossible to calculate, predict, or direct the historical process, because it consists of a huge number of insignificant random facts that cannot be taken into account, determined and, pierced with a pin, cataloged. When great empires lose battles just because one mule in the wagon train has an upset stomach caused by a thistle bush that is too juicy, you can’t make real science out of this. Alas.

But on the other hand, no one prevents you from crawling back and forth along the timeline with a ruler and a hygrometer, periodically exclaiming: “Just look at what the establishment of the proto-parliament in Chatal Huyuk has led to!*”

* - Note Phacochoerus "a Funtik:
« In fact, in the Russian tradition, the name Çatal Hüyük is more often written as “Chatal-Hyuyuk” or “Chatal-Hyuyuk”, I don’t know for what reasons. This is one of the oldest cities in the world, which existed about 8-9 thousand years ago. Very little is known about the Chatal-Khuyuks. For example, the fact that for some reason they made a bunch of stone figurines depicting women with large breasts. The researchers believe that here we see evidence of the cult of the Mother Goddess, but I will see what these researchers say when they dig up our editorial office and find MAXIM»

Therefore, in this article we are not going to argue that if Ivan the Terrible had been strangled with a pillow in infancy, then we would now be inventing iPads for the whole world. It may very well be not. But on the other hand, we can quite scientifically insist that some scraps of the system built by this king are still alive. For example, some elements of the oprichnina are undoubtedly still with us. Unfortunately.

A few words about little Titka

If we are already talking about random factors in history, then, apparently, the amazing innate cowardice of little Titus, better known to us under the name, can also be attributed to them.

Yes, the little one has been through a lot. He was born in 1530 and lost his father at the age of three and his mother at the age of eight. The childhood of the future king passed under the endless strife of his uncles and guardians, who fought for the right to control the young grand duke. Conspiracies, executions of traitors, coups and popular riots went on in an endless series, and the fact that Titus-John managed to survive in this snake-house, and not accidentally cut himself with a knife due to childish thoughtlessness, can again be considered a historical accident.

Distrust, panic attacks and frequent bouts of sheer paranoia as a result became important traits of the royal character: for the ruler of that warlike era, he was incredibly afraid of death, pain and disease.

But still, his character cannot be explained only by a difficult childhood. People who suffered a lot in their youth often turn out to be inclined towards mercy and altruism - things for which Grozny cannot be reproached. For example, the English Elizabeth the Great, a contemporary of Grozny, saw even worse pictures in her childhood, including the view of her mother on the scaffold and her own long-term imprisonment in anticipation of a possible execution, but at the same time she did not become a bloodthirsty beast, and the rules were quite vegetarian at that time in a way that less did not prevent her from laying the foundation of the British Empire.

Terrible, in principle, was not familiar with the feeling of mercy, but until old age he was perfectly able to hide under benches if a suspicious noise was heard near the royal bedchamber.

The world for Grozny, judging by his own notes, looked something like this.

Knowing his worth perfectly well, this cowardly, superstitious and ignoble man saw the undoubted will of God in the fact that he was a Grand Duke. In his letters, he repeatedly expressed the idea that since the finger of the Lord pointed to him, then, as he is, he is what God needs him to be. Iron logic. In fact, if the higher powers could enthrone a handsome hero with a knightly disposition, but chose him, the evil Titka, urinating under himself at the sight of a bug, then why try to be better? As he was born, so he came in handy ...

Ivan the Terrible was even angry with God because he, it seems, was preparing him for the fire of hell, forcing the damned Novgorod babies to be drowned, the peasant who dared to grumble to be executed. With his hands, John's, God clears this barn. And what if he then takes it and pours demonic coals into these little hands?!

Very Terrible felt sorry for himself.

However, until the age of 35, John more or less held on. Not trusting the boyars - the highest aristocracy of Russia, he gathered around him a circle of relative like-minded people, half of whom were not very noble people (Prince Kurbsky calls this circle the Chosen Rada, since then the term has stuck).

The tsar, with these advisers, carried out reforms that later led to the creation in the country of that autocracy that appeared before us several centuries later. He takes care of the additional enslavement of the peasants, pulls power into his own hands, chop off the land from his neighbors, but behaves relatively carefully. For example, it does not openly encroach on civil liberties - on the contrary, it often promotes completely democratic norms, granting freedom and electivity to various communities to the detriment of the boyars. Heads, of course, sometimes fly, but such is the work of the king.

But the older the king became, the worse his character became. And soon yesterday’s favorites had to scatter from him in all directions of the world - from Livonia to Italy, since Grozny developed an unpleasant habit of looking for conspiracies everywhere, starting with his own closet, after which the perpetrators ate the entire spectrum of medieval investigative activities (we are not joking about the closet: due to frequent indigestion, the king suspected relatives, servants and relatives of poisoning and spoiling him). Numerous wars of the 1550s and 1560s also did not improve the mood of any of the moskovits, as we were called in the European chronicles of that era. Foreigners who came here left deadly evidence that the people swelled from hunger, dying out by whole volosts; in the troops going either to the Swedes, then to the Tatars, then to the Lithuanians, they are taken by villages from young to old and almost women, and the willingness of the Muscovites to endure everything that happens is truly amazing. After another serious defeat on the Ole River in 1564, Grozny finally decided to restore order and undertook to remake the country. First, he announced that he was abdicating the throne, confidentially telling the people, they say, let the greedy and evil sorcerers-boyars deal with you now, but I'm tired, I'm leaving.

Some part of the people, in the best traditions, howled: “They are offending the Tsar-father!” - and Grozny hurried to make a statement: so be it, since you can’t do without me, then I probably won’t recant, but now hold on, I’ll take care of you all! Such a simple PR campaign.

First of all, Grozny divided the country in half. The southern part, where there were mainly estates of the ancient aristocracy, he called "zemshchina". The northern volosts, populated mainly by free peasants, including Vologda and Galich, he declared a special, that is, oprichnina, territory. Grozny also gathered a personal guard - unborn descendants of boyar families, nobles, as well as completely rootless adventurers, both local and European.

These worthy people received the title of "guardsmen" - "specialists". Grozny calculated that since their rise and income would depend only on him, then he did not need to fear betrayal on their part. And for reliability, he did everything to pit the guardsmen against the boyars and the common population.

Laws did not apply to guardsmen, it was forbidden to judge them.

Oprichniki did not have the right to be friends, and simply talk with anyone from the Zemstvo, in order to reduce the risk of bribery and conspiracy.

Oprichniki could take any property of the Zemshchina for free. If anyone is dissatisfied - you are welcome to submit a petition to the king, if you do not feel sorry for your own skin.

First of all, Grozny sent guardsmen to slaughter and kill boyars who were especially unsympathetic to him, members of boyar families, their servants, their friends, their wives and children. By that time, the tsar had become so orthodox that he organized his office in the church of the Alexander Sloboda. Orders for arrests and executions were given here, the still breathing remnants of the punished were dragged here, if the king wanted to finally admire the traitor or work with a knife himself.

In order for the guardsman to be visible from afar, he was given special insignia: a broom, symbolizing putting things in order, and a severed dog's head, which marked the readiness to gnaw the tsar's enemies with his teeth. All this was hung on the saddles.

In order for the people to learn everything correctly, the tsar issued several appeals explaining why the servant of the tsar - the protege of God - is above any law and why a person in the state service cannot be judged by an ordinary court. Because he is in the state service!

The common people, not without pleasure, watched how the cursed boyars were slaughtered, but they were not humble enough to experience the same pleasure in the fact that guardsmen kill and rob ordinary loyal subjects. At first, they tried to repulse the young fellows who flew into the huts. But the punishment for resisting the lawful actions of a representative of power came immediately, and soon the streets of Moscow, Rostov and Yaroslavl began to look like toothless mouths - there were so many burned houses of rebellious owners, whom the guardsmen hung on their own gates with all children and households. And so that the people would not doubt that the guardsmen were acting out of bounds according to the tsar's will, Grozny himself periodically participated in small campaigns against villages and cities.

The most detailed surviving description of oprichnina life comes from the pen of the German adventurer Heinrich Staden, a native of Münster. He came to the Muscovite state from Lithuania, as he had, in his words, "the unfortunate habit of getting involved in enterprises that promised not so much a benefit to the wallet as a rope to the neck." Learning that leaving the Muscovite state, if you already got here, is impossible, since anyone trying to cross the border will be immediately executed, Henry became discouraged, but soon met fellow countrymen who tempted him to join the ranks of the guardsmen, which “it’s not difficult to do, since the king is much believes less in his fellow tribesmen than in foreigners.

Having added to his rank and generosity, since this required only his own oral confirmation, Henry went to the royal court, where he was immediately hired. He was generously endowed with money, soon several estates with peasants were also easily given out, and Staden's life went very well.

“Then the Grand Duke went to plunder his own people, his land and cities. And I was with the Grand Duke with one horse and two servants. All cities and roads were occupied by outposts, and therefore I could not pass with my servants and horses. When I returned to my estate with 49 horses, 22 of them were harnessed to a sleigh loaded with all sorts of good things - I sent all this to my Moscow yard.

“When the Grand Duke left for Pskov, merchants from the city of Kholmogory came running to me. They had a lot of sables - they were afraid that the guardsmen would take away their goods at the outposts. They asked to buy these sables and give them at least some money. I could take these sables from them and not pay them at all, but I didn’t need the sables, since a lot of them were sent to me by a person who collects tribute from Samoyeds with sables. I did nothing to the merchants and let them go.”

“Here I began to take all kinds of servants to me, especially those who were naked and barefoot; dressed them. They liked it. And then I started my own campaigns and led my people back inland along another road. For this, my people remained loyal to me. Whenever they took someone in full, they asked with honor where - in monasteries, churches or farmsteads - one could take money and goods, and especially good horses. If the prisoner did not want to respond kindly, then they tortured him until he confessed. So they got me money and good.

“One day we approached a church in one place. My people rushed in and started robbing, taking away icons and similar nonsense. And it was not far from the court of one of the zemstvo princes, and the zemstvos gathered there about three hundred armed men. These three hundred men were chasing six horsemen. At that time, I was the only one in the saddle, and, not knowing whether those six people were zemstvo or oprichnina, I began to call my people from the church to the horses. But then the true state of affairs became clear: those six were guardsmen, who were persecuted by the zemstvos. They asked me for help, and I set off on the zemstvos. When they saw that so many people had moved out of the church, they turned back to the courtyard. I immediately killed one of them with one shot on the spot, broke through their crowd and slipped through the gate. Stones rained down on us from the windows of the women's quarters. Calling my servant Teshata with me, I quickly ran up the stairs with an ax in my hand. Upstairs I was met by the princess, who wanted to throw herself at my feet. But, frightened by my menacing appearance, she rushed back to the ward. I drove an ax into her back, and she fell on the threshold. And I stepped over the corpse and met their girl's. Then we drove all night and came to a large unprotected tenement. I didn't offend anyone here. I rested."

However, Staden eventually had to flee from these heavenly places. And he succeeded. He got to Germany, managed to live there to a respectable age and even die not on the gallows. The Crimean Khan Devlet-Girey, who in 1571 decided to plunder Moscow, saved our ancestors from the “special” power.

Grozny took the news of the Tatar invasion calmly. The tsar knew perfectly well what his brave guardsmen were capable of, with the help of which he had just pacified the rebellious Novgorod - then the sovereign's servants massacred more than six thousand people in a day, including women and babies, and did not even sweat. Grozny believed in his guardsmen. To their reliable head - the valiant Malyuta Skuratov, who just severely punished all the rioters in Moscow. Two hundred people were executed at the Execution Ground at the same time: they were chopped with axes, hanged, burned, skinned. The cry was for all of Moscow ... What will the feeble Tatars do to such brave dogs? The brave dogs, however, had a different opinion. Hearing that a Tatar army of forty thousand people was marching on Moscow, the guardsmen suddenly remembered that they had an awful lot of important things to do in their northern oprichnina estates. By the time Devlet-Giray approached Moscow, there were no more than five hundred guardsmen left there. (To the credit of Heinrich Staden, we mention that he and his people just made an attempt to attack the approaching Tatars. True, this ended in the loss of the entire detachment, while Heinrich himself was saved by a fall from a horse into the river at the time of the attack.)

Boyar Mikhail Vorotynsky, the founder of Voronezh, managed to take the fight in time. His army, albeit not numerous, drove off the Tatars, who had already managed to set fire to and plunder the Moscow suburbs. The Tatars at that moment were more concerned about the safety of the booty, especially 60 thousand Russian slaves and slaves, whom they drove in front of them for sale. Therefore, they preferred to retreat slowly, evading an attack on Vorotynsky, but in readiness to repulse him if he attacks. He did not dare to attack, but the deed was done: Devlet-Giray was not allowed into Moscow. (As a reward for this, in a couple of years the tsar would personally pull out Vorotynsky’s beard and cover his body on the torture table with red-hot coals. According to Kurbsky, this is how the savior of Moscow died, suspected by the paranoid tsar of yet another conspiracy.)

Oddly enough, the tsar reacted quite calmly to the betrayal of the guardsmen. True, the word “oprichnina” itself was forbidden to be pronounced, punishment with a whip was supposed for this, but most of the guardsmen were not punished (the same Malyuta Skuratov still enjoyed royal favor), and many of them simply quietly dispersed to the estates granted to them and began , thus, the main ancestors of the Russian petty nobility.

“Everything they did,” wrote Heinrich Staden, “was with the approval of the tsar. They did evil deeds not against the sovereign power, but against the people, and for that they are not punished in Muscovy.

And for a very long time in Russia, persons in power will be above the law, which ceases to operate when it comes to the offenses of "sovereign people."