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Russia Engages the World, 1453-1825
1453 Through the Reign of Ivan the Terrible (1533-1584) The Time of Troubles to the First Romanovs (1598-1682) Peter the Great and His Legacy (1682-1762) The Age of Catherine the Great (1762-1801) The Reign of Emperor Alexander I (1801-1825)

                                     

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Overview
History
Maps
Personalities
Themes
Translations
  Russia Events
Engagement Symbol The Building of the Kremlin, 1156–1516
Russia Symbol Ivan IV Takes a Wife, 1547
Engagement Symbol Taking of Kazan, 1552
Russia Symbol Printing of the First Book in Moscow, 1564
Russia Symbol Oprichnina, 1564
  World Events
World Symbol
The Golden Horde, 1300s
World Symbol
Ottoman Capture of Constantinople (Istanbul), 1453
Engagement Symbol The Establishment of the Safavid Dynasty, 1502
World Symbol
The Protestant Reformation, 1517
Engagement Symbol The Jenkinson Mission to West Asia, 1558
Special Features


Russia's Globalization:
A Key

Events marked Russia Symbol are specific to Muscovy/Russia's internal development.
Those marked World Symbol are important world historical or cultural events.
Engagement Symbol indicates specific points of sociocultural or military engagement between Muscovy/Russia and foreign powers or individuals.




















 

 

 World Symbol     Ottoman Capture of Constantinople ( Istanbul), 1453

After centuries of incursion by invaders, the city of Constantinople was captured by the Ottoman Turks. Its fall brought to a close the history of the Roman Empire (the western Empire fell to nomadic invasion in the 5th century; Rome was sacked in 410), although by this time there was little left of its glory and once-expansive territories.

The city was named for the Emperor Constantine the Great (d. 337), who adopted Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire. In May of 1453, some 10,000 soldiers under Emperor Constantine XI (r. 1448–53) were overwhelmed by ten times as many well-armed and equipped Ottoman troops. Constantine himself was killed in the siege, fighting for his namesake's legacy.

In 1054, the Christian world was divided in two. Much of western and central Europe recognized the spiritual and political authority of the western, or Roman, Church, led by the Pope in Rome. Territories to the east adhered to Eastern Orthodoxy, with the patriarch in Constantinople at its head. Once Constantinople fell to the Ottoman Turks, it became a center of Islam. Muscovy remained the only independent Eastern Orthodox realm and began assuming the role of defender of the “True Faith,” a role that transcended its borders, drawing it into heightened levels of engagement with the other eastern Christians of Europe and North Africa.