bluejayfic:

prokopetz:

Everybody talks about Anastasia, which is a shame, because it’s a far less interesting example of Russian fake heir drama than that whole business with the False Dmitries.

Okay, so Ivan the Terrible’s youngest son,
Dmitry, was assassinated in 1591 at the age of 8. Fast-forward nine years, and there’s a guy going about Eastern Europe claiming that he is Dmitry, having secretly escaped the assassination attempt and lived in hiding under a false identity ever since. This sort of business isn’t too unusual, but this guy actually pulls it off, managing to gain the Russian throne and rule for nearly eleven months before being dragged from the palace and publicly executed in early 1606. He’d subsequently go down in history as False Dmitry I.

Here’s where it gets interesting. In mid 1607, a second impostor declares himself. Bizarrely, this one doesn’t dispute the first impostor’s legitimacy; instead, he claims to be the same guy, having miraculously survived his apparent execution the year before. He somehow wins the political support of False Dmitry I’s widow, and with her vouching for his identity, he gains the allegiance of the Cossacks, rallies an army over 100 000 strong, and tries to “take back” the throne. Though his march on Moscow ultimately failed, he successfully conquered most of Southeastern Russia, which he would rule until his untimely death in December of 1610, when he was beheaded in a drunken altercation with a Tartar prince. The history books know him as False Dmitry II.

Now jump ahead three months to March of 1611, when a third fucking impostor pops up. Dude apparently just magically appeared from behind a waterfall in goddamn Ivangorod and declared himself Tsar. Following the lead of False Dmitry II, he doesn’t dispute either of the two previous impostors, instead claiming some sort of spiritual reincarnation and/or magical resurrection – it’s not entirely clear which – to establish himself as the same guy. He must have talked a good game, because he managed to win the support of the same fucking Cossacks who supported False Dmitry II’s claim. Unfortunately, he was a far less able commander, being forced to flee his stronghold only a year later, whereupon he was spirited away to Moscow and secretly executed. Though he never managed to actually rule anything, historians decided to stick to the theme and dubbed him False Dmitry III.

At this point the historical record becomes confused, with some sources asserting there was a fourth False Dmitry, though others insist that the third False Dmitry was simply counted twice due to poor record-keeping. Still, whether we’re talking about three False Dmitries or four, imagine the whole mess from the Tsar’s perspective. Dude just wouldn’t stay dead!

This is called the Time of Troubles, and it was a catastrophe. 

The thing is, after Ivan the Terrible and his elder son Feodor both died, there was no one left with a reasonable claim to the throne. Literally no one. Feodor’s brother-in-law, Boris Godunov was crowned Tsar, largely because he was already the power behind the throne under Feodor, and it was relatively easy for him to seize power.

Dmitry died in 1591, when Feodor was still alive. The investigation into his death found that it was an accident, that he was playing with a knife and had an epileptic seizure; the accepted narrative for centuries was that Godunov had him murdered and covered it up; these days, we have no idea, both narratives sound plausible. 

Unfortunately for Godunov, False Dmitry I was super convincing. He managed to convince a whole army, and when Boris Godunov suddenly died mid-war, he took Moscow, killed Godunov’s wife and son, raped his daughter, and crowned himself Tsar.

After which he was promptly deposed by Vasily Shuisky, a prominent nobleman descended from Grand Princes of Moscow before they were Tsars; Shuisky was in turn deposed by a coalition known as the Seven Boyars, who looked at False Dmitry II and at the Polish army that was, by now, outside their doorstep and agreed to crown the Polish Prince Władysław; the Polish army tried to forcibly convert the whole country to Catholicism, the country rose in revolt in response, Sweden invaded, False Dmitry III declared himself, was captured and killed, and eventually the resistance kicked the Poles out of Moscow.

Once the Poles retreated, the nobles decided to crown one of their own – Mikhail Romanov. He was the great-nephew of Ivan the Terrible’s first wife, but more importantly, he came from a reasonably prominent noble family, he was Russian, and he was young and easy to influence. Which is how the Romanov dynasty first came to power.

By the time things settled down, a third of the population was dead, Moscow was in ruins, and a bunch of land had been annexed by various neighbors.

Like I said. Catastrophe.