Grand Duchy of Moscow: The most powerful state that eventually emerged after the destruction of Kievan Rus’ was the Grand Duchy of Moscow, originally part of Vladimir-Suzdal. While still under the Mongol-Tatar domain and with their resolve, Moscow began to assert its influence in Middle Rus in the early 14th century, gradually becoming a major force in the process of reunification and expansion of the Russian ‘Rus land’. Moscow’s final rival, the Novgorod Republic, prospered as a major fur trading center and the Hanseatic League’s easternmost port.
Dmitry Donskoy in the Battle of Kulikovo: Led by Prince Dmitry Donskoy of Moscow and aided by the Russian Orthodox Church, the unified armies of the Russian kingdoms inflicted a decisive defeat on the Mongol-Tatars in the Battle of Kulikovo in 1380. Moscow gradually absorbed the surrounding kingdoms, including its rivals previously strong rivals such as Tver and Novgorod.
Ivan III (“the great”) eventually relinquished control of the Golden Horde and consolidated all of Central and Northern Rus under Moscow rule. He was also the first to assume the title “Grand Prince of All Russia”.[46] After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, Moscow claimed succession to its inheritance from the Eastern Roman Empire. Ivan III married Sophia Palaiologina, niece of the last Byzantine emperor, Constantine XI, and made the Byzantine double-headed eagle his own, and eventually became the coat of arms of Russia.
Tsar Ivan IV (Ivan the Terrible): In developing the ideas of the Third Rome, Grand Duke Ivan IV (the “Terrible”) was formally crowned as Russia’s first Tsar in 1547. The tsar promulgated a new law code (Sudebnik 1550), established Russia’s first feudal representative body (Zemsky Sobor) and introduced local self-government to the countryside.
During his long reign, Ivan the Terrible nearly doubled Russia’s already vast territory by annexing three Tatar khanates (part of the destroyed Golden Horde): Kazan and Astrakhan along the Volga River, and the Siberian Khanate in southwestern Siberia. Thus, by the end of the 16th century, Russia was turning into a multiethnic, multidenominational and transcontinental state.
Kuzma Minin called on the people of Nizhny Novgorod to gather an army of volunteers against the Polish invaders during the Time of Troubles.
The death of Ivan’s son marked the end of the ancient Rurik dynasty in 1598, and combined with the famine of 1601–03, led to civil war, sham rule, and foreign intervention during the Time of Troubles in the early 17th century. The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth occupied part of Russia, including Moscow. In 1612, the Poles were forced back by the Russian volunteer corps, led by two national heroes, the merchant Kuzma Minin and Prince Dmitry Pozharsky. The Romanov dynasty acceded to the throne in 1613 by decision of the Zemsky Sobor, and the country began a gradual recovery from the crisis.
In the east, the rapid Russian exploration and colonization of vast Siberian territories was led largely by Cossacks who hunted for valuable furs and ivory. Russian explorers pushed eastward mainly along the Siberian River Route, and by the mid-17th century there were Russian settlements in Eastern Siberia, on the Chukchi Peninsula, along the Amur River, and on the Pacific coast. In 1648, Fedot Popov and Semyon Dezhnyov, two Russian explorers, became the first Europeans to sail through the Bering Strait to North America.
