During a break in one of Podporin’s hearings—the case is ongoing—his brother conveyed this spirit of historiographical fanaticism. Ivan was a “great leader,” he said. “With all of the great figures in ...

Who was the son of Ivan the Terrible? Repin’s model for the Tsarevich was the mentally ill Russian writer Vsevolod Garshin, who later committed suicide by throwing himself down a staircase.

Ivan IV Vasilyevich was just a teenager when he was crowned czar and grand prince of all Russia on January 16, 1547. Today, Ivan is better known as Ivan the Terrible, though the name wouldn’t be ...

The Oprichniki by Nikolai Nevrev (1888). The painting shows the last minutes of one of the aristocratic elite taken out by Ivan IV. Wikimedia Commons. Ivan IV Vasilyevich was just a teenager when ...