From the coronation of Ivan the Terrible in 1547 through the conquest of the Volga and Siberia, the Time of Troubles, the rise of the Romanovs, the binding of the serfs and the schism of the Church, to Peter the Great's victory over Sweden and the proclamation of the Russian Empire in 1721. Slide across the years to read the major events that turned Muscovy into a great European power.
In the Dormition Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin, the sixteen-year-old grand prince Ivan IV is crowned tsar, the first ruler of Moscow to take the imperial title formally.
From the coronation of Ivan the Terrible in 1547 through the conquest of the Volga and Siberia, the Time of Troubles, the rise of the Romanovs, the binding of the serfs and the schism of the Church, to Peter the Great's victory over Sweden and the proclamation of the Russian Empire in 1721. Slide across the years to read the major events that turned Muscovy into a great European power.
In the Dormition Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin, the sixteen-year-old grand prince Ivan IV is crowned tsar, the first ruler of Moscow to take the imperial title formally.
Ivan IV summons the first 'Assembly of the Land', bringing together clergy, boyars, and servitors to support a program of reform under the so-called Chosen Council.
Ivan IV's armies storm Kazan, destroying the Tatar khanate on the middle Volga and opening the river to Russian control.
Moscow takes Astrakhan at the mouth of the Volga, gaining control of the entire river and access to the Caspian Sea.
Ivan divides the realm and creates the oprichnina, a personal domain policed by black-clad oprichniki who terrorize the boyar aristocracy.
An army of the Crimean Khanate under Devlet Giray storms and burns Moscow, exposing the strain of Ivan's wars and the weakness of the oprichnina system.
The Cossack ataman Yermak Timofeyevich, in the service of the Stroganov merchants, defeats the Khanate of Sibir and begins Russia's expansion across the Urals.
Ivan IV dies, leaving the throne to his weak and pious son Feodor I, with real power held by the regent Boris Godunov.
With the consent of the Eastern patriarchs, the metropolitan of Moscow, Job, is raised to patriarch, giving the Russian Church its own independent head.
The death of the childless Feodor I extinguishes the ancient dynasty of Rurik, and a Zemsky Sobor elects the regent Boris Godunov as tsar.
A catastrophic famine, caused by ruined harvests after a global cooling event, kills perhaps a third of the population and shatters confidence in Boris Godunov's rule.
After Boris Godunov's sudden death, a pretender claiming to be the murdered Tsarevich Dmitry, backed by Polish-Lithuanian magnates, enters Moscow and is crowned tsar.
Amid the collapse of central authority, Polish-Lithuanian troops occupy the Moscow Kremlin and the boyars offer the throne to the Polish prince Władysław.
A volunteer army raised in Nizhny Novgorod by the merchant Kuzma Minin and Prince Dmitry Pozharsky drives the Polish garrison from the Kremlin.
A great Zemsky Sobor elects the sixteen-year-old Michael Romanov as tsar, founding the dynasty that would rule Russia until 1917.
Under Tsar Alexis, a comprehensive law code abolishes the time limit on recovering fugitive peasants, binding serfs permanently to the land and their masters.
Patriarch Nikon revises liturgical books and rituals to match Greek practice, provoking fierce resistance from traditionalists led by the archpriest Avvakum.
The Cossack hetman Bohdan Khmelnytsky places the Zaporozhian Host under the protection of the tsar, drawing Russia into war with Poland-Lithuania.
The Thirteen Years' War with Poland-Lithuania ends with Russia gaining Smolensk and left-bank Ukraine, including the city of Kyiv.
The Don Cossack Stenka Razin leads a vast rebellion of Cossacks, peasants, and frontier peoples along the Volga against the nobility and the state.
After a bloody streltsy revolt, the boy Peter and his sickly half-brother Ivan V are proclaimed joint tsars, with their sister Sophia ruling as regent.
The seventeen-year-old Peter outmaneuvers his half-sister Sophia, confines her to a convent, and takes real power into his own hands.
On his second campaign, Peter takes the Ottoman fortress of Azov with the help of a newly built river fleet, gaining an outlet to the southern seas.
Peter launches the Great Northern War against Sweden but suffers a crushing defeat at Narva, where Charles XII routs a much larger Russian army.
On marshland newly seized from Sweden at the mouth of the Neva, Peter founds Saint Petersburg, his 'window to the West'.
Peter's reformed army decisively defeats Charles XII of Sweden at Poltava in Ukraine, breaking Swedish military power.
The Treaty of Nystad ends the Great Northern War with victory over Sweden, and the Senate proclaims Peter 'Emperor of All Russia', founding the Russian Empire.