Romanov family tree with years of reign. Romanovs

On Ivan IV the Terrible (†1584) The Rurik dynasty in Russia was interrupted. After his death it began Time of Troubles.

The result of the 50-year reign of Ivan the Terrible was sad. Endless wars, oprichnina, and mass executions led to unprecedented economic decline. By the 1580s, a huge part of the previously prosperous lands had become deserted: abandoned villages and villages stood all over the country, arable land was overgrown with forest and weeds. As a result of the protracted Livonian War, the country lost part of its western lands. Noble and influential aristocratic clans strove for power and waged an irreconcilable struggle among themselves. A heavy inheritance fell on the lot of the successor of Tsar Ivan IV - his son Fyodor Ivanovich and guardian Boris Godunov. (Ivan the Terrible had one more son-heir - Tsarevich Dmitry Uglichsky, who was 2 years old at that time).

Boris Godunov (1584-1605)

After the death of Ivan the Terrible, his son ascended the throne Fedor Ioannovich . The new king was unable to rule the country (according to some reports he was weak in health and mind) and was under the tutelage first of the council of boyars, then of his brother-in-law Boris Godunov. A stubborn struggle between the boyar groups of the Godunovs, Romanovs, Shuiskys, and Mstislavskys began at court. But a year later, as a result of the “undercover struggle,” Boris Godunov cleared the way for himself from his rivals (some were accused of treason and exiled, some were forcibly tonsured as monks, some “died into another world” in time). Those. The boyar became the de facto ruler of the state. During the reign of Fyodor Ivanovich, the position of Boris Godunov became so significant that overseas diplomats sought an audience with Boris Godunov, his will was the law. Fedor reigned, Boris ruled - everyone knew this both in Rus' and abroad.

S. V. Ivanov. "Boyar Duma"

After the death of Fedor (January 7, 1598), a new tsar was elected at the Zemsky Sobor - Boris Godunov (thus, he became the first Russian Tsar to receive the throne not by inheritance, but by election at the Zemsky Sobor).

(1552 - April 13, 1605) - after the death of Ivan the Terrible, he became the de facto ruler of the state as the guardian of Fyodor Ioannovich, and since 1598 - Russian Tsar .

Under Ivan the Terrible, Boris Godunov was first a guardsman. In 1571 he married the daughter of Malyuta Skuratov. And after the marriage of his sister Irina in 1575 (the only "Tsarina Irina" on the Russian throne) On the son of Ivan the Terrible, Tsarevich Fyodor Ioannovich, he became a close person to the Tsar.

After the death of Ivan the Terrible, the royal throne first went to his son Fedor (under the guardianship of Godunov), and after his death - to Boris Godunov himself.

He died in 1605 at the age of 53, at the height of the war with False Dmitry I, who had moved to Moscow. After his death, Boris’s son, Fedor, an educated and extremely intelligent young man, became king. But as a result of the rebellion in Moscow, provoked by False Dmitry, Tsar Fedor and his mother Maria Godunova were brutally killed.(The rebels left only Boris’s daughter, Ksenia, alive. She faced the bleak fate of the impostor’s concubine.)

Boris Godunov was pburied in the Archangel Cathedral of the Kremlin. Under Tsar Vasily Shuisky, the remains of Boris, his wife and son were transferred to the Trinity-Sergius Lavra and buried in a sitting position at the northwestern corner of the Assumption Cathedral. Ksenia was buried there in 1622, and Olga was buried in monasticism. In 1782, a tomb was built over their tombs.

The activities of Godunov's reign are assessed positively by historians. Under him, the comprehensive strengthening of statehood began. Thanks to his efforts, he was elected in 1589 first Russian patriarch which he became Moscow Metropolitan Job. The establishment of the patriarchate testified to the increased prestige of Russia.

Patriarch Job (1589-1605)

An unprecedented construction of cities and fortifications began. To ensure the safety of the waterway from Kazan to Astrakhan, cities were built on the Volga - Samara (1586), Tsaritsyn (1589) (future Volgograd), Saratov (1590).

In foreign policy, Godunov proved himself to be a talented diplomat - Russia regained all the lands transferred to Sweden following the unsuccessful Livonian War (1558-1583).Russia's rapprochement with the West has begun. There was never before in Rus' a sovereign who was so favorable to foreigners as Godunov. He began to invite foreigners to serve. For foreign trade, the government created the most favored nation regime. At the same time, strictly protecting Russian interests. Under Godunov, nobles began to be sent to the West to study. True, none of those who left brought any benefit to Russia: having studied, none of them wanted to return to their homeland.Tsar Boris himself really wanted to strengthen his ties with the West by becoming related to the European dynasty, and made a lot of efforts to profitably marry off his daughter Ksenia.

Having started successfully, the reign of Boris Godunov ended sadly. A series of boyar conspiracies (many boyars harbored hostility towards the “upstart”) gave rise to despondency, and soon a real catastrophe broke out. The silent opposition that accompanied Boris's reign from beginning to end was no secret to him. There is evidence that the tsar directly accused the close boyars of the fact that the appearance of the impostor False Dmitry I could not have happened without their assistance. The urban population was also in opposition to the authorities, dissatisfied with the heavy exactions and arbitrariness of local officials. And the rumors circulating about Boris Godunov’s involvement in the murder of the heir to the throne, Tsarevich Dmitry Ioannovich, “heated up” the situation even more. Thus, hatred of Godunov by the end of his reign was universal.

Troubles (1598-1613)

Famine (1601 - 1603)

IN 1601-1603 erupted in the country catastrophic famine , which lasted 3 years. The price of bread increased 100 times. Boris prohibited the sale of bread above a certain limit, even resorting to persecution of those who inflated prices, but did not achieve success. In an effort to help the hungry, he spared no expense, widely distributing money to the poor. But bread became more expensive, and money lost value. Boris ordered the royal barns to be opened for the hungry. However, even their reserves were not enough for all the hungry, especially since, having learned about the distribution, people from all over the country flocked to Moscow, abandoning the meager supplies that they still had at home. In Moscow alone, 127,000 people died of hunger, and not everyone had time to bury them. Cases of cannibalism appeared. People began to think that this was God's punishment. The conviction arose that Boris's reign was not blessed by God, because it was lawless, achieved through untruth. Therefore, it cannot end well.

A sharp deterioration in the situation of all segments of the population led to mass unrest under the slogan of overthrowing Tsar Boris Godunov and transferring the throne to the “legitimate” sovereign. The stage was ready for the appearance of an impostor.

False Dmitry I (1 (11) June 1605 - 17 (27) May 1606)

Rumors began to circulate throughout the country that the “born sovereign,” Tsarevich Dmitry, miraculously escaped and was alive.

Tsarevich Dmitry (†1591) , the son of Ivan the Terrible from the Tsar’s last wife, Maria Feodorovna Nagaya (monastically Martha), died under circumstances that have not yet been clarified - from a knife wound to the throat.

Death of Tsarevich Dmitry (Uglichsky)

Little Dmitry suffered from mental disorders, more than once fell into causeless anger, threw his fists even at his mother, and suffered from epilepsy. All this, however, did not negate the fact that he was a prince and after the death of Fyodor Ioannovich (†1598) he had to ascend to his father’s throne. Dmitry posed a real threat to many: the boyar nobility had suffered enough from Ivan the Terrible, so they watched the violent heir with alarm. But most of all, the prince was dangerous, of course, to those forces that relied on Godunov. That is why, when news of his strange death came from Uglich, where 8-year-old Dmitry was sent with his mother, popular rumor immediately, without any doubt that it was right, pointed to Boris Godunov as the mastermind of the crime. The official conclusion that the prince killed himself: while playing with a knife, he allegedly had an epileptic fit, and in convulsions he stabbed himself in the throat, few people were convinced.

The death of Dmitry in Uglich and the subsequent death of the childless Tsar Fyodor Ioannovich led to a crisis of power.

It was not possible to put an end to the rumors, and Godunov tried to do this by force. The more actively the king fought against people’s rumors, the wider and louder it became.

In 1601, a man appeared on the scene posing as Tsarevich Dmitry, and went down in history under the name False Dmitry I . He, the only one of all Russian impostors, managed to seize the throne for a while.

- an impostor who pretended to be the miraculously saved youngest son of Ivan IV the Terrible - Tsarevich Dmitry. The first of three impostors who called themselves the son of Ivan the Terrible and claimed the Russian throne (False Dmitry II and False Dmitry III). From June 1 (11), 1605 to May 17 (27), 1606 - Tsar of Russia.

According to the most common version, False Dmitry is someone Grigory Otrepiev , fugitive monk of the Chudov Monastery (which is why the people received the nickname Rasstriga - deprived of clergy, i.e. the degree of priesthood). Before becoming a monk, he served in the service of Mikhail Nikitich Romanov (brother of Patriarch Filaret and uncle of the first tsar of the Romanov family, Mikhail Fedorovich). After the persecution of the Romanov family by Boris Godunov began in 1600, he fled to the Zheleznoborkovsky Monastery (Kostroma) and became a monk. But soon he moved to the Euthymius Monastery in the city of Suzdal, and then to the Moscow Miracle Monastery (in the Moscow Kremlin). There he quickly becomes a “deacon of the cross”: he is engaged in copying books and is present as a scribe in the “sovereign Duma”. ABOUTTrepiev becomes quite familiar with Patriarch Job and many of the Duma boyars. However, the life of a monk did not attract him. Around 1601, he fled to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania), where he declared himself a “miraculously saved prince.” Further, his traces are lost in Poland until 1603.

Otrepyev in Poland declares himself Tsarevich Dmitry

According to some sources, Otrepievconverted to Catholicism and proclaimed himself prince. Although the impostor treated questions of faith lightly, being indifferent to both Orthodox and Catholic traditions. There in Poland, Otrepiev saw and fell in love with the beautiful and proud lady Marina Mnishek.

Poland actively supported the impostor. In exchange for support, False Dmitry promised, after ascending the throne, to return half of the Smolensk land to the Polish crown along with the city of Smolensk and the Chernigov-Seversk land, to support the Catholic faith in Russia - in particular, to open churches and allow Jesuits into Muscovy, to support the Polish king Sigismund III in his claims to the Swedish crown and promote rapprochement - and ultimately, merger - between Russia and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. At the same time, False Dmitry turns to the Pope with a letter promising favor and help.

Oath of False Dmitry I to the Polish King Sigismund III for the introduction of Catholicism in Russia

After a private audience in Krakow with the King of Poland, Sigismund III, False Dmitry began to form a detachment for a campaign against Moscow. According to some reports, he managed to gather more than 15,000 people.

On October 16, 1604, False Dmitry I with detachments of Poles and Cossacks moved towards Moscow. When the news of the attack of False Dmitry reached Moscow, the boyar elite, dissatisfied with Godunov, was willingly ready to recognize a new contender for the throne. Even the curses of the Moscow Patriarch did not cool the people’s enthusiasm on the path of “Tsarevich Dmitry.”

The success of False Dmitry I was caused not so much by the military factor as by the unpopularity of the Russian Tsar Boris Godunov. Ordinary Russian warriors were reluctant to fight against someone who, in their opinion, could be the “true” prince; some governors even said out loud that it was “not right” to fight against the true sovereign.

On April 13, 1605, Boris Godunov died unexpectedly. The boyars swore allegiance to the kingdom to his son Fedor, but on June 1 there was an uprising in Moscow, and Fedor Borisovich Godunov was overthrown. And on June 10, he and his mother were killed. The people wanted to see the “God-given” Dmitry as king.

Convinced of the support of the nobles and the people, on June 20, 1605, to the festive ringing of bells and the welcoming cries of the crowds crowded on both sides of the road, False Dmitry I solemnly entered the Kremlin. The new king was accompanied by the Poles. On July 18, False Dmitry was recognized by Tsarina Maria, the wife of Ivan the Terrible and the mother of Tsarevich Dmitry. On July 30, False Dmitry was crowned king by the new Patriarch Ignatius.

For the first time in Russian history, Western foreigners came to Moscow not by invitation and not as dependent people, but as the main characters. The impostor brought with him a huge retinue that occupied the entire city center. For the first time, Moscow was filled with Catholics; for the first time, the Moscow court began to live not according to Russian, but according to Western, or more precisely, Polish laws. For the first time, foreigners began to push Russians around as if they were their slaves, demonstratively showing them that they were second-class citizens.The history of the Poles' stay in Moscow is full of bullying by uninvited guests against the owners of the house.

False Dmitry removed obstacles to leaving the state and moving within it. The British, who were in Moscow at that time, noted that no European state had ever known such freedom. In most of his actions, some modern historians recognize False Dmitry as an innovator who sought to Europeanize the state. At the same time, he began to look for allies in the West, especially the Pope and the Polish king; the proposed alliance was also supposed to include the German emperor, the French king and the Venetians.

One of the weaknesses of False Dmitry was women, including the wives and daughters of boyars, who actually became the tsar’s free or involuntary concubines. Among them was even the daughter of Boris Godunov, Ksenia, whom, because of her beauty, the impostor spared during the extermination of the Godunov family, and then kept with him for several months. In May 1606, False Dmitry married the daughter of a Polish governor Marina Mnishek , who was crowned as a Russian queen without observing Orthodox rites. The new queen reigned in Moscow for exactly a week.

At the same time, a dual situation arose: on the one hand, the people loved False Dmitry, and on the other, they suspected him of being an impostor. In the winter of 1605, the Chudov monk was captured, publicly declaring that Grishka Otrepyev was sitting on the throne, whom “he himself taught to read and write.” The monk was tortured, but without achieving anything, he was drowned in the Moscow River along with several of his comrades.

Almost from the first day, a wave of discontent swept through the capital due to the tsar’s failure to observe church fasts and violation of Russian customs in clothing and life, his disposition towards foreigners, his promise to marry a Polish woman and the planned war with Turkey and Sweden. At the head of the dissatisfied were Vasily Shuisky, Vasily Golitsyn, Prince Kurakin and the most conservative representatives of the clergy - Kazan Metropolitan Hermogenes and Kolomna Bishop Joseph.

What irritated the people was that the tsar, the more clearly he mocked Muscovite prejudices, dressed in foreign clothes and seemed to deliberately tease the boyars, ordering them to serve veal, which the Russians did not eat.

Vasily Shuisky (1606-1610)

17 May 1606 as a result of a coup led by Shuisky's people False Dmitry was killed . The mutilated corpse was thrown onto the Execution Ground, with a buffoonish cap put on its head and bagpipes placed on its chest. Subsequently, the body was burned, and the ashes were loaded into a cannon and fired from it towards Poland.

1 9 May 1606 Vasily Shuisky became king (was crowned by Metropolitan Isidore of Novgorod in the Assumption Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin as Tsar Vasily IV on June 1, 1606). Such an election was illegal, but this did not bother any of the boyars.

Vasily Ivanovich Shuisky , from the family of Suzdal princes Shuisky, who descended from Alexander Nevsky, was born in 1552. Since 1584 he was a boyar and head of the Moscow Court Chamber.

In 1587 he led the opposition to Boris Godunov. As a result, he fell into disgrace, but managed to regain the king’s favor and was forgiven.

After the death of Godunov, Vasily Shuisky tried to carry out a coup, but was arrested and exiled along with his brothers. But False Dmitry needed boyar support, and at the end of 1605 the Shuiskys returned to Moscow.

After the murder of False Dmitry I, organized by Vasily Shuisky, the boyars and the crowd bribed by them, gathered on Red Square in Moscow, elected Shuisky to the throne on May 19, 1606.

However, 4 years later, in the summer of 1610, the same boyars and nobles overthrew him from the throne and forced him and his wife to become monks. In September 1610, the former “boyar” tsar was handed over to the Polish hetman (commander-in-chief) Zholkiewski, who took Shuiski to Poland. In Warsaw, the Tsar and his brothers were presented as prisoners to King Sigismund III.

Vasily Shuisky died on September 12, 1612, in custody in Gostyninsky Castle, in Poland, 130 versts from Warsaw. In 1635, at the request of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich, the remains of Vasily Shuisky were returned by the Poles to Russia. Vasily was buried in the Archangel Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin.

With the accession of Vasily Shuisky to the throne, the Troubles did not end, but entered an even more complex phase. Tsar Vasily was not popular among the people. The legitimacy of the new king was not recognized by a significant number of the population, who were awaiting the new coming of the “true king.” Unlike False Dmitry, Shuisky could not pretend to be a descendant of the Ruriks and appeal to the hereditary right to the throne. Unlike Godunov, the conspirator was not legally elected by the council, which means he could not, like Tsar Boris, claim the legitimacy of his power. He relied only on a narrow circle of supporters and could not resist the elements that were already raging in the country.

In August 1607 a new contender for the throne has appeared, reanimated” by the same Poland -.

This second impostor received the nickname in Russian history Tushino thief . In his army there were up to 20 thousand multilingual rabble. This whole mass scoured the Russian soil and behaved as occupiers usually behave, that is, they robbed, killed and raped. In the summer of 1608, False Dmitry II approached Moscow and camped near its walls in the village of Tushino. Tsar Vasily Shuisky and his government were locked up in Moscow; An alternative capital with its own government hierarchy arose under its walls.

The Polish governor Mniszek and his daughter soon arrived at the camp. Oddly enough, Marina Mnishek “recognized” her ex-fiancé in the impostor and secretly married False Dmitry II.

False Dmitry II actually ruled Russia - he distributed land to nobles, considered complaints, and met foreign ambassadors.By the end of 1608, a significant part of Russia came under the rule of the Tushins, and Shuisky no longer controlled the regions of the country. The Moscow state seemed to cease to exist forever.

In September 1608 began siege of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery , and inFamine struck besieged Moscow. Trying to save the situation, Vasily Shuisky decided to call on mercenaries for help and turned to the Swedes.

Siege of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra by the troops of False Dmitry II and the Polish hetman Jan Sapieha

In December 1609, due to the advance of a 15,000-strong Swedish army and the betrayal of Polish military leaders who began to swear allegiance to King Sigismund III, False Dmitry II was forced to flee from Tushin to Kaluga, where a year later he was killed.

Interregnum (1610-1613)

Russia's situation worsened day by day. The Russian land was torn apart by civil strife, the Swedes threatened war in the north, the Tatars constantly rebelled in the south, and the Poles threatened from the west. During the Time of Troubles, the Russian people tried anarchy, military dictatorship, thieves' law, tried to introduce a constitutional monarchy, and offer the throne to foreigners. But nothing helped. At that time, many Russians agreed to recognize any sovereign, if only there would finally be peace in the tormented country.

In England, in turn, the project of an English protectorate over all Russian land not yet occupied by the Poles and Swedes was seriously considered. According to the documents, King James I of England “was carried away by the plan to send an army to Russia to govern it through his delegate.”

However, on July 27, 1610, as a result of a boyar conspiracy, Russian Tsar Vasily Shuisky was removed from the throne. A period of rule has begun in Russia "Seven Boyars" .

"Seven Boyars" - a “temporary” boyar government formed in Russia after the overthrow of Tsar Vasily Shuisky (died in Polish captivity) in July 1610 and formally existed until the election of Tsar Mikhail Romanov to the throne.

Consisted of 7 members of the Boyar Duma - princes F.I. Mstislavsky, I.M. Vorotynsky, A.V. Trubetskoy, A.V. Golitsyna, B.M. Lykov-Obolensky, I.N. Romanov (uncle of the future Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich and younger brother of the future Patriarch Filaret) and F.I.Sheremetyev. The prince, boyar, governor, and influential member of the Boyar Duma, Fyodor Ivanovich Mstislavsky, was elected head of the Seven Boyars.

One of the tasks of the new government was to prepare for the election of a new king. However, “military conditions” required immediate decisions.
In the west of Moscow, in the immediate vicinity of Poklonnaya Hill near the village of Dorogomilov, the army of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, led by Hetman Zholkiewski, stood up, and in the southeast, in Kolomenskoye, False Dmitry II, with whom was the Lithuanian detachment of Sapieha. The boyars were especially afraid of False Dmitry because he had many supporters in Moscow and was at least more popular than them. In order to avoid the struggle of boyar clans for power, it was decided not to elect representatives of Russian clans as tsar.

As a result, the so-called “Semibyarshchina” entered into an agreement with the Poles on the election of the 15-year-old Polish prince Vladislav IV to the Russian throne (son of Sigismund III) on the terms of his conversion to Orthodoxy.

Fearing False Dmitry II, the boyars went even further and on the night of September 21, 1610 secretly allowed the Polish troops of Hetman Zholkiewski into the Kremlin (in Russian history this fact is considered an act of national treason).

Thus, real power in the capital and beyond was concentrated in the hands of the governor, Władysław Pan Gonsiewski, and the military leaders of the Polish garrison.

Disregarding the Russian government, they generously distributed lands to supporters of Poland, confiscating them from those who remained loyal to the country.

Meanwhile, King Sigismund III had no intention of letting his son Vladislav go to Moscow, especially since he did not want to allow him to convert to Orthodoxy. Sigismund himself dreamed of taking the Moscow throne and becoming king of Muscovite Rus'. Taking advantage of the chaos, the Polish king conquered the western and southeastern regions of the Moscow state and began to consider himself the sovereign of all Rus'.

This changed the attitude of the members of the government of the Seven Boyars themselves towards the Poles they called. Taking advantage of the growing discontent, Patriarch Hermogenes began sending letters to the cities of Russia, calling for resistance to the new government. For this he was taken into custody and subsequently executed. All this served as a signal for the unification of almost all Russians with the goal of expelling the Polish invaders from Moscow and electing a new Russian Tsar not only by the boyars and princes, but “by the will of the whole earth.”

People's militia of Dmitry Pozharsky (1611-1612)

Seeing the atrocities of foreigners, the robbery of churches, monasteries and the episcopal treasury, the residents began to fight for the faith, for their spiritual salvation. The siege of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery by Sapieha and Lisovsky and its defense played a huge role in strengthening patriotism.

Defense of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, which lasted almost 16 months - from September 23, 1608 to January 12, 1610

The patriotic movement under the slogan of electing the “original” sovereign led to the formation in the Ryazan cities First Militia (1611) who began the liberation of the country. In October 1612, troops Second Militia (1611-1612) Led by Prince Dmitry Pozharsky and Kuzma Minin, they liberated the capital, forcing the Polish garrison to surrender.

After the expulsion of the Poles from Moscow, thanks to the feat of the Second People's Militia led by Minin and Pozharsky, the country was ruled for several months by a provisional government led by princes Dmitry Pozharsky and Dmitry Trubetskoy.

At the very end of December 1612, Pozharsky and Trubetskoy sent letters to the cities in which they summoned the best and most intelligent elected people from all cities and from every rank to Moscow, “for the zemstvo council and for state election.” These elected people were to elect a new king in Rus'. The Zemsky Militia Government (“Council of the Whole Land”) began preparations for the Zemsky Sobor.

Zemsky Sobor of 1613 and the election of a new tsar

Before the start of the Zemsky Sobor, a 3-day strict fast was announced everywhere. Many prayer services were held in churches so that God would enlighten the elected people, and the matter of election to the kingdom would be accomplished not by human desire, but by the will of God.

On January 6 (19), 1613, the Zemsky Sobor began in Moscow , at which the issue of electing a Russian Tsar was decided. This was the first indisputably all-class Zemsky Sobor with the participation of townspeople and even rural representatives. All segments of the population were represented, with the exception of slaves and serfs. The number of “council people” gathered in Moscow exceeded 800 people, representing at least 58 cities.

The conciliar meetings took place in an atmosphere of fierce rivalry between various political groups that had taken shape in Russian society during the ten-year Troubles and sought to strengthen their position by electing their contender to the royal throne. The Council participants nominated more than ten candidates for the throne.

At first, the Polish prince Vladislav and the Swedish prince Karl Philip were named as contenders for the throne. However, these candidates met with opposition from the vast majority of the Council. The Zemsky Sobor annulled the decision of the Seven Boyars to elect Prince Vladislav to the Russian throne and decreed: “Foreign princes and Tatar princes should not be invited to the Russian throne.”

Candidates from old princely families also did not receive support. Various sources name Fyodor Mstislavsky, Ivan Vorotynsky, Fyodor Sheremetev, Dmitry Trubetskoy, Dmitry Mamstrukovich and Ivan Borisovich Cherkassky, Ivan Golitsyn, Ivan Nikitich and Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov and Pyotr Pronsky among the candidates. Dmitry Pozharsky was also proposed as king. But he decisively rejected his candidacy and was one of the first to point out the ancient family of Romanov boyars. Pozharsky said: “According to the nobility of the family, and the amount of services to the fatherland, Metropolitan Filaret from the Romanov family would have been suitable for king. But this good servant of God is now in Polish captivity and cannot become king. But he has a sixteen-year-old son, and he, by the right of the antiquity of his family and by the right of his pious upbringing by his nun mother, should become king.”(In the world, Metropolitan Filaret was a boyar - Fyodor Nikitich Romanov. Boris Godunov forced him to become a monk, fearing that he might displace Godunov and sit on the royal throne.)

Moscow nobles, supported by the townspeople, proposed to elevate 16-year-old Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov, the son of Patriarch Filaret, to the throne. According to a number of historians, the decisive role in the election of Mikhail Romanov to the kingdom was played by the Cossacks, who during this period became an influential social force. A movement arose among service people and Cossacks, the center of which was the Moscow courtyard of the Trinity-Sergius Monastery, and its active inspirer was the cellarer of this monastery, Avraamy Palitsyn, a very influential person among both the militias and Muscovites. At meetings with the participation of cellarer Abraham, it was decided to proclaim Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov Yuryev, the son of Rostov Metropolitan Filaret captured by the Poles, as Tsar.The main argument of Mikhail Romanov’s supporters was that, unlike elected tsars, he was elected not by people, but by God, since he comes from a noble royal root. Not kinship with Rurik, but closeness and kinship with the dynasty of Ivan IV gave the right to occupy his throne. Many boyars joined the Romanov party, and he was also supported by the highest Orthodox clergy - Consecrated Cathedral.

On February 21 (March 3), 1613, the Zemsky Sobor elected Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov to the kingdom, laying the foundation for a new dynasty.

In 1613, the Zemsky Sobor swore allegiance to 16-year-old Mikhail Fedorovich

Letters were sent to the cities and districts of the country with the news of the election of a king and the oath of allegiance to the new dynasty.

On March 13, 1613, the ambassadors of the Council arrived in Kostroma. At the Ipatiev Monastery, where Mikhail was with his mother, he was informed of his election to the throne.

The Poles tried to prevent the new Tsar from arriving in Moscow. A small detachment of them went to the Ipatiev Monastery to kill Michael, but got lost along the way, because the peasant Ivan Susanin , agreeing to show the way, led him into a dense forest.

On June 11, 1613, Mikhail Fedorovich was crowned king in the Assumption Cathedral of the Kremlin. The celebrations lasted 3 days.

The election of Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov to the kingdom put an end to the Troubles and gave rise to the Romanov dynasty.

Material prepared by Sergey SHULYAK

The family belongs to the ancient families of the Moscow boyars. The first ancestor of this family known to us from the chronicles is Andrei Ivanovich, who had the nickname Mare, in 1347 he was in the service of the Great Prince of Vladimir and Moscow, Semyon Ivanovich Proud.

Semyon Proud was the eldest son and heir and continued the policies of his father. At that time, the Moscow principality strengthened significantly, and Moscow began to claim leadership among other lands of North-Eastern Rus'. The Moscow princes not only established good relations with the Golden Horde, but also began to play a more important role in all-Russian affairs. Among the Russian princes, Semyon was considered the eldest, and few of them dared to contradict him. His character was clearly evident in his family life. After the death of his first wife, the daughter of the Grand Duke of Lithuania Gediminas, Semyon remarried.

His chosen one was the Smolensk princess Eupraxia, but a year after the wedding the Moscow prince for some reason sent her back to her father, Prince Fyodor Svyatoslavich. Then Semyon decided on a third marriage, this time turning to Moscow's old rivals - the Tver princes. In 1347, an embassy went to Tver to woo Princess Maria, the daughter of Tver Prince Alexander Mikhailovich.

At one time, Alexander Mikhailovich died tragically in the Horde, falling victim to the intrigues of Ivan Kalita, Semyon’s father. And now the children of irreconcilable enemies were united by marriage. The embassy to Tver was headed by two Moscow boyars - Andrei Kobyla and Alexey Bosovolkov. This is how the ancestor of Tsar Mikhail Romanov appeared on the historical stage for the first time.

The embassy was successful. But Metropolitan Theognost unexpectedly intervened and refused to bless this marriage. Moreover, he ordered the closure of Moscow churches to prevent weddings. This position was apparently caused by Semyon’s previous divorce. But the prince sent generous gifts to the Patriarch of Constantinople, to whom the Moscow Metropolitan was subordinate, and received permission for the marriage. In 1353, Semyon the Proud died from the plague that raged in Rus'. Nothing more is known about Andrei Kobyl, but his descendants continued to serve the Moscow princes.

According to genealogists, the offspring of Andrei Kobyla was extensive. He left five sons, who became the founders of many famous noble families. The sons' names were: Semyon Stallion (didn't he get his name in honor of Semyon the Proud?), Alexander Yolka, Vasily Ivantey (or Vantey), Gavrila Gavsha (Gavsha is the same as Gabriel, only in a diminutive form; such endings of names in “-sha” were common in Novgorod land) and Fedor Koshka. In addition, Andrei had a younger brother Fyodor Shevlyaga, from whom came the noble families of Motovilovs, Trusovs, Vorobins and Grabezhevs. The nicknames Mare, Stallion and Shevlyaga (“nag”) are close in meaning to each other, which is not surprising, since several noble families have a similar tradition - representatives of the same family could bear nicknames from the same semantic circle. However, what was the origin of the brothers Andrei and Fyodor Ivanovich themselves?

The genealogies of the 16th – early 17th centuries do not report anything about this. But already in the first half of the 17th century, when they gained a foothold on the Russian throne, a legend about their ancestors appeared. Many noble families traced themselves to people from other countries and lands. This became a kind of tradition of the ancient Russian nobility, which, thus, almost entirely had “foreign” origin. Moreover, the most popular were two “directions” from where the noble ancestors supposedly “exited”: either “from the Germans” or “from the Horde”. “Germans” meant not only the inhabitants of Germany, but all Europeans in general. Therefore, in the legends about the “excursions” of the founders of the clans, one can find the following clarifications: “From German, from Prus” or “From German, from Svei (i.e., Swedish) land.”

All these legends were similar to each other. Usually, a certain “honest man” with a strange name, unusual for Russian ears, came, often with a retinue, to serve one of the Grand Dukes. Here he was baptized, and his descendants became part of the Russian elite. Then noble families arose from their nicknames, and since many families traced themselves back to the same ancestor, it is understandable that different versions of the same legends appeared. The reasons for creating these stories are quite clear. By inventing foreign ancestors for themselves, Russian aristocrats “justified” their leadership position in society.

They made their families more ancient, constructed a high origin, because many of the ancestors were considered descendants of foreign princes and rulers, thereby emphasizing their exclusivity. Of course, this does not mean that absolutely all the legends were fictitious; probably, the most ancient of them could have had a real basis (for example, the ancestor of the Pushkins, Radsha, judging by the end of the name, was related to Novgorod and lived in the 12th century, according to some researchers, could actually be of foreign origin). But isolating these historical facts behind the layers of conjecture and conjecture is quite difficult. And besides, it can be difficult to unambiguously confirm or refute such a story due to the lack of sources. Towards the end of the 17th century, and especially in the 18th century, such legends acquired an increasingly fabulous character, turning into pure fantasies of authors poorly familiar with history. The Romanovs did not escape this either.

The creation of the family legend was “took upon themselves” by representatives of those families who had common ancestors with the Romanovs: the Sheremetevs, the already mentioned Trusovs, the Kolychevs. When the official genealogical book of the Muscovite kingdom was created in the 1680s, which later received the name “Velvet” because of its binding, noble families submitted their genealogies to the Rank Order, which was in charge of this matter. The Sheremetevs also presented the painting of their ancestors, and it turned out that, according to their information, the Russian boyar Andrei Ivanovich Kobyla was in fact a prince who came from Prussia.

The “Prussian” origin of the ancestor was very common at that time among ancient families. It has been suggested that this happened because of the “Prussian Street” at one end of ancient Novgorod. Along this street there was a road to Pskov, the so-called. "The Prussian Way". After the annexation of Novgorod to the Moscow state, many noble families of this city were resettled to the Moscow volosts, and vice versa. Thus, thanks to a misunderstood name, “Prussian” immigrants joined the Moscow nobility. But in the case of Andrei Kobyla, one can rather see the influence of another legend, very famous at that time.

At the turn of the 15th–16th centuries, when a unified Moscow state was formed and the Moscow princes began to lay claim to the royal (cesar, i.e., imperial) title, the well-known idea “Moscow is the Third Rome” appeared. Moscow became the heir to the great Orthodox tradition of the Second Rome - Constantinople, and through it the imperial power of the First Rome - the Rome of the emperors Augustus and Constantine the Great. The continuity of power was ensured by the marriage of Ivan III with Sophia Palaeologus, and the legend “about the gifts of Monomakh” - the Byzantine emperor, who transferred the royal crown and other regalia of royal power to his grandson Vladimir Monomakh in Rus', and the adoption of the imperial double-headed eagle as a state symbol. Visible proof of the greatness of the new kingdom was the magnificent ensemble of the Moscow Kremlin built under Ivan III and Vasily III. This idea was also maintained at the genealogical level. It was at this time that the legend about the origin of the then ruling Rurik dynasty arose. Rurik’s foreign, Varangian origin could not fit into the new ideology, and the founder of the princely dynasty became a 14th-generation descendant of a certain Prus, a relative of Emperor Augustus himself. Prus was supposedly the ruler of ancient Prussia, once inhabited by Slavs, and his descendants became the rulers of Rus'. And just as the Rurikovichs turned out to be the successors of the Prussian kings, and through them the Roman emperors, so the descendants of Andrei Kobyla created a “Prussian” legend for themselves.
Subsequently, the legend acquired new details. In a more complete form, it was drawn up by the steward Stepan Andreevich Kolychev, who under Peter I became the first Russian king of arms. In 1722, he headed the Heraldry Office under the Senate, a special institution that dealt with state heraldry and was in charge of accounting and class affairs of the nobility. Now the origins of Andrei Kobyla have “acquired” new features.

In 373 (or even 305) AD (at that time the Roman Empire still existed), the Prussian king Pruteno gave the kingdom to his brother Weidewut, and he himself became the high priest of his pagan tribe in the city of Romanov. This city seemed to be located on the banks of the Dubissa and Nevyazha rivers, at the confluence of which grew a sacred, evergreen oak tree of extraordinary height and thickness. Before his death, Veidevuth divided his kingdom among his twelve sons. The fourth son was Nedron, whose descendants owned the Samogit lands (part of Lithuania). In the ninth generation, a descendant of Nedron was Divon. He lived already in the 13th century and constantly defended his lands from the knights of the sword. Finally, in 1280, his sons, Russingen and Glanda Kambila, were baptized, and in 1283 Glanda (Glandal or Glandus) Kambila came to Rus' to serve the Moscow prince Daniil Alexandrovich. Here he was baptized and began to be called Mare. According to other versions, Glanda was baptized with the name Ivan in 1287, and Andrei Kobyla was his son.

The artificiality of this story is obvious. Everything about it is fantastic, and no matter how hard some historians tried to verify its authenticity, their attempts were unsuccessful. Two characteristic motifs are striking. Firstly, the 12 sons of Veydevut are very reminiscent of the 12 sons of Prince Vladimir, the baptist of Rus', and the fourth son Nedron is the fourth son of Vladimir, Yaroslav the Wise. Secondly, the author’s desire to connect the beginning of the Romanov family in Rus' with the first Moscow princes is obvious. After all, Daniil Alexandrovich was not only the founder of the Moscow principality, but also the founder of the Moscow dynasty, whose successors were the Romanovs.
Nevertheless, the “Prussian” legend became very popular and was officially recorded in the “General Arms Book of the Noble Families of the All-Russian Empire,” created on the initiative of Paul I, who decided to streamline all Russian noble heraldry. The noble family coats of arms were entered into the armorial book, which were approved by the emperor, and along with the image and description of the coat of arms, a certificate of the origin of the family was also given. The descendants of Kobyla - the Sheremetevs, Konovnitsyns, Neplyuevs, Yakovlevs and others, noting their “Prussian” origin, introduced the image of a “sacred” oak as one of the figures in their family coats of arms, and borrowed the central image itself (two crosses above which a crown is placed) from the heraldry of the city of Danzig (Gdansk).

Of course, as historical science developed, researchers not only were critical of the legend about the origin of the Mare, but also tried to discover any real historical basis in it. The most extensive study of the “Prussian” roots of the Romanovs was undertaken by the outstanding pre-revolutionary historian V.K. Trutovsky, who saw some correspondence between the information in the legend about Glanda Kambila and the real situation in the Prussian lands of the 13th century. Historians did not abandon such attempts in the future. But if the legend about Glanda Kambile could convey to us some grains of historical data, then its “external” design practically reduces this significance to nothing. It may be of interest from the point of view of the social consciousness of the Russian nobility of the 17th–18th centuries, but not in the matter of clarifying the true origin of the reigning family. Such a brilliant expert on Russian genealogy as A.A. Zimin wrote that Andrei Kobyla “probably came from native Moscow (and Pereslavl) landowners.” In any case, be that as it may, it is Andrei Ivanovich who remains the first reliable ancestor of the Romanov dynasty.
Let's return to the real pedigree of his descendants. The eldest son of Mare, Semyon Stallion, became the founder of the nobles Lodygins, Konovnitsyns, Kokorevs, Obraztsovs, Gorbunovs. Of these, the Lodygins and Konovnitsyns left the greatest mark on Russian history. The Lodygins come from the son of Semyon Stallion - Grigory Lodyga (“lodyga” is an ancient Russian word meaning foot, stand, ankle). The famous engineer Alexander Nikolaevich Lodygin (1847–1923), who in 1872 invented the incandescent electric lamp in Russia, belonged to this family.

The Konovnitsyns descend from the grandson of Grigory Lodyga - Ivan Semyonovich Konovnitsa. Among them, General Pyotr Petrovich Konovnitsyn (1764–1822), the hero of many wars waged by Russia at the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries, including the Patriotic War of 1812, became famous. He distinguished himself in the battles for Smolensk, Maloyaroslavets, in the “Battle of the Nations” near Leipzig, and in the Battle of Borodino he commanded the Second Army after Prince P.I. was wounded. Bagration. In 1815–1819, Konovnitsyn was Minister of War, and in 1819, together with his descendants, he was elevated to the dignity of count of the Russian Empire.
From the second son of Andrei Kobyla, Alexander Yolka, came the families of the Kolychevs, Sukhovo-Kobylins, Sterbeevs, Khludenevs, Neplyuevs. Alexander's eldest son Fyodor Kolych (from the word "kolcha", i.e. lame) became the founder of the Kolychevs. Of the representatives of this genus, the most famous is St. Philip (in the world Fyodor Stepanovich Kolychev, 1507–1569). In 1566 he became Metropolitan of Moscow and All Rus'. Angrily denouncing the atrocities of Tsar Ivan the Terrible, Philip was deposed in 1568 and then strangled by one of the leaders of the guardsmen, Malyuta Skuratov.

The Sukhovo-Kobylins descend from another son of Alexander Yolka, Ivan Sukhoi (i.e., “thin”). The most prominent representative of this family was the playwright Alexander Vasilyevich Sukhovo-Kobylin (1817–1903), author of the trilogy “Krechinsky’s Wedding”, “The Affair” and “The Death of Tarelkin”. In 1902, he was elected an honorary academician of the Imperial Academy of Sciences in the category of fine literature. His sister, Sofya Vasilievna (1825–1867), an artist who received a large gold medal from the Imperial Academy of Arts in 1854 for a landscape from life (which she depicted in the painting of the same name from the collection of the Tretyakov Gallery), also painted portraits and genre compositions. Another sister, Elizaveta Vasilievna (1815–1892), married Countess Salias de Tournemire, gained fame as a writer under the pseudonym Evgenia Tour. Her son, Count Evgeniy Andreevich Salias de Tournemire (1840–1908), was also a famous writer and historical novelist in his time (he was called the Russian Alexandre Dumas). His sister, Maria Andreevna (1841–1906), was the wife of Field Marshal Joseph Vladimirovich Gurko (1828–1901), and his granddaughter, Princess Evdokia (Eda) Yuryevna Urusova (1908–1996), was an outstanding theater and film actress of the Soviet era.

The youngest son of Alexander Yolka, Fyodor Dyutka (Dyudka, Dudka or even Detko), became the founder of the Neplyuev family. Among the Neplyuevs, Ivan Ivanovich Neplyuev (1693–1773), a diplomat who was a Russian resident in Turkey (1721–1734), and then the governor of the Orenburg region, and from 1760 a senator and conference minister, stands out.
Vasily Ivantey's descendants ended with his son Gregory, who died childless.

From the fourth son of Kobyla, Gavrila Gavsha, came the Boborykins. This family produced the talented writer Pyotr Dmitrievich Boborykin (1836–1921), author of the novels “Businessmen”, “China Town” and, among others, by the way, “Vasily Terkin” (except for the name, this literary character has nothing in common with the hero A. T. Tvardovsky).
Finally, Andrei Kobyla's fifth son, Fyodor Koshka, was the direct ancestor of the Romanovs. He served Dmitry Donskoy and is repeatedly mentioned in chronicles among his entourage. Perhaps it was he who was entrusted by the prince to defend Moscow during the famous war with Mamai, which ended in the victory of the Russians on the Kulikovo Field. Before his death, the Cat took monastic vows and was named Theodoret. His family became related to the Moscow and Tver princely dynasties - branches of the Rurikovich family. Thus, Fyodor’s daughter Anna was married to the Mikulin prince Fyodor Mikhailovich in 1391. The Mikulin inheritance was part of the Tver land, and Fyodor Mikhailovich himself was the youngest son of the Tver prince Mikhail Alexandrovich. Mikhail Alexandrovich was at enmity with Dmitry Donskoy for a long time. Three times he received a label from the Horde for the Great Reign of Vladimir, but each time, due to Dmitry’s opposition, he could not become the main Russian prince. However, gradually the strife between the Moscow and Tver princes faded away. Back in 1375, at the head of an entire coalition of princes, Dmitry made a successful campaign against Tver, and since then Mikhail Alexandrovich abandoned attempts to seize leadership from the Moscow prince, although relations between them remained tense. The marriage with the Koshkins was probably supposed to help establish friendly relations between the eternal enemies.

But not only Tver was embraced by the descendants of Fyodor Koshka with their matrimonial politics. Soon the Moscow princes themselves fell into their orbit. Among the sons of Koshka was Fyodor Goltai, whose daughter, Maria, was married in the winter of 1407 by one of the sons of the Serpukhov and Borovsk prince Vladimir Andreevich, Yaroslav.
Vladimir Andreevich, the founder of Serpukhov, was Dmitry Donskoy’s cousin. There were always the kindest friendly relations between them. The brothers took many important steps in the life of the Moscow state together. So, together they supervised the construction of the white-stone Moscow Kremlin, together they fought on the Kulikovo Field. Moreover, it was Vladimir Andreevich with the governor D.M. Bobrok-Volynsky commanded an ambush regiment, which at a critical moment decided the outcome of the entire battle. Therefore, he entered with the nickname not only Brave, but also Donskoy.

Yaroslav Vladimirovich, and in his honor the city of Maloyaroslavets was founded, where he reigned, he also bore the name Afanasy in baptism. This was one of the last cases when, according to a long-standing tradition, the Rurikovichs gave their children double names: secular and baptismal. The prince died of a pestilence in 1426 and was buried in the Archangel Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin, where his grave exists to this day. From his marriage to the granddaughter of Fyodor Koshka, Yaroslav had a son, Vasily, who inherited the entire Borovsk-Serpukhov inheritance, and two daughters, Maria and Elena. In 1433, Maria was married to the young Moscow prince Vasily II Vasilyevich, grandson of Dmitry Donskoy.
At this time, a brutal strife began on Moscow soil between Vasily and his mother Sofia Vitovtovna, on the one hand, and the family of his uncle Yuri Dmitrievich, Prince of Zvenigorod, on the other. Yuri and his sons - Vasily (in the future, blinded in one eye and became Kosym) and Dmitry Shemyaka (the nickname comes from the Tatar “chimek” - “outfit”) - laid claim to the Moscow reign. Both Yuryevichs attended Vasily’s wedding in Moscow. And it was here that the famous historical episode took place, fueling this irreconcilable struggle. Seeing Vasily Yuryevich wearing a gold belt that once belonged to Dmitry Donskoy, Grand Duchess Sofya Vitovtovna tore it off, deciding that it did not rightfully belong to the Zvenigorod prince. One of the initiators of this scandal was the grandson of Fyodor Koshka Zakhary Ivanovich. The offended Yuryevichs left the wedding feast, and soon a war broke out. During it, Vasily II was blinded by Shemyaka and became Dark, but ultimately victory remained on his side. With the death of Shemyaka, poisoned in Novgorod, Vasily could no longer worry about the future of his reign. During the war, Vasily Yaroslavich, who became the brother-in-law of the Moscow prince, supported him in everything. But in 1456, Vasily II ordered the arrest of a relative and sent him to prison in the city of Uglich. There the unfortunate son of Maria Goltyaeva spent 27 years until he died in 1483. His grave can be seen on the left side of the iconostasis of the Moscow Archangel Cathedral. There is also a portrait image of this prince. The children of Vasily Yaroslavich died in captivity, and his second wife and her son from her first marriage, Ivan, managed to flee to Lithuania. The family of Borovsk princes continued there for a short time.

From Maria Yaroslavna, Vasily II had several sons, including Ivan III. Thus, all representatives of the Moscow princely dynasty, starting with Vasily II and up to the sons and granddaughter of Ivan the Terrible, were descendants of the Koshkins on the female line.
Grand Duchess Sofya Vitovtovna tearing off the belt from Vasily Kosoy at the wedding of Vasily the Dark. From a painting by P.P. Chistyakova. 1861
The descendants of Fyodor Koshka successively bore the family names Koshkins, Zakharyins, Yuryevs and, finally, Romanovs. In addition to his daughter Anna and son Fyodor Goltai, mentioned above, Fyodor Koshka had sons Ivan, Alexander Bezzubets, Nikifor and Mikhail Durny. Alexander's descendants were called the Bezzubtsevs, and then the Sheremetevs and Epanchins. The Sheremetevs descend from Alexander’s grandson, Andrei Konstantinovich Sheremet, and the Epanchins from another grandson, Semyon Konstantinovich Epancha (ancient clothing in the form of a cloak was called an epancha).

The Sheremetevs are one of the most famous Russian noble families. Probably the most famous of the Sheremetevs is Boris Petrovich (1652–1719). An associate of Peter the Great, one of the first Russian field marshals (the first Russian by origin), he participated in the Crimean and Azov campaigns, became famous for his victories in the Northern War, and commanded the Russian army in the Battle of Poltava. He was one of the first to be elevated by Peter to the dignity of a count of the Russian Empire (obviously, this happened in 1710). Among the descendants of Boris Petrovich Sheremetev, Russian historians especially revere Count Sergei Dmitrievich (1844–1918), a prominent researcher of Russian antiquity, chairman of the Archaeographic Commission under the Ministry of Public Education, who did a lot for the publication and study of documents of the Russian Middle Ages. His wife was the granddaughter of Prince Pyotr Andreevich Vyazemsky, and his son Pavel Sergeevich (1871–1943) also became a famous historian and genealogist. This branch of the family owned the famous Ostafyevo near Moscow (inherited from the Vyazemskys), preserved through the efforts of Pavel Sergeevich after the revolutionary events of 1917. The descendants of Sergei Dmitrievich, who found themselves in exile, became related there with the Romanovs. This family still exists today, in particular, the descendant of Sergei Dmitrievich, Count Pyotr Petrovich, who now lives in Paris, heads the Russian Conservatory named after S.V. Rachmaninov. The Sheremetevs owned two architectural pearls near Moscow: Ostankino and Kuskovo. How can one not recall here the serf actress Praskovya Kovaleva-Zhemchugova, who became Countess Sheremeteva, and her wife Count Nikolai Petrovich (1751–1809), the founder of the famous Moscow Hospice House (now the N.V. Sklifosovsky Institute of Emergency Medicine is located in its building). Sergei Dmitrievich was the grandson of N.P. Sheremetev and the serf actress.

The Epanchins are less noticeable in Russian history, but they also left their mark on it. In the 19th century, representatives of this family served in the navy, and two of them, Nikolai and Ivan Petrovich, heroes of the Battle of Navarino in 1827, became Russian admirals. Their great-nephew, General Nikolai Alekseevich Epanchin (1857–1941), a famous military historian, served as director of the Corps of Pages in 1900–1907. Already in exile, he wrote interesting memoirs “In the Service of Three Emperors,” published in Russia in 1996.

Actually, the Romanov family descends from the eldest son of Fyodor Koshka, Ivan, who was a boyar of Vasily I. It was Ivan Koshka’s son Zakhary Ivanovich who identified the notorious belt in 1433 at the wedding of Vasily the Dark. Zachary had three sons, so the Koshkins were divided into three more branches. The younger ones - the Lyatskys (Lyatskys) - left to serve in Lithuania, and their traces were lost there. The eldest son of Zakhary, Yakov Zakharyevich (died in 1510), a boyar and governor under Ivan III and Vasily III, served as viceroy in Novgorod and Kolomna for some time, took part in the war with Lithuania and, in particular, took the cities of Bryansk and Putivl, which then seceded to the Russian state. The descendants of Yakov formed the noble family of the Yakovlevs. He is known for his two “illegal” representatives: in 1812, the wealthy landowner Ivan Alekseevich Yakovlev (1767–1846) and the daughter of a German official Louise Ivanovna Haag (1795–1851), who were not legally married, had a son, Alexander Ivanovich Herzen (d. . in 1870) (grandson of A.I. Herzen - Pyotr Aleksandrovich Herzen (1871–1947) - one of the largest domestic surgeons, a specialist in the field of clinical oncology). And in 1819, his brother Lev Alekseevich Yakovlev had an illegitimate son, Sergei Lvovich Levitsky (died in 1898), one of the most famous Russian photographers (who was thus A.I. Herzen’s cousin).

Zakhary's middle son, Yuri Zakharyevich (died in 1505 [?]), a boyar and governor under Ivan III, like his older brother, fought with the Lithuanians in the famous battle near the Vedrosha River in 1500. His wife was Irina Ivanovna Tuchkova, a representative of a famous noble family. The surname Romanov came from one of the sons of Yuri and Irina, the okolnichy Roman Yuryevich (died in 1543). It was his family who became related to the royal dynasty.

On February 3, 1547, the sixteen-year-old Tsar, who had been crowned king half a month earlier in the Assumption Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin, married the daughter of Roman Yuryevich Zakharyin, Anastasia.

There was a strict ceremony at court: the baby was carried in the arms of a nanny, and she was supported by two boyars, relatives of Queen Anastasia. The journey took place along rivers and on plows. One day, the nanny with the prince and the boyars stepped onto the shaky gangplank of the plow, and, unable to resist, they all fell into the water. Dmitry choked. Then Ivan named his youngest son from his last marriage with Maria Naga by this name. However, the fate of this boy turned out to be tragic: at the age of nine he... The name Dmitry turned out to be unlucky for the Grozny family.

The tsar’s second son, Ivan Ivanovich, had a difficult character. Cruel and domineering, he could become a complete image of his father. But in 1581, the 27-year-old prince was mortally wounded by Grozny during a quarrel. The reason for the unbridled outburst of anger was allegedly the third wife of Tsarevich Ivan (he sent the first two to the monastery) - Elena Ivanovna Sheremeteva, a distant relative of the Romanovs. Being pregnant, she appeared to her father-in-law in a light shirt, “in an indecent appearance.” The king beat his daughter-in-law, who later had a miscarriage. Ivan stood up for his wife and immediately received a blow to the temple with an iron staff. A few days later he died, and Elena was tonsured with the name Leonidas in one of the monasteries.

After the death of the heir, Ivan the Terrible was succeeded by his third son from Anastasia, Fedor. In 1584 he became the Tsar of Moscow. Fyodor Ivanovich was distinguished by a quiet and meek disposition. He was disgusted by the cruel tyranny of his father, and he spent a significant part of his reign in prayers and fasts, atonement for the sins of his ancestors. Such a high spiritual attitude of the tsar seemed strange to his subjects, which is why the popular legend about Fedor’s dementia appeared. In 1598, he serenely fell asleep forever, and his brother-in-law Boris Godunov took over the throne. Fyodor's only daughter Theodosia died before reaching the age of two. Thus ended the offspring of Anastasia Romanovna.
With her kind, gentle character, Anastasia restrained the king’s cruel temper. But in August 1560 the queen died. An analysis of her remains, now located in the basement chamber of the Archangel Cathedral, already carried out in our time, showed a high probability that Anastasia was poisoned. After her death, a new stage began in the life of Ivan the Terrible: the era of Oprichnina and lawlessness.

Ivan's marriage to Anastasia brought her relatives to the forefront of Moscow politics. The queen’s brother, Nikita Romanovich (died in 1586), was especially popular. He became famous as a talented commander and brave warrior during the Livonian War, rose to the rank of boyar and was one of the close associates of Ivan the Terrible. He was part of the inner circle of Tsar Fedor. Shortly before his death, Nikita took monastic vows with the name Nifont. Was married twice. His first wife, Varvara Ivanovna Khovrina, came from the Khovrin-Golovin family, which later produced several famous figures in Russian history, including Peter I’s associate, Admiral Fyodor Alekseevich Golovin. Nikita Romanovich’s second wife, Princess Evdokia Alexandrovna Gorbataya-Shuyskaya, belonged to the descendants of the Suzdal-Nizhny Novgorod Rurikovichs. Nikita Romanovich lived in his chambers on Varvarka Street in Moscow, where in the middle of the 19th century. a museum was opened.

Seven sons and five daughters of Nikita Romanovich continued this boyar family. For a long time, researchers doubted which marriage of Nikita Romanovich gave birth to his eldest son Fyodor Nikitich, the future Patriarch Filaret, the father of the first tsar from the Romanov dynasty. After all, if his mother was Princess Gorbataya-Shuiskaya, then the Romanovs are thus descendants of the Rurikovichs through the female line. At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, historians assumed that Fyodor Nikitich was most likely born from his father’s first marriage. And only in recent years has this issue apparently been finally resolved. During the study of the Romanov necropolis in the Moscow Novospassky Monastery, the tombstone of Varvara Ivanovna Khovrina was discovered. In the tombstone epitaph, the year of her death should perhaps be read as 7063, i.e. 1555 (she died on June 29), and not 7060 (1552), as previously believed. This dating removes the question of the origin of Fyodor Nikitich, who died in 1633, being “more than 80 years old.” The ancestors of Varvara Ivanovna and, therefore, the ancestors of the entire royal House of Romanov, the Khovrins, came from the trading people of the Crimean Sudak and had Greek roots.

Fyodor Nikitich Romanov served as a regimental commander, took part in campaigns against the cities of Koporye, Yam and Ivangorod during the successful Russian-Swedish war of 1590–1595, defended the southern borders of Russia from Crimean raids. A prominent position at court made it possible for the Romanovs to become related to other then-known families: the princes of Sitsky, Cherkasy, as well as the Godunovs (Boris Fedorovich’s nephew married Nikita Romanovich’s daughter, Irina). But these family ties did not save the Romanovs from disgrace after the death of their benefactor Tsar Fedor.

With his accession to the throne, everything changed. Hating the entire Romanov family and fearing them as potential rivals in the struggle for power, the new tsar began to eliminate his opponents one by one. In 1600–1601, repression fell on the Romanovs. Fyodor Nikitich was forcibly tonsured a monk (under the name Filaret) and sent to the distant Anthony Siysky Monastery in Arkhangelsk district. The same fate befell his wife Ksenia Ivanovna Shestova. Tonsured under the name of Martha, she was exiled to the Tolvuisky churchyard in Zaonezhye, and then lived with her children in the village of Klin, Yuryevsky district. Her young daughter Tatyana and son Mikhail (the future Tsar) were taken to prison on Beloozero along with her aunt Anastasia Nikitichna, who later became the wife of a prominent figure in the Time of Troubles, Prince Boris Mikhailovich Lykov-Obolensky. Fyodor Nikitich's brother, boyar Alexander, was exiled on a false denunciation to one of the villages of the Kirillo-Belozersky monastery, where he was killed. Another brother, the okolnichy Mikhail, also died in disgrace, transported from Moscow to the remote Perm village of Nyrob. There he died in prison and in chains from hunger. Another son of Nikita, steward Vasily, died in the city of Pelym, where he and his brother Ivan were kept chained to the wall. And their sisters Efimiya (monastically Evdokia) and Martha went into exile together with their husbands, the princes of Sitsky and Cherkassy. Only Martha survived imprisonment. Thus, almost the entire Romanov family was destroyed. Miraculously, only Ivan Nikitich, nicknamed Kasha, survived, returned after a short exile.

But the Godunov dynasty was not allowed to rule in Rus'. The fire of the Great Troubles was already flaring up, and in this seething cauldron the Romanovs emerged from oblivion. The active and energetic Fyodor Nikitich (Filaret) returned to “big” politics at the first opportunity - False Dmitry I made his benefactor Metropolitan of Rostov and Yaroslavl. The fact is that Grigory Otrepiev was once his servant. There is even a version that the Romanovs specially prepared the ambitious adventurer for the role of the “legitimate” heir to the Moscow throne. Be that as it may, Filaret took a prominent place in the church hierarchy.

He made a new career “leap” with the help of another impostor - False Dmitry II, the “Tushinsky Thief”. In 1608, during the capture of Rostov, the Tushins captured Filaret and brought the impostor to the camp.
False Dmitry invited him to become patriarch, and Filaret agreed. In Tushino, in general, a kind of second capital was formed: it had its own king, it had its own boyars, its own orders, and now also its own patriarch (in Moscow, the patriarchal throne was occupied by Hermogenes). When the Tushin camp collapsed, Filaret managed to return to Moscow, where he participated in the overthrow of Tsar Vasily Shuisky. The Seven Boyars that formed after this included the younger brother of the “patriarch” Ivan Nikitich Romanov, who received the boyars on the day of Otrepiev’s crowning. As is known, the new government decided to invite the son of the Polish king, Vladislav, to the Russian throne and concluded a corresponding agreement with Hetman Stanislav Zolkiewski, and in order to settle all the formalities, a “great embassy” was sent from Moscow to Smolensk, where the king was located, headed by Filaret. However, negotiations with King Sigismund reached a dead end, the ambassadors were arrested and sent to Poland. There, in captivity, Filaret remained until 1619 and only after the conclusion of the Deulin truce and the end of the many years of war did he return to Moscow. His son Mikhail was already the Russian Tsar.

Fyodor-Filaret's wife Ksenia Ivanovna came from the ancient Shestov family. Their ancestor was considered to be Mikhail Prushanin, or, as he was also called, Misha, an associate of Alexander Nevsky. He was also the founder of such famous families as the Morozovs, Saltykovs, Sheins, Tuchkovs, Cheglokovs, Scriabins. Misha's descendants became related to the Romanovs back in the 15th century, since the mother of Roman Yuryevich Zakharyin was one of the Tuchkovs. By the way, the Shestovs’ ancestral estates included the Kostroma village of Domnino, where Ksenia and her son Mikhail lived for some time after the liberation of Moscow from the Poles. The headman of this village, Ivan Susanin, became famous for saving the young king from death at the cost of his life. After her son’s accession to the throne, the “great old lady” Martha helped him in governing the country until his father, Filaret, returned from captivity.

Ksenia-Marfa had a kind character. So, remembering the widows of previous tsars who lived in monasteries - Ivan the Terrible, Vasily Shuisky, Tsarevich Ivan Ivanovich - she repeatedly sent them gifts. She often went on pilgrimages, was strict in matters of religion, but did not shy away from the joys of life: in the Ascension Kremlin Monastery she organized a gold-embroidery workshop, which produced beautiful fabrics and clothes for the royal court.
Mikhail Fedorovich's uncle Ivan Nikitich (died in 1640) also occupied a prominent place at his nephew's court. With the death of his son, boyar and butler Nikita Ivanovich in 1654, all other branches of the Romanovs, except for the royal offspring of Mikhail Fedorovich, were cut short. The ancestral tomb of the Romanovs was the Moscow Novospassky Monastery, where in recent years much work has been carried out to study and restore this ancient necropolis. As a result, many burials of the ancestors of the royal dynasty were identified, and from some remains, experts even recreated portrait images, including that of Roman Yuryevich Zakharyin, the great-grandfather of Tsar Mikhail.

The Romanov family coat of arms dates back to Livonian heraldry and was created in the mid-19th century. the outstanding Russian heraldist Baron B.V. Köne based on emblematic images found on objects that belonged to the Romanovs in the second half of the 16th - early 17th centuries. The description of the coat of arms is as follows:
“In a silver field is a scarlet vulture holding a golden sword and tarch, crowned with a small eagle; on the black border there are eight severed lion heads: four gold and four silver.”

Evgeny Vladimirovich Pchelov
Romanovs. History of a great dynasty

400 years ago, the first ruler of the Romanov family, Mikhail Fedorovich, reigned in Russia. His ascension to the throne marked the end of the Russian Troubles, and his descendants were to rule the state for another three centuries, expanding the borders and strengthening the power of the country, which thanks to them became an empire. We remember this date with an associate professor at the Russian State University for the Humanities, head of the department of auxiliary historical disciplines, author of the books “The Romanovs. History of the dynasty", "Genealogy of the Romanovs. 1613-2001" and many others by Evgeny Pchelov.

- Evgeny Vladimirovich, where did the Romanov family come from?

The Romanovs are an ancient family of Moscow boyars, the origins of which go back to the first half of the 14th century, when the earliest ancestor of the Romanovs lived, Andrei Ivanovich Kobyla, who served Semyon Proud, the eldest son of Ivan Kalita. Thus, the Romanovs are associated with the family of the Great Moscow Princes almost from the very beginning of this dynasty; this, one might say, is the “indigenous” family of the Moscow aristocracy. The earlier ancestors of the Romanovs, before Andrei Kobyla, are unknown to chronicle sources. Much later, in the 17th – 18th centuries, when the Romanovs were in power, a legend arose about their foreign origin, and this legend was created not by the Romanovs themselves, but by their relatives, i.e. descendants of clans of the same origin as the Romanovs - the Kolychevs, Sheremetevs, etc. According to this legend, the ancestor of the Romanovs allegedly left for Rus' “from Prussian”, i.e. from the Prussian land, once inhabited by the Prussians - one of the Baltic tribes. His name was allegedly Glanda Kambila, and in Rus' he became Ivan Kobyla, the father of that same Andrei, who was known at the court of Semyon the Proud. It is clear that Glanda Kambila is a completely artificial name, distorted from Ivan Kobyla. Such legends about the departures of ancestors from other countries were commonplace among the Russian nobility. Of course, this legend has no basis in reality.

- How did they become the Romanovs?

The descendants of Fyodor Koshka’s grandson, Zakhary Ivanovich, were nicknamed the Zakharyins, his son, Yuri, was the father of Roman Yuryevich Zakharyin, and on behalf of Roman the surname Romanovs was formed. In fact, these were all generic nicknames, derived from patronymics and grandfatherings. So the Romanov surname has a rather traditional origin for Russian surnames.

- Were the Romanovs related to the Rurik dynasty?

They became related to the dynasties of the Tver and Serpukhov princes, and through the branch of the Serpukhov princes they found themselves in direct kinship with the Moscow Rurikovichs. Ivan III was the great-great-grandson of Fyodor Koshka on his mother’s side, i.e. starting with him, the Moscow Rurikovichs were descendants of Andrei Kobyla, but Kobyla’s descendants, the Romanovs, were not descendants of the family of Moscow princes. IN 1547 g . The first Russian Tsar Ivan the Terrible married Anastasia Romanovna Zakharyina-Yuryeva, daughter of Roman Yuryevich Zakharyin, who is often incorrectly called a boyar, although he did not have this rank. From his marriage to Anastasia Romanovna, Ivan the Terrible had several children, including Tsarevich Ivan, who died in a quarrel with his father in 1581 g ., and Fedor, who became king in 1584 g . Fyodor Ioannovich was the last of the dynasty of Moscow kings - the Rurikovichs. His uncle Nikita Romanovich, Anastasia's brother, enjoyed great fame at the court of Ivan the Terrible, Nikita's son, Fyodor, later became Moscow Patriarch Filaret, and his grandson, Mikhail, became the first tsar from the new dynasty, elected to the throne in 1613

- Were there other contenders for the throne in 1613?

It is known that that year, at the Zemsky Sobor, which was supposed to choose a new king, the names of several contenders were heard. The most authoritative boyar at that time was Prince Fyodor Ivanovich Mstislavsky, who headed the seven-boyars. He was a distant descendant of Ivan III through his daughter, i.e. was a royal relative. According to sources, the leaders of the Zemstvo militia, Prince Dmitry Timofeevich Trubetskoy (who spent heavily during the Zemsky Council) and Prince Dmitry Mikhailovich Pozharsky, also claimed the throne. There were other notable representatives of the Russian aristocracy.

- Why was Mikhail Fedorovich elected?

Of course, Mikhail Fedorovich was a very young man, he could be controlled, and he stood outside the court groups fighting for power. But the main thing is the family connection of Mikhail Fedorovich and the Romanovs with Tsar Fedor Ivanovich, the son of Ivan the Terrible. Fyodor Ivanovich was perceived at that moment as the last “legitimate” Moscow Tsar, the last representative of the real Tsar’s “root”. His personality and reign were idealized, as always happens after an era of bloody crimes, and the return to the interrupted tradition seemed to restore those quiet and calm times. It was not for nothing that the zemstvo militia minted coins with the name of Fyodor Ivanovich, who had already been dead for 15 years by that time. Mikhail Fedorovich was the nephew of Tsar Fedor - he was perceived as a kind of “reincarnation” of Fedor, a continuation of his era. And although the Romanovs did not have a direct relationship with the Rurikovichs, their inherent and family ties through marriages were of great importance. The direct descendants of the Rurikovichs, be they the Pozharsky princes or the Vorotynsky princes, were not perceived as part of the royal family, but only as subjects of the royal dynasty, which in its status rose above its peers. That is why the Romanovs turned out to be the closest relatives of the last of the Moscow Rurikovichs. Mikhail Fedorovich himself did not take any part in the work of the Zemsky Sobor and learned about its decision when an embassy came to him with an invitation to the throne. It must be said that he and especially his mother, nun Martha, stubbornly refused such an honor. But then, succumbing to persuasion, they finally agreed. Thus began the reign of a new dynasty - the Romanovs.

- Who are the most famous representatives of the House of Romanov today? What are they doing?

Now the Romanov clan, we will talk specifically about the clan, is not very numerous. Representatives of the generation of the 1920s, the first generation of Romanovs born in emigration, are still alive. The oldest today are Nikolai Romanovich, living in Switzerland, Andrei Andreevich, living in the USA, and Dmitry Romanovich, living in Denmark. The first two recently turned 90 years old. All of them came to Russia several times. Together with their younger relatives and some female descendants of the Romanovs (like Prince Michael of Kent, for example), they form the public organization “Association of Members of the Romanov Family.” There is also a Romanov assistance fund for Russia, which is headed by Dimitri Romanovich. However, the activities of the Association in Russia, at least, are not too strongly felt. Among the members of the association there are also very young people, like Rostislav Rostislavich Romanov, for example. A notable figure is the descendant of Alexander II from his second, morganatic marriage, His Serene Highness Prince Georgy Alexandrovich Yuryevsky. He lives in Switzerland and St. Petersburg, where he often visits. There is the family of the late Prince Vladimir Kirillovich - his daughter Maria Vladimirovna and her son from her marriage to the Prussian prince Georgy Mikhailovich. This family considers itself legitimate contenders for the throne; it does not recognize all the other Romanovs and behaves accordingly. Maria Vladimirovna makes “official visits”, favors the nobility and orders of old Russia and in every possible way presents herself as the “Head of the Russian Imperial House”. It is clear that this activity has a very definite ideological and political connotation. The family of Vladimir Kirillovich is seeking some kind of special legal status for itself in Russia, the rights to which are being very convincingly questioned by many. There are other descendants of the Romanovs, more or less noticeable, such as Paul Edward Larsen, who now calls himself Pavel Eduardovich Kulikovsky - the great-grandson of the sister of Nicholas II, Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna. He often appears at numerous events and presentations as a guest. But as such, almost none of the Romanovs and their descendants conduct meaningful and useful activities in Russia.

Perhaps the only exception is Olga Nikolaevna Kulikovskaya-Romanova. By origin, she does not belong to the Romanov family, but is the widow of Nicholas II’s own nephew, Tikhon Nikolaevich Kulikovsky-Romanov, the eldest son of the already mentioned Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna. It must be said that her activities in Russia, unlike her other relatives, are extremely active and productive. Olga Nikolaevna heads the Charitable Foundation named after V.kn. Olga Alexandrovna, which was founded by her together with her late husband Tikhon Nikolaevich, who lived in Canada. Now Olga Nikolaevna spends even more time in Russia than in Canada. The Foundation has carried out enormous charitable work, over the years of its existence providing real assistance to many medical and social institutions in Russia, the Solovetsky Monastery, etc., right down to individual individuals in need of such assistance. In recent years, Olga Nikolaevna has been carrying out great cultural activities, regularly organizing exhibitions of artistic works of Grand Duchess Olga Alexandrovna, who was a lot and fruitfully engaged in painting, in different cities of the country. This side of the history of the royal family was completely unknown until recently. Now exhibitions of the Grand Duchess’s works have been held not only in the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow and the Russian Museum in St. Petersburg, but also in centers as distant from the capitals as Tyumen or Vladivostok. Olga Nikolaevna has traveled almost all of Russia, she is well known in many parts of our country. Of course, she is a completely unique person, literally charging everyone who has encountered her with her energy. Her fate is very interesting - after all, before the Second World War, she studied at the Mariinsky Don Institute, formed even before the revolution in Novocherkassk following the example of the famous Smolny Institute of Noble Maidens, and in exile was located in the Serbian city of Bila Tserkva. The excellent upbringing in a Russian family of first-wave emigrants and education in this educational institution could not but affect Olga Nikolaevna’s personality; she told me a lot about this period of her biography. She knew, of course, the Romanovs of the older generation, for example, the daughter of Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich, the famous poet K.R. – Princess Vera Konstantinovna, with whom she and Tikhon Nikolaevich had friendly relations.

Each page of history holds its own lessons for future generations. What lesson does the history of the Romanovs’ reign teach us?

I believe that the most important thing that the Romanovs did for Russia is the emergence of the Russian Empire, a great European power with great culture and science. If they know Russia abroad (precisely Russia, not the Soviet Union), it is by the names of those people who lived and worked during this period. We can say that it was under the Romanovs that Russia stood on a par with the leading world powers, and on absolutely equal terms. This was one of the highest rises of our country in the entire history of its diverse existence. And the Romanovs played a very big role in this, for which we can be sincerely grateful to them.

Background of the Romanovs. Genus name changes

According to family tradition, the ancestors of the Romanovs left for Rus' “from Prussia” at the beginning of the 14th century. However, many historians believe that the Romanovs came from Novgorod.

The first reliable ancestor of the Romanovs and a number of other noble families is considered to be Andrei Ivanovich Kobyla, a boyar of the Moscow prince Ivan Kalita. Andrei Ivanovich had five sons: Semyon Zherebets, Alexander Yolka, Vasily Ivantey, Gavriil Gavsha and Fyodor Koshka. They were the founders of many Russian noble houses.

The descendants of Fyodor Koshka began to be called Koshkins. The children of Zakhary Ivanovich Koshkin became Koshkins-Zakharyins, and the grandchildren simply became Zakharyins. From Yuri Zakharyevich came the Zakharyins-Yuryevs, and from his brother Yakov - the Zakharyins-Yakovlevs.

Rise of the family

Thanks to the marriage of Ivan IV the Terrible with Anastasia Romanovna Zakharyina, the Zakharyin-Yuryev family became close to the royal court in the 16th century, and after the suppression of the Moscow branch of the Rurikovichs began to lay claim to the throne. In 1613, Anastasia's great-nephew Mikhail Fedorovich was elected to the throne, and his descendants (traditionally called the "House of Romanov") ruled Russia until 1917.

Romanov-Holstein-Gottorp branch

After Anna Petrovna’s marriage to Duke Karl of Holstein-Gottorp, the Romanov clan actually passed into the Holstein-Gottorp clan, however, according to a dynastic agreement, the son from this marriage (the future Peter III) was recognized as a member of the House of Romanov. Thus, according to genealogical rules, the clan is called the Romanovs-Holstein-Gottorp, which is reflected on the Romanov family coat of arms and the coat of arms of the Russian Empire.

Surname "Romanov"

Legally, members of the royal, and then imperial, family did not bear any surnames at all (“Tsarevich Ivan Alekseevich”, “Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich”, etc.). In addition, since 1761, Russia was ruled by the descendants of the daughter of Anna Petrovna and the Duke of Holstein-Gottorp, Karl Friedrich, who in the male line were no longer descended from the Romanovs, but from the Holstein-Gottorp family (the younger branch of the Oldenburg dynasty, known since the 12th century). In genealogical literature (especially foreign), representatives of the dynasty, starting with Peter III, are called Romanov-Holstein-Gottorp. Despite this, the names “Romanovs” and “House of Romanov” were almost generally used to informally designate the Russian Imperial House, the coat of arms of the Romanov boyars was included in official legislation, and in 1913 the three-hundredth anniversary of the House of Romanov was widely celebrated.

After 1917, almost all members of the reigning house officially began to bear the Romanov surname (according to the laws of the Provisional Government, and then in exile). The exception is the descendants of Grand Duke Dmitry Pavlovich. He was one of the Romanovs who recognized Kirill Vladimirovich as emperor in exile. The marriage of Dmitry Pavlovich to Audrey Emery was recognized by Kirill as a morganatic marriage of a member of the reigning house, and the wife and children received the title of Princes Romanovsky-Ilyinsky (now it is borne by two of Dmitry Pavlovich’s grandchildren - Dmitry and Michael/Mikhail, as well as their wives and daughters). The rest of the Romanovs also entered into morganatic (from the point of view of the Russian law on succession to the throne) marriages, but did not consider it necessary to change their surname. After the creation of the Association of Princes of the House of Romanov in the late 1970s, the Ilyinskys became its members on a general basis.

Romanovs after 1917

At the beginning of 1917, the Romanov dynasty consisted of 32 male representatives, 13 of whom were executed by the Bolsheviks in 1918-19. Those who escaped this settled in Western Europe (mainly France) and the USA. In the 1920s and 30s, a significant part of the dynasty continued to hope for the collapse of Soviet power in Russia and the restoration of the monarchy.

All representatives of the dynasty are descendants of the four sons of Nicholas I:
Alexandrovich, descendants of Alexander Nikolaevich. This branch has two living representatives - the brothers Dmitry and Mikhail Pavlovich Romanovsky-Ilyinsky, the younger of whom was born in 1961.
Konstantinovich, descendants of Konstantin Nikolaevich. In the male line, the branch was terminated in 1973 (with the death of Vsevolod, the son of John Konstantinovich).
Nikolaevichs, descendants of Nikolai Nikolaevich the Elder. The two living male representatives are brothers Nikolai and Dmitry Romanovich Romanov, the youngest of whom was born in 1926.
Mikhailovichs, descendants of Mikhail Nikolaevich. All other living male Romanovs belong to this branch (see below), the youngest of them was born in 1987.

In total, as of September 2008, the Romanov clan consisted of 12 male representatives. Among them, only four (grandsons of Prince Rostislav Alexandrovich) are not older than forty years.

Leadership in the dynasty

After the abolition of the monarchy in Russia, a number of members of the dynasty continued to adhere to the imperial legislation on succession to the throne, according to which, however, none of the living members of the dynasty are included in the Imperial House, since they were all born in unequal marriages and, naturally, their parents did not ask permission to marry at the emperor's.

If we recognize imperial legislation as no longer in force in 1917, then the order of leadership in the dynasty under the semi-Salic succession scheme approved by Paul I is as follows:
1917-1938 - Kirill Vladimirovich (1876-1938), cousin of Nicholas II
1938-1992 - Vladimir Kirillovich (1917-1992), his son
1992-2004 - Pavel Dmitrievich (1928-2004), second cousin of Vladimir Kirillovich
from 2004 - Dmitry Pavlovich (b. 1954), son of Pavel Dmitrievich

Further order of dynastic precedence:
Mikhail Pavlovich (b. 1961), brother of Dmitry Pavlovich
Nikolai Romanovich (b. 1922), great-grandson of Nikolai Nikolaevich the Elder
Dimitry Romanovich (b. 1926), brother of Nikolai Romanovich
Andrey Andreevich (b. 1923), grandson of Alexander Mikhailovich
Alexey Andreevich (b. 1951), son of Andrei Andreevich
Pyotr Andreevich (b. 1961), son of Andrei Andreevich
Andrei Andreevich (b. 1963), son of Andrei Andreevich
Rostislav Rostislavovich (b. 1985), great-grandson of Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich
Nikita Rostislavovich (b. 1987), brother of Rostislav Rostislavich
Nikolai-Christopher Nikolaevich (b. 1968), great-grandson of Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovich
Daniil Nikolaevich (b. 1972), brother of Nikolai Nikolaevich

However, neither Pavel Dmitrievich nor his sons Dmitry and Mikhail, living in the USA, ever made claims to leadership in the dynasty. The daughter of Vladimir Kirillovich, Maria Vladimirovna, who calls herself the head of the Imperial House, and Nikolai Romanovich, who heads the “Association of Members of the House of Romanov,” which includes most of the living representatives of the dynasty, are vying for this role. Nikolai Romanovich believes that the question of the monarchy in Russia, as well as who should take the throne, should be decided in a national referendum.

Famous representatives of the Zakharyin-Yuryev-Romanov family
Zakhary Ivanovich.
Yuri Zakharyevich.
Mikhail Yurievich.
Pyotr Yakovlevich, okolnichy since 1510; in 1512-1514 he took part in the Lithuanian War, in 1521 - in campaigns against the Crimeans.
Ivan Vasilyevich, nicknamed Lyatsky. He took part in the Lithuanian War of 1514-1519 and especially distinguished himself in 1517, when he defeated a six-thousand-strong enemy army near Konstantinov; then he was on a campaign against the Crimeans (1522) and Kazan (1524); in 1526 he was sent to Warsaw to approve the treaty; in 1534 he fled, together with his son Ivan and Belsky, to Lithuania and died there.
Roman Yuryevich - okolnichy; was a commander in the campaign of 1531. Died in 1543.
Grigory Yuryevich was a commander in the campaigns of 1531, 1536 and 1543. In 1547 - boyar. Around 1556 he accepted monasticism under the name Guria and died in 1567. He was an opponent of the Glinsky princes and greatly contributed to the uprising of the mob against them during the Moscow fire of 1547.
Vasily Mikhailovich, Tver butler and boyar, was in 1547 “at the bedside at the prince’s wedding. Yuri Vasilievich." In 1548 he ruled in Kazan. He is mentioned among the boyars who remained in Moscow in 1559 to govern the state, then his name appears in the response letter (1566) to the ambassadors of the Polish king. Died in 1567.
Daniil Romanovich, brother of Tsarina Anastasia Romanovna, okolnichy (1547), boyar (1548). He took part in the Kazan campaign of 1551-1552, and especially distinguished himself during the capture of the Arsk fort and in campaigns against the Crimeans and Lithuanians in 1556-1557, 1559 and 1564. Died in 1571.
Nikita Romanovich is the grandfather of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich. Participated in the Swedish campaign of 1551; was a governor during the Lithuanian campaign (1559, 1564-1557). In 1563 he was made a butler and boyar. In 1584-1585 he participated in government. He died in 1585, having become a monk with the name Nifont.
Fyodor Nikitich - Filaret, patriarch.
Alexander Nikitich in 1585 was in the palace on the day of the reception of the Lithuanian ambassador. In 1586 he was the governor of Kashira. In 1591 he took part in the campaign against Gaza II Giray. In 1598 - boyar. Boris Godunov in 1601 deprived him of his boyar title and exiled him to Usolye-Luda, where, according to the chronicler, he was strangled.
Mikhail Nikitich - steward in 1597, okolnichy in 1598. In 1601 he was exiled to Nyrob, where he soon died.
Vasily Nikitich, steward (1597), was exiled to Yaransk in 1601, a month later transferred to Pelym, where he was kept chained to the wall. Died in 1602.
Ivan Nikitich, nicknamed Kasha, steward (1591). In 1601 he was exiled to Pelym, in 1602 he was transferred to Nizhny Novgorod; soon returned to Moscow. On the day of the coronation of False Dmitry I he was made a boyar. In 1606-1607 he was a governor in Kozelsk and defeated Prince Masalsky, a supporter of False Dmitry II, on the banks of the Vyrka River (1607). Under Mikhail Fedorovich he played a very prominent role, leading mainly external affairs. Died in 1640.
Nikita Ivanovich, the last boyar of the non-royal line of the Romanovs. He was a steward in 1644, a boyar in 1646. Died in 1655.

The ancient Moscow courtyard of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich or the so-called Chamber of Romanovs was restored under Emperor Alexander II. Things that belonged to Patriarch Filaret, Mikhail Fedorovich and Queen Evdokia are kept here. All materials relating to the Romanovs were collected in a special Romanov department, founded by N. N. Selifontov in 1896, at the Kostroma Scientific Archival Commission.

Historical coincidences

The royal dynasty of the Romanovs began with the rite of calling to the kingdom in the Ipatiev Monastery (in Kostroma) and ended with the execution of the royal family in the Ipatiev House (in Yekaterinburg).
- Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov stepped over 23 steps, ascending to the throne during the coronation. In 1918, the last Romanov, after 23 years of rule, crossed 23 steps going down to the basement of the Ipatiev House.

Based on materials from the Wikipedia encyclopedia

Rus' and its autocrats Anishkin Valery Georgievich

Appendix 3. Family tree of the Romanov family