And his wars with Poland and Sweden are the same competition for a better place on the periphery of the world system, among the raw material appendages of the "core" countries, as the Greek-Turkish or Serbo-Bulgarian (Prussian-Austrian, Prussian-Danish, Swedish-Russian etc.) wars a lot later. The Crown and the Grand Duchy were far ahead of Muscovy in socio-economic adaptation to this role: the intensification of corvee economy with the second edition of serfdom, the reform of farms, private cities arranged by tycoons for large incomes from the export of rye, etc., it also made up for military means.

True, by joining the process, Grozny was more successful in modernizing the country than the current liberals - incl. because as a tsar, he did not distinguish between personal and state wool, and it was technically more difficult to transfer income to London. What see “ Peripheral empire"- a qualitative retelling by B.Yu. Kagarlitsky in the works of modern historians of the world-system and neo-Marxist school, who restored "on an increased basis" the concept of development of M.N. Pokrovsky:

the icon "Blessed is the Host of the Heavenly King", painted in honor of the capture of Kazan

« The British "discover" Muscovy

At the beginning of the 16th century, the economy of the Muscovy was developing in about the same way as in other European countries. In 1534, Elena Glinskaya, the mother of the future Tsar Ivan the Terrible, carried out a monetary reform, which replaced the coins of various appanage principalities with a single system. Conditions are emerging for the formation of an all-Russian internal market. Production and trade are growing. The paradox is that the economic upturn is accompanied by an increase in the backwardness of Russia from the West. This seeming contradiction is caused by the fact that, being involved in the general process of development and socio-economic transformation, Russia finds itself on its periphery.

The growth of the economy is taking place against the background of the expansion of the borders of the state. If Western European countries begin to create colonies in America and on the coast of Africa, then Russia is moving east.

The estates are losing their isolation.

"The transformation of bread into a commodity," Pokrovsky notes, "made the land that provided bread also a commodity."

Previous relationships of ownership and mutual responsibility are now in question. However, the boyar patrimony is not sold or divided, it remains a family inheritance.

Market relations are most quickly assimilated in Russia by monasteries. On the contrary, large boyar estates turned out to be a brake on development. Nevertheless, it was impossible to divide them or sell them on the market due to the remaining political power of the boyars. This also makes the Russian situation much like the Spanish one (in contrast to England, where, after the War of the Red and White Rose, the old aristocracy was largely exterminated, and its political influence was undermined). Since the expropriation of the boyars was politically difficult and risky, external expansion seemed to be a reasonable decision: it was possible to obtain land and supply grain to the market without sacrificing the interests of the boyars. However, the war in the Kazan Khanate was not as easy as it seemed at first. After the capture of Kazan, the resistance of local residents in the form of a partisan struggle lasted for about 6 years. The victory was achieved only due to the mass resettlement of Russian colonists from the interior regions of the country to the Volga region. Thousands of peasants died, but they changed the demographic situation in favor of the conquerors. The nobility, on the other hand, was the loser. For 6 years of the war, it was never able to seize new estates for itself, and the number of peasants in the western regions became even smaller. The merchants won more. Merchant capital gained access to the river routes leading to Persia, but this only whetted his appetites.

Now Russia is striving to get rid of trade intermediaries - German merchants who control trade in the eastern Baltic through Riga, Revel, Narva. Meanwhile, Russia is not the only country thwarted by German trade intermediation. In the West of Europe, a new trading power begins to rise - England. She has not yet become the ruler of the seas, and the main problem for the development of British commercial capitalism is the Spanish-Portuguese monopoly in the Atlantic. But German domination in the Baltic also holds back the development of British trade. New markets and new sources of raw materials are needed. Russia can provide both for the British merchant capital.

In 1553, three ships set sail towards Norway, officially with the aim of finding the northern sea route to China, Japan and India. The idea was initially unrealistic. The Northern Sea Route, bypassing Siberia and Chukotka, could not really be laid even in Soviet time with the help of icebreakers. However, in the 16th century, the idea of ​​opening a northern route to China did not seem crazy either in England or in Russia itself. Thirty years after the failure of the English expedition, the Stroganov merchant house made a second attempt of this kind. The Dutch sailors hired by them in 1584 tried to do what the British did not succeed, and, naturally, also failed.

Meanwhile, the British expedition initially pursued a much wider range of goals. Its organizers were looking for new markets, because

"Our merchants discover that the goods and products of England are not in great demand from the countries and peoples around us."

The ships leaving for the voyage carried with them a message from King Edward VI, addressed to no less than "all kings, princes, rulers, judges and governors of the land." This was not only a confirmation of the powers of the travelers, who were both merchants and official representatives of their country.

“The letter described the benefits of free trade in terms that would be appreciated by the economists of the 19th century free-trading school,” writes the English historian T.S. Willan.

Two ships were lost because the crews were not prepared to sail in the Far North. Together with them, the leader of the expedition, Hugh Willoughby, died. But the third ship - "Edward Bonaventure" under the command of Captain Richard Chancellor - entered the mouth of the Northern Dvina. In February 1554, Chancellor was received in Moscow by Ivan the Terrible as the British ambassador. The tsar granted the British trade privileges in Russia, including the right to duty-free trade throughout the country In 1567, the Cossack ataman Ivan Petrov was sent to them with a letter “to unknown peoples”. Together with the Cossack Burkash Yelichev, he walked from the Urals to Beijing, having received in Mongolia a letter to pass through the "iron gates" of the Chinese wall, and then compiled a description of the lands he saw].

After that, Chancellor and his companions returned safely to their homeland. A year later, the Moscow Company was established in London. Its importance is evidenced by the fact that it turned out to be the first such company, the charter of which was approved by parliament. In a sense, the Moscow Company turned out to be not only the prototype of trade and political organizations created to operate in the West Indies and East Indies, but also the predecessor of the transnational corporations of the 20th century.

The commercial activity of the company was closely related to the diplomatic one. The British embassies at the royal court defended the interests of merchants, and the company's representative office dealt with the affairs of the English crown. While in Muscovy, the British wasted no time. Unlike the notes of other travelers, the texts prepared by Chancellor and his comrade John Hass most closely resemble the instructions for the commercial use of Russia. They describe in detail the economic geography of the kingdom of Ivan the Terrible: where and what is produced, what can be bought, what and where can be sold. Soon after this, the English Court appears in Moscow - first one building, and then a whole complex of buildings - residential, commercial, industrial, the remains of which exist in Moscow to this day.

The stone house on Varvarka was presented to the British as a gift from the tsar "as a sign of his special favor." As noted by Russian sources, this company was not enough:

"And the Germans of Aglina built the wooden mansions themselves."

Soon "English houses" appeared in Kholmogory, Yaroslavl, Borisov and other cities. The company's offices were in Novgorod, Pskov, Yaroslavl, Kazan, Astrakhan, Kostroma, Ivan-gorod. In Yaroslavl, the British set up large warehouses for goods, which were then sent to Asia. Protestant churches also appeared in Muscovy. In general, in relation to the Western Reformation, the Moscow rulers took by no means the position of outside observers. "The Russian government," notes the well-known researcher I. Lyubmenko, "being extremely hostile to Catholics, often showed great tolerance towards Protestants."

Northern route

The new trade route was important not only for the British, but also for Muscovy. In 1556, the Russian embassy arrived in England, headed by the boyar Osip Nepeya. Chancellor died bringing the ambassador to London, but he fulfilled his mission. Nepea went down in the history of diplomacy because

"Achieved in London the same benefits that the British received in Moscow."

However, Russian merchants could not use them. They did not have a fleet capable of making long sea voyages.

Regular trade along the northern route began in 1557. Initially, these travels were accompanied by numerous casualties. 6-7 ships left England for navigation, and sometimes no more than half made it back safely. The navigation season was short - the sea froze for 5-6 months. However, as the British sailors gained experience in sailing in the northern latitudes, these voyages became less risky. Nevertheless, the company periodically complained about losses - the raids of the Tatars, pirates, northern storms - all this damaged trade. The raid of the Crimean Khan Devlet-Girey on Moscow caused the company a loss for a huge amount of 10 thousand rubles at that time (which, incidentally, testifies to the huge turnover of the company). About 40 of the 60 Englishmen who were in Moscow at the time were killed in the fire. The Tatar pogrom apparently made a strong impression on the company's management, and therefore already under Tsar Fedor, the British donated 350 pounds for the construction of a new stone wall around Moscow.

The shareholders of the company were repeatedly called upon to make additional investments - 50 pounds per share in 1570, 200 pounds in 1572. But they were not going to wind up the case. And the reason for this is not only in the high profits that from time to time it was possible to get from trade with Muscovy, but also in the importance of these supplies for the general military-political situation in England. They brought from Russia not just northern goods, but strategic raw materials.

As Willan notes, 16th century Anglo-Russian trade

"In many ways resembled the exchange that developed between England and her colonies." Wood, wax, leather, meat, bacon, sometimes grain, flax, hemp, blubber, resin, ropes, and ship masts were supplied from Russia to England. The king himself bargained. According to the British, he was "one of the most important suppliers of wax and sable furs."

Wax was an extremely profitable commodity - candles were made from it, and a huge amount of them was required to illuminate Gothic cathedrals. This made it possible for the king to assert that wax is not a simple commodity, but a sacred, "reserved" one. And the kings should trade it. Such a monopoly for other Russian merchants was a sheer punishment, and the British were not cheap, but for Tsar Ivan it turned out to be extremely profitable. As for the goods brought from England, the king demanded the right of the first sale, and paid inaccurately. In this, however, the tsar also did not differ from his contemporaries. Elizabeth of England also did not like to pay debts.

During the oprichnina, the English company tried to get the tsar to return the money owed to her by the boyars executed by the tsar. The tsar listened to the claims, but did not give the money, recommending to his English partners to lend out to Muscovites less often. However, sometimes bad debts were returned. During the Bose embassy, ​​Ivan the Terrible suddenly ordered the payment of 3,000 marks, which had already been written off by the company.

"Moscow company"

The British brought to Moscow paper, sugar, salt, textiles, dishes, copper, lead tiles for roofing, and luxury goods. London cloth in Russian markets was called "lundysh". Of no small importance were the "exotic" goods that came to Russia from America and Asia through the "Moscow Company". In the lists of supplied goods, we also find almonds, raisins, horse harnesses, medicines, musical instruments, halberds, jewelry, dishes and even ... lions. Bells and precious metals were also transported, which were prohibited for export from England, but an exception was made for Russia by a special order of the crown. And yet, it was especially important for Moscow that lead, gunpowder, saltpeter, sulfur and, apparently, weapons and ammunition arrived on the British ships.

Of course, the Moscow Company was not a monopoly in trade with the West. German, Dutch, Italian, Danish, even Spanish and Italian entrepreneurs rushed to Muscovy. However, it was the British in the 16th century who managed to bring trade cooperation to the level of state policy.

In 1557 the British set up a rope-making facility in Kholmogory. Vologda became another production center of the company. By 1560, local workers had already mastered the technology, and most of the English craftsmen were returning to their homeland. English craftsmen were paid 9 pounds a year during their stay in Kholmogory (of which 2 pounds a year were deposited into their account in England). It was quite decent money for that time, but the influx of precious metals from America caused a frenzied inflation that went down in history as the "price revolution". As it turns out, this happened not only in Western Europe. 25 years after the first English workshops appeared in Muscovy, a certain John Finch, referring to the high cost, already demanded an increase in salary of up to 42 rubles a year - for English money this amounted to 28 pounds. As T.S. Willan, this is evidence that the 'price revolution' has reached Russia during this time. "

In 1558, Anthony Jenkinson, a representative of the Moscow Company, received the Tsar's permission for an expedition to Persia and Bukhara along the Volga route. Although a significant part of the purchased goods was lost on the way back, the brought was enough to justify the company's activities in a commercial sense for a long time. At the same time, the English merchant carried out in Persia and the diplomatic assignment of Ivan the Terrible. The Moscow tsar sought an alliance with the Persians against the Turks.

In the early days of capitalism, politics was overtly intertwined with trade. Azerbaijani researcher L.I. Yunusova notes that Jenkinson's commercial success was largely determined by the fact that he was "not just an English merchant, but an envoy of the Russian Tsar."

Jenkinson's mission marked the beginning of a long period of rivalry-cooperation between English and Russian capital in the Caspian. On the one hand, Moscow, and later Petersburg, needed foreign partners. Trade with Persia was largely transit. The British helped to establish trade routes, on British and later Dutch ships Persian silk and other goods were exported further to Europe. But, on the other hand, the partners waged a fierce struggle among themselves. Both of them sought to retain the maximum share of the profits from the Persian trade.

Jenkinson achieved trade privileges in Persia similar to those in Moscow. English expeditions to Persia followed one after another - in 1564, 1565, 1568, 1569 and 1579. This caused fears in Moscow, where they did not want to give up such a lucrative trade route to foreigners. In the future, the royal court takes measures to ensure that the Volga trade remains under its control, and the activities of the British in this direction are limited. Trade expeditions to the south could only be undertaken with the royal permission and joint forces. Despite all the problems, the Persian trade was a real "gold mine" for the company, but by the beginning of the 17th century, another, safer and easier way to Persia through Indian Ocean... The East India Company began exporting Persian goods to the West in significant quantities, thereby reducing the commercial attractiveness of the Volga route. Later, another transit route appeared - through Turkey. Nevertheless, trade with Persia through the Caspian continues, leading to the heyday of Astrakhan.

Partners or competitors?

Subsequently, the activities of the Moscow Company became a topic of heated discussion among Russian historians. The 19th century historian N. Kostomarov drew attention to the fact that the British merchants, organized around the Moscow Company, were closely associated with their government, acted in concert, often even to the detriment of their compatriots who did not have political support in London. Kostomarov is convinced that the British had "extensive types of political dominance in Russia."

It is easy to guess that this thesis was very popular among Soviet historians, especially in the early years " cold war". A number of Soviet authors argued that the British had found a backward country in Russia and "strove in every possible way to consolidate this backwardness," "prevented the Russians from mastering and studying advanced technology," followed "by pressure and blackmail."

On the contrary, historians of the "Westernizing" wing saw in the English merchants representatives of an advanced civilization who carried knowledge to the backward Russian people. Only at the beginning of the 60s of the XX century Ya.S. Lurie tried to demythologize the history of Anglo-Russian relations in the 16th century.

In fact, the activities of the British in Russia were accompanied by numerous mutual claims between Russian and British partners. Complaints of Russian merchants about foreign competition are repeated regularly, starting from the second half of XVI century and ending with the era of the first Romanovs. In the petition of 1646, filed with the tsarist government against the "English Germans", the claims are about the same as in the documents more early period... The Russians accused the British of manipulating prices, the British, in turn, complained about the unreliability of Russian merchants, frequent delays, and fraud.

Often the complaints of the British (and foreigners in general) who were in Muscovy in the 16th-17th centuries look rather comical. Thus, foreigners complained that they were being “fed”, clearly trying to harm their health with excessive treats. In Muscovy of those times, it was indecent to get up from the table on your own, and if the next day the guests did not complain of feeling unwell due to excessive food and drink, then the feast was considered unsuccessful.

Communicating with Russian partners, the British noticed that those words did not hold,

"And if they start to swear and swear, then they probably want to deceive."

The Russians' ability to combine ingenuity and enterprise with carelessness and dishonesty could not fail to amaze the Protestants, however, as Kostomarov notes, the mutual claims of Russian and Western merchants never prevented them from "deceiving the government together."

In fairness, it should be noted that backdating the situation always looks more dramatic than it actually is. The fact is that the cases when the parties dispersed amicably leave fewer traces in the documents. It is when mutual claims arise that people begin to write complaints, apply to various authorities, thereby providing material for future historians. Paradoxically, it is the sheer number of all kinds of complaints that testifies to the scope and intensity of trade relations between the British and the Russians.

In reality, of course, the main problems were not at all in cultural contradictions. Having settled in Muscovy, the British began to trade in the domestic market, successfully competing with local merchants. They organized their own network of suppliers and a system of bulk purchasing, providing loans to manufacturers [ as then in the Ottoman Empire and ]. This order, notes Kostomarov,

"Was beneficial for small traders and for the people in general, but ruinous for Russian wholesalers." The law of commercial capitalism is that the market is controlled by the one with the big capital. Having an advantage in financial resources, the British also took a stronger position than their Russian competitors.

Behavior English merchants in Muscovy caused discontent not only among their competitors among the Russian merchants, but also among many in England itself. There was a belief in London that the Russian soil was corrupting the employees of the company. Once in Muscovy, they rapidly enriched themselves, built luxurious mansions, which London shareholders could not afford, adopted local customs, kept servants, dogs and bears. They began, like the Moscow boyars, to overeat to stomach cramps. In London, it was believed that Russia was corrupting the British with the temptation of excessive freedom, and those who lived in Moscow did not want to return to puritanical abstinence. Ambassador Bowes openly complained about his poverty to Grozny. When company employees were recalled, they did everything to stay. Some for the sake of this switched to the Russian service and even accepted Orthodoxy.

Later, in the 17th century, the English ambassador John Merik complained to the tsarist officials about his own people, merchants and clerks, who, without the knowledge of the company, marry Russian women. The ambassador was worried about such marriages only by the material side: converting to Orthodoxy on the occasion of marriage, the British became Russian subjects and avoided paying debts to their compatriots. Merik demanded not to allow marriages until the company confirms the payment of all the promissory notes. However, the Russians pretended not to understand what they were talking about and assured the Englishman that

"They do not marry by force, and in the Muscovite state they do not leave anyone by force."

Trade with the British was so important for Ivan the Terrible that he ordered the boyar Boris Godunov, at that moment, the rising star of the Kremlin administration, to deal with their affairs. The British called Godunov in their own way "protector". The English astrologer, known in Moscow as Elisha Bomelius, was especially influential at the tsar's court. In addition to predicting the future, he also performed more practical tasks of the ruler: he prepared poisons for him, collected information about the boyars suspected of treason.

“The fame of Bomelia,” writes S.F. Platonov, - was so broad, and the fame of his power was so noisy that even a dull provincial chronicle of that time told about him in an epic and fairy-tale tone. "

According to the chronicler, the "fierce sorcerer" Bomelius was guilty of all the troubles that the reign of Grozny brought down on the country. The English astrologer instilled in the tsar "ferocity" in relation to his own subjects and tuned him in favor of the "Germans" Platonov, in a number of sources. For example, the clerk Ivan Timofeev complains that the tsar, instead of "good-minded nobles", brought foreigners closer to him and fell under their influence to such an extent that "all that was inside him was in the hand of a barbarian." Platonov remarks to this that we are dealing with a clear exaggeration, for "the foreigners, although they were kept in the oprichnina, did not have any meaning in it" (ibid.). Which, in a technical sense, is certainly true. But this is not only about the personal participation of certain overseas guests in making specific decisions. Pointing to the influence of foreigners, Ivan's contemporaries instinctively felt that the very essence of the Tsar's policy, its logic was dictated not only by internal circumstances, but also by some other motives, more understandable for foreigners than for Russians].

The question, however, is not what was the behavior of the British, but what the Russian government expected of them. Karamzin is sure that establishing ties with England, the Tsar of Muscovy used the opportunity to "borrow from foreigners what was most needed for her civic education." Historians note that Ivan the Terrible patronized foreigners so much that there was "a lot of insult to his subjects, whom he willingly belittled before foreigners." However, the Russian tsar's interest in foreigners was quite practical. Ivan the Terrible tried to find an English military-trade ally in Elizabeth.

Strategic alliance

The fact that both the British and Russian governments gave preference to organized merchants from the Moscow Company over single merchants, both Russians and British, indicates that both sides tried to solve their problems at the state level. The mutual interest of Elizabeth of England and Ivan the Terrible is completely natural. If the Swedes and Germans needed to maintain their commercial dominance in the eastern part of the Baltic, the British, on the contrary, needed to gain access to Russian resources without the intermediation of the Riga and Revel merchants. Likewise, Muscovy tried to find direct access to European markets. However, the trade tasks of England and Muscovy could not be solved peacefully.

The German cities of Livonia, which controlled the flow of Russian goods to the West, sought to preserve the position of monopoly intermediaries at any cost. K.N. Bestuzhev-Ryumin in his "Russian History" recalls that the Hanseatic merchants

“They tried to derive as much benefit from this trade as possible, setting it up for others with the most restrictive conditions: foreigners, especially the Dutch, were forbidden to study in Russian and trade directly with the Russians; the import of silver into Russia was prohibited, trade with Russians on credit was prohibited, etc. "

In 1547, artists and craftsmen recruited for the Russian tsar in Germany were detained at the request of the Livonians in Lubeck, despite the fact that there was permission from Emperor Charles V to recruit specialists. Later, a certain Schlitte, a Saxon who was recruiting personnel for Moscow, was taken into custody in Livonia, and one of his men was executed.

In order to understand why government intervention from both London and Moscow was so intense, just look at the list of goods supplied to each other by both sides: it was not only and not so much about commerce, but about military-technical cooperation.

Individual consignments of weapons can also be supplied by individual traders, but systematic military supplies were already coordinated at the state level in the 16th century. The effectiveness of such cooperation is ensured by the fact that the sale of weapons is combined with the supply of military materials and the transfer of technology, the arrival of specialists, etc. Deliveries from Russia were a decisive factor in the development of the British navy. Russian-English cooperation was part of the Anglo-Spanish confrontation. The Spanish king Philip II was preparing to invade England, and Elizabeth of England was urgently creating a fleet.

“To cut off England and the Netherlands from Eastern European raw materials meant to destroy these states,” wrote the historian Ya.S. Lurie. - This is exactly the goal that Philip II sought in Poland, Sweden and Russia. In Poland, his diplomats had little success. In Russia they have failed completely. "

"The English fleet, built during these years and defeating the Spanish Invincible Armada in 1588, was equipped mainly with Russian materials",

- notes the Swedish historian Arthur Attman.

Moscow Company was the official supplier royal navy... “Russia was not a monopoly supplier of ropes and gear, which were also imported from the Baltic countries, but Russian supplies were especially important for Elizabeth’s fleet, and ropes and tackle for the then fleet were as important as oil for the modern,” Willan writes.

The British sailors admitted that the tackle supplied from Russia was "the best brought into the country." In addition, the ropes and tackles that came from Muscovy were cheaper than those that were supplied from other places. Therefore, Willan concludes, northern trade "was more important to England than to Russia."

In turn, Ivan the Terrible asked England for the supply of military materials, weapons, engineers, knowledgeable in artillery, architects familiar with the construction of fortifications. As soon as the Livonian War began in 1557, rumors spread throughout Europe about British weapons in the hands of the Muscovites. Poland and Sweden protested. In Cologne and Hamburg, large consignments of weapons purchased by the British were blocked, as the Germans feared that the equipment was actually intended for the troops of Ivan the Terrible. Elizabeth of England, of course, denied everything. Not only did she assure other monarchs that there was no military cooperation with Muscovy, she in every possible way belittled the scale of trade, claiming that we were talking about several merchant ships that almost accidentally swam into the mouth of the Northern Dvina. The merchants, of course, were peaceful people, thinking exclusively about commercial benefits.

One episode testifies to how “peaceful people” the employees of the “Moscow Company” were. In 1570, at the height of the Livonian War, Swedish corsairs attacked English merchants transporting "Russian" cargo. As a result of the ensuing battle, the flagship (!) Of the Swedes was taken on board and captured by "peaceful merchants". The victorious report was immediately sent by representatives of the company to Moscow and brought to the attention of the Russian authorities.

Nevertheless, British diplomats across Europe denied "rumors" of military cooperation: for this purpose a special embassy was sent to the continent. In the meantime, the troops of Ivan the Terrible, from nowhere, appeared weapons and military technology, suspiciously reminiscent of the British.

In 1558, an employee of the company, Thomas Alcock, captured by the Poles, admitted that military supplies had taken place, but justified himself by the fact that

"They imported only old, worthless weapons."

Engineer Locke would hardly agree with this, boasting in his letters that with his help Moscow learned to make the most advanced weaponry in Europe. In the meantime, not only British doctors and pharmacists are arriving in Russia, but also architects and specialists "for the construction of stone buildings." Taking into account the fact that Ivan the Terrible several times wrote directly to London about the fact that he needed help in carrying out fortification works, it becomes clear what kind of "stone buildings" we are talking about.

The surviving documents also leave no doubt about what was in the holds of the ships of the Moscow Company. They brought in saltpeter, lead, sulfur, gunpowder. Although, of course, not all supplies were strategically intended. The British, not being winemakers themselves, brought wine to Muscovy. Moscow consumers were undemanding. Therefore, they imported

"Various spoiled wines, sweet wines, wines with a lot of cider."

Probably, they were carrying many other things, because not all deliveries were documented.

Cooperation between England and Muscovy was strategic as well as commercial. Trade of the XVI-XVII centuries is inseparable from the war. Having opened the way from Northern Europe to the mouth of the Northern Dvina, the British quickly made it attractive to others Western countries... However, the Russian Pomors themselves did not have either the technology or the resources to build a serious fleet. Moreover, it was in principle impossible to create a serious fleet in the north, even if the British had helped in its construction. This required not only a lot of forest and know-how. In the end, specialists can be ordered from abroad, as Peter I did later. But a strong fleet can only be based in large port cities. The Northern Dvina was too remote from the rest of Russia, there were too few resources and people to compete with Riga. And it was unprofitable to develop trade there - the sea freezes in winter. The main flow of Russian goods went through the German-owned Revel and through the Swedish Vyborg.

The "Moscow company" was in the fiercest competition with them [Attman notes that up to the beginning of the Livonian War, it was through Revel that most of Novgorod's exports passed through and, in fact, it was precisely as a transit port for Novgorod that this city developed and flourished (P. 35)]. In order to gain access to new trade routes, Russia needed trading positions in the Baltic, and therefore German merchants, who at first were opponents and then leading partners of the Novgorodians, are again turning into opponents - now for Muscovy. Russia needed its own large port on the Baltic. And with the outbreak of the Livonian War, she received it.

Livonian war

In his study of the origin of the modern world economic system, Immanuel Wallerstein argues that during the Livonian War Ivan the Terrible tried to "achieve the autonomy of the Russian state in relation to the European world economy," and in this sense, the Tsar's policy that led to the war was not only not a defeat, but on the contrary, it was a "gigantic success." As a result of Ivan the Terrible's policy, “Russia was not drawn into the European world economy,” which allowed our country to preserve a developed national bourgeoisie and subsequently become not a periphery, but a semi-periphery of world capitalism. It is curious that Wallerstein's reasoning coincides with the official propaganda myth that prevailed in Stalin's times. Meanwhile, the Livonian War was not only a military disaster, but was also caused by the desire of the tsarist government at any cost to achieve inclusion in the emerging world system.

At first glance, the integration of Russia into the world system proceeded quite successfully in the 16th century. As Artur Attman notes, Russia has always had an active trade balance in relation to Western countries.

"As for the Russian market, from the Middle Ages and at least until the middle of the 17th century, each of these countries had to spend precious metals to cover their trade deficit."

The situation for Russia as a whole was better than for Poland - despite the fact that both countries often traded in the same goods (but Poland, unlike Russia, could not act as a supplier of furs on the world market) [Wallerstein believes that Ivan's policy Grozny helped the Russian bourgeoisie and the monarchy avoid "at least during that period, the fate that befell the Polish elites." hindsight can be considered "luck". But in reality, Moscow's military defeats did not at all isolate it from the world system, but simply forced it to integrate on less favorable terms. As for Poland, the struggle between it and Russia for a place in the world system continued until Poland disappeared from the map of Europe].

Yet Russian trade in the 16th century is a paradoxical phenomenon. On the one hand, there is a positive balance, a constant influx of hard currency. In other words, Russia benefited from world trade by providing capital accumulation. On the other hand, the trade structure is clearly peripheral. Willan's similarity to the American colonies is far from coincidental. Colonies in North America (New England) were originally conceived as raw material bases that were supposed to replace or supplement the products received from Russia. However, as noted by the famous researcher of colonial history, J.L. Beer,

"Attempts to secure shipments from New England of tar, tar, hemp and other shipbuilding supplies over a long period have ended in complete failure."

Free American colonists from the very beginning produced not what the mother country needed, but what was beneficial to them. The economic structure of New England spontaneously reproduced the British economy. In such a situation, the supply of raw materials from Russia remained indispensable for the British fleet and industry throughout the entire 17th and 18th centuries.

Russia is exporting raw materials and importing technologies. It competes in the world market with other countries and territories that make up the periphery of the emerging world system. This combination of strength and vulnerability predetermined the inevitable aggressiveness of Muscovy's foreign policy, as well as its subsequent failures.

When Wallerstein, comparing Russia with Poland, concludes that Ivan the Terrible fought to avoid the fate of Poland, which became an appendage of the European world system, he is deeply mistaken. The Russian tsar sought just the opposite, unsuccessfully trying to occupy in the emerging world system the very place that Poland occupied in the 16th-17th centuries. Contemporaries were well aware of the fact that Russia and Poland were competitors on the world market. In the 17th century, Dutch trade representatives in Moscow directly discussed these issues with the tsar, insisting on the expansion of Russian grain exports.

Contrary to Wallerstein's opinion, the ruling circles of Russia did not strive to resist the expansion of the West, but, on the contrary, to join the world system - as its periphery, but on their own terms. In turn, Poland and Sweden in this war defended the places that they had already occupied in the world-economy by the middle of the 16th century.

At first, the Livonian War developed successfully for the Russian troops. Starting hostilities, Ivan the Terrible took advantage of a completely ridiculous and deliberately far-fetched pretext, recalling the non-payment of the tribute by the Dorpat bishop, which had never been recalled for 50 years. Ideologically, the order was undermined by the reformation, its troops were few in number. Unlike the conflicts of the 17th century, the armament of the Russian troops was not yet much inferior to the western ones. The presence of British military specialists also affected. Artillery and metalworking were at a completely modern level for those years, which predetermined the rapid success of the tsarist troops at the first stage of the war. The Livonian Order suffered a crushing defeat. In May 1558, Russian troops took Narva, a key port and fortress that opened the way to the Baltic.

In turn, for England the capture of Narva opened up direct access to Russian raw materials. However, for the shareholders of the Moscow Company this was by no means good news, since the northern route, which it had mastered with such difficulty, was losing its attractiveness. After the Russians took Narva, English ships arrive there. In fact, the Narva port was not very convenient, and the conditions for doing business were incomparably worse here than in Reval. However, Narva attracted western traders. As noted by the American researcher Walter Kirchner,

"As in the case of the northern route, traders here were attracted to Russia by the potential of this market, and not by the real state of affairs."

In 1566, 42 ships already visited Narva, and trade is booming. Compared to this, the 6-7 ships sailing the northern route seem like an insignificant trade operation. The monopoly of the "Moscow Company" does not extend to Narva, everyone who wants to float here.

In turn, the company protests, complains that traders who have no experience of working in Muscovy are bringing in all sorts of rubbish and undermining the reputation of British goods. If in the case of the Northern Sea Route, official London was completely on the side of the Moscow Company, in every possible way protecting its monopoly, then in the conflict around the Narva voyage, the company has to yield. Here trade is already reaching such proportions that military-strategic considerations cannot but be pushed aside by commercial ones. It is significant that Elizaveta, who previously supported the Moscow Company in everything, this time is in no hurry to take measures against the Narva merchants. The company was not only a trading company, but also a political instrument of England in Russia, however, with the capture of Narva, one of the key political goals was achieved. Of course, this does not indicate a change in policy, especially since the compromise reached between the company and its competitors keeps the company in a dominant position. All English merchants can now reap the benefits of her efforts. The issue of Narva trade is discussed in parliament, the monopoly is ultimately confirmed, but in such a form that for the company, in a commercial sense, it turns out to be a Pyrrhic victory.

Narva swimming

Before the Livonian War, Narva was not so much a trading port as a fortress that blocked the Russians' access to the Baltic. But after 1559, Narva trade developed rapidly: in addition to the British, merchants from many European countries appeared here. The largest number of ships arrived in Narva from the Netherlands. Having extensive experience in trading in the Baltic, the Dutch immediately took advantage of the new opportunities that had opened up. Large-scale construction begins in the city, business life is in full swing. In 1566 98 ships from Narva passed through Riga, and only 35 ships left Riga to the west. In 1567, no less than 70 English ships were sent here. With the passing of Narva under the rule of Russia, the Revel port fell into decay (even after the end of the war, Narva continued to undermine its position). Another German port on the Baltic, Königsberg, suffered less damage, for Polish exports went through it.

At first, the Swedes tried to compensate for the losses by introducing duty-free trade for Russian merchants in Vyborg. At the same time, Swedish pirates terrorized merchants heading to Narva [Attman notes that Vyborg trade was an item for the bots of Swedish kings during the 16th-17th centuries. They deliberately pursued a policy that was supposed to direct Russian trade flows through Swedish ports. In 1550, Gustav Vasa prepared a corresponding study of the Russian market. In 1640, the Swedish resident in Moscow Peter Loofeldt prepared a new study, where he drew attention to the growing activity of the British and Dutch in Arkhangelsk and proposed measures to strengthen the Swedish position in the Russian market]. To protect the port, the tsar was forced to hire the German privateer Carsten Rode and asked for help from the British.

Despite all the efforts of the Swedes, Vyborg was unable to occupy a dominant position in the eastern part of the Baltic. The trade objectives of the Livonian War were achieved. Meanwhile, starting the war, Ivan the Terrible relied not only on the merchants, but also on the land-poor nobility. “The bourgeoisie was satisfied,” writes Pokrovsky, “for them the continuation of the war no longer made sense. When the order's embassy arrived in Moscow to seek peace, it found support from the Moscow merchants. But the success made a completely different impression on the "army". The campaign of 1558 yielded a huge booty - the war in a rich, cultured country was not at all the same as the fight against foreigners in distant Kazan or the pursuit of the elusive Crimeans across the steppes. The landowners already dreamed of a lasting conquest of all of Livonia and the distribution of German knights to the estates of the rich manors. This distribution has actually begun. But the transition to the rule of Russia of the entire southeastern coast of the Baltic lifted the whole of Eastern Europe to its feet: neither the Swedes nor the Poles could allow this. "

The capture of Reval and Riga would give Russia a chance to enter European trade without intermediaries. Poland could not allow the transfer of Riga to the rule of Russia, which was its main competitor on the world market. The era of trade wars began, for which Muscovy was not ready, above all - diplomatically and politically. Having defeated the Livonian knights, Ivan the Terrible faced the combined forces of Sweden and Poland. Polish merchant capital was in the same situation as Russian, and therefore the domination of Russia in the Baltic would mean a disaster for it. In 1561, the Swedes occupied Revel, and the Poles annexed most of Livonia. Ivan the Terrible tried to avoid a war with the Swedes, but it was too late. Negotiations with the Swedish king Eric XIV ended due to palace coup, after which Johann III stood at the head of Sweden, categorically rejecting any concessions to the Muscovites.

As Pokrovsky notes, at the first stage of the war, the victories of the Russian troops

"They were provided only by a colossal numerical superiority: where the order could field hundreds of soldiers, there were tens of thousands of Muscovites."

With the entry of Sweden and Poland into the war, the balance of forces is changing. It was already difficult to deal with the Polish army. When superbly armed, organized and trained Swedish troops (perhaps the best in Europe at that time) appeared on the battlefield, the state of affairs became simply catastrophic. Prince Kurbsky, the best of the governors of Grozny, lost the battle of Nevel to 4 thousand Poles, having 15 thousand troops, and in 1564 near Orsha the Russian army was completely defeated. Senior warlords were killed, the enemy got guns, carts. And most importantly, the fighting spirit of the Moscow army was broken. A split occurred in the coalition that supported Grozny's reforms.

Oprichnina

The more difficult the military situation became, the more the tsar had a field for maneuvers.

“In an atmosphere of foreign policy failures,” writes the Soviet historian R.G. Skrynnikov, - the tsar's associates strongly advised to establish a dictatorship in the country and crush the opposition with the help of terror and violence. But in the Russian state, not a single major political decision could be made without approval in the Boyar Duma. Meanwhile, the position of the Duma and the church leadership was known and did not promise any success for the enterprise. "

Trying to put pressure on the Duma, the tsar left Moscow, announced his abdication from the throne. Before the whole country, the tsar presented himself as offended and "expelled" by the boyars from his own capital. The Duma was forced to reject the tsar's abdication and itself turned to him with assurances of loyalty.

Having undermined the political positions of the Duma, the tsar announced that in order to "protect" his life, he was forced to divide his entire land into "Zemshchina" and "Oprichnina". If the "Zemshchina" remained under the control of the Boyar Duma, then the oprichnina was subordinated to the personal power of Ivan the Terrible. Here everything was organized as in an appanage principality, the affairs of the king's appointees, who did not have a noble past, were in charge. Here they selected "artistic" nobles who had no ties with the boyar aristocracy. They willingly took foreigners to the guardsmen service. The oprichnina army staffed in this way became a reliable instrument of the tsar in the struggle against internal opposition.

Moscow has witnessed bloody executions. The real and imaginary opponents of the king, accused of conspiracy, ascended the scaffold. At the direction of Ivan the Terrible, the chronicles were corrected in accordance with the changed political situation, and legends about boyar conspiracies recorded under the dictation of the tsarist people replaced nonexistent investigative materials.

However, the oprichnina was not just a terrorist organization in the service of the tsar. Oprichnina meant the beginning of a large land redistribution. On the territory of the oprichnina, the confiscation of boyar possessions began, which provided for the tsar's promotions. The tsar twice tried to satisfy the land hunger of the petty nobility. The first time during the Kazan campaign, the second time during the Livonian War. But in neither case was the goal achieved. There was only one way out - the expropriation of the feudal aristocracy. On the territory of the oprichnina, not only unrestrained terror began against the old boyar families and their supporters, but also land redistribution. In place of feudal estates, landowners' farms, much smaller in size, arose. The boyar patrimony was large enough to live its own closed life. She supplied to the market only the surplus of her production. The new estates, on the other hand, were not self-sufficient; from the very beginning, they produced a significant part of their products for exchange in the market.

The redistribution of property that took place in the oprichnina is strikingly similar to what was happening in England several decades earlier during the Reformation carried out by Henry VIII. The English aristocracy was largely exterminated during the war of the Scarlet and White Rose, and therefore huge monastic possessions were destroyed. The "new nobility" that settled on the occupied land laid the foundations of rural capitalism. The more the estates were oriented towards the market, the stronger the connection between the “new nobility” and the urban bourgeoisie became: in the civil war of the 17th century they acted as allies.

The land redistribution, carried out by Ivan the Terrible, also received the full support of the merchant capital. It is significant that all the main trade cities and routes fell into the oprichnina:

“Of all the roads that connected Moscow with the borders, perhaps only the roads to the south, to Tula and Ryazan, were left unattended by the oprichnina,” writes the famous historian S.F. Platonov, "we think because their customs and any other profitability was not great, and their entire length was in the restless places of southern Ukraine."

This approach cannot be explained by concern for defense - from a military point of view, it was the unsafe southern roads that should have attracted attention in the first place. But the oprichnina was not so much a military organization as a socio-political one.

“It was not for nothing that the British, who dealt with the northern regions, asked to be transferred to the jurisdiction of the oprichnina,” notes Platonov. , and, apparently, was not afraid of the horrors with which we associate the idea of ​​the oprichnina. "

Mikhail Pokrovsky, quoting this statement, sarcastically adds:

“Another would be to be afraid of what was created with the participation of this very capital”.

Skrynnikov also notes the economic successes of the British achieved in the oprichnina. They were given the right to look for iron in the oprichnina districts, "and where they successfully find it, build a house for making this iron." The privileges of foreign capital in the oprichnina were not limited to this.

"It is curious that it was the oprichnina government for the first time in Russian history that granted concessions to foreign capital, and that these concessions were located exclusively within the oprichnina."

As Pokrovsky notes, the oprichnina represented the expropriation of the boyars by the petty nobility, focused on commodity production, primarily on the grain trade. Oprichnina, Pokrovsky believes, "followed the line of natural economic development."

Meanwhile, the Livonian War was hopelessly lost. Attacks against the Swedes in Reval were undertaken twice - in 1570 and 1577, both times ending in heavy defeats. In 1571 Crimean Tatars reached Moscow, subjecting the city to terrible ruin. Contemporaries wrote about 800 thousand dead and 150 thousand taken into slavery. Even if these figures are exaggerated, we are talking about a real catastrophe in a country whose population did not exceed 10 million.

The oprichnina terror takes on a "senseless and merciless" character against the backdrop of military setbacks and chronic lack of funds. Expropriations turn into a common robbery, not only for the benefit of the treasury, but also for the benefit of the guardsmen themselves. Discontent is growing in the country, to which the authorities are responding with increased terror. The pinnacle of madness was the defeat of Veliky Novgorod in January 1570 by the tsar. At first, almost the entire local elite, including women and children, was massacred by the tsar and the guardsmen. The clergy did not escape reprisals either. Then a real pogrom began in the city.

According to the famous historian R.G. Skrynnikov, the guardsmen “made a uniform attack on the city. They plundered the Novgorod bargaining and divided the most valuable of the loot among themselves. Simple goods such as lard, wax, flax, they piled up in large heaps and burned. During the days of the pogrom, large stocks of goods destined for trade with the West were destroyed. Not only the auctions, but also the houses of the townspeople were robbed. The guardsmen broke down the gates, exposed doors, and beat windows. Citizens who tried to resist the violence were killed on the spot. The tsar's servants persecuted the poor with particular cruelty. As a result of the famine, many beggars gathered in Novgorod. In severe frosts, the king ordered to drive them all out of the city gates. Most of these people died from cold and hunger. "

Despite the terror, and largely because of it, the government's position remained unstable. In 1567, Ivan the Terrible stipulates in his letters the receipt political asylum in England - in case enemies defeat him at home. And more weapons. And architects for the construction of fortresses. And even better - the English fleet for the war with Poland and Sweden. Elizabeth promises asylum. Weapons, apparently, continue to arrive, although clearly not in the quantities that Tsar Ivan had hoped for. But the queen openly refuses to enter the Livonian War. Naturally, the cunning and cautious Elizabeth could not agree to this. And the point here is not only the fear of a war on two fronts - a conflict with Spain is brewing, and the war in the Baltic is an unaffordable luxury for England. In addition, the fleet, which is to "rule the seas", has not yet been built (it is precisely for its creation that ropes and masts from Narva are needed). But Elizabeth has another reason to be careful. No matter how important its interests in Russia are, the British also conduct active trade in Poland and do not intend to sacrifice it. London is quite happy with the current state of affairs.

However, having refused to send a navy to Moscow, Elizabeth did not completely ignore the requests of her partner. In 1572 at least 16 British sailors were in the tsar's service in Narva. They are trying 130 years before Peter the Great to create a Russian military fleet in the Baltic, train people, help build ships. Only later, in 1582, two English warships were sent to the White Sea, and all the merchants were told "by the sovereign's word" to wait for the British, and then they went in a caravan "with all the ships together."

The embassy of Thomas Randolph in 1568 confronts the tsar with a fact: we will trade, but we will not conclude an open military alliance. Ivan the Terrible has repeatedly expressed his displeasure, but, in turn, was forced to accept the conditions of the British, realizing that he simply had no other choice. The privileges of the "Moscow Company" were confirmed in 1569 in the maximum volume and were, according to Lyubimenko,

"Undoubtedly the culmination point in the history of the successes achieved by the company with the Russian supreme power."

Difficulties began shortly thereafter. In 1571, against the backdrop of a worsening military situation in Livonia, Ivan the Terrible again tried to get the British to intervene directly. The tsar repeatedly complained that Elizabeth was interested in "not royal" but "merchant" affairs - trade, finance. I must say that these complaints were clearly demagogic - the tsar himself did not disdain trade either. But such complaints should, in modern terms, shift the focus of the discussion from trade to military-political issues. Unable to achieve what he wanted, the Moscow tsar tried to influence the commercial interests of the British. Privileges were revoked, English goods were seized. It is significant that this crisis in Anglo-Russian relations coincides with the crisis of Ivan's regime. But the king was in a disadvantageous position. In 1572, trade resumes on English terms.

Disaster in Livonia and Dutch successes

In 1581 Narva was lost. Together with her, the Swedes occupied the old Novgorod fortress Ivangorod. The Livonian War finally took on a catastrophic character for Muscovy. A year later, the privileges of the British in Russia were once again confirmed, but to a limited extent. Ivan the Terrible again tries to use trade as a pretext for an open alliance, this time a dynastic one. He asks for the hand of an English princess from the house of the Tudors [In popular historical literature, it is widely believed that the king asked for the hand of Elizabeth of England herself. However, there is no confirmation of this in the documents].

In general, this idea originated in 1568, but only now it has become the subject of diplomatic negotiations. Lady Mary Hastings was introduced to the Russian ambassador, Fyodor Pisemsky, who, apparently, did not make much of an impression on him. The British delayed, and in 1584 Ivan the Terrible died.

The result of the reign of Ivan the Terrible was the lost war in Livonia and the internal disorder in the state. The struggle for the Baltic coast turned into a complete defeat for Russia, when it was necessary not only to abandon the seized ports in the Baltic, but also to cede its own territories. Polish troops led by Stefan Batory were at the walls of Smolensk and almost took the city. The Moscow state was devastated by the war and exhausted. Swedish hegemony was established in the Baltic for more than a hundred years. The Swedes captured not only the Baltic shopping centers, but, later, also the sparsely populated strip of land between Narva and Lake Ladoga. This territory had no value in itself, but the possession of it finally guaranteed control over the Novgorod trade routes.

After the catastrophic defeat in the Livonian War, Russia risked finding itself not so much on the periphery of the emerging world system as outside it. And it was in this that the tragedy of the historical fate of the Russian state manifested itself. The only real alternative to peripheral development was isolation and stagnation.

On the contrary, England has achieved its goals, although not in full. She did not receive free access to the Russian market, but provided a systematic supply of raw materials and supplies for the emerging fleet during the most difficult period of the conflict with Spain. In 1588, the Spanish Invincible Armada was destroyed, Britain took the first decisive step towards becoming the "Master of the Seas". And yet the defeat of Muscovy in the Livonian War was simultaneously a major defeat for England in the struggle for direct access to Russian resources. Already at the end of the 16th century, the Anglo-Dutch trade rivalry intensified. Recent allies in the struggle against Spain, the British and Dutch bourgeoisie, are fighting for market dominance. Throughout the 17th century, this confrontation led to constant conflicts, ending in war three times. This struggle is being waged on the territory of Russia, and the Dutch, following in the footsteps of the British, are pushing them more and more.

The first Dutch ship entered the mouth of the Northern Dvina in 1578. This was not yet a serious threat to the British. In addition to them, the Swedes, the French, the Germans and even the Spaniards also traded in the north, but no one could seriously undermine the position of the London merchants. Soon, however, Dutch merchants, fleeing the pursuit of Danish pirates, accidentally discovered a new harbor, more convenient than the one used by the British. This harbor, located near the Mikhailo-Arkhangelsk monastery, became the beginning of the city of Arkhangelsk. The Dutch asked to move trade here. The British resisted, but there was nothing to do, and in 1583-1584 it was here that the main port of the Russian North was built.

Arkhangelsk harbor was the most convenient of all that there was in the Russian North. However, it was shallow, like most of the Dutch harbors. She was ideal for lighter Dutch ships. The displacement of the British ships was large, and therefore for the "Moscow Company" the transfer of trade to Arkhangelsk meant additional difficulties.

After the opening of the Arkhangelsk port, the rivalry between the British and the Dutch intensified. Holland, having defended its freedom in the struggle against the Spanish crown, turns into a leading maritime power. If at the beginning of the struggle for independence the Dutch bourgeoisie needed the support of the English monarchy against a common enemy, now the two most advanced countries of Europe are at first rivals and then enemies. Russia is becoming one of the arenas of their rivalry. The Dutch exported furs, caviar, hemp, flax, tar, tallow, soap, and ship masts from Muscovy. British and Dutch embassies to Moscow follow one after the other. The British are trying unsuccessfully to keep their rivals out of the country. During the Anglo-Dutch wars, both sides tried to persuade the king to ban the supply of masts - strategic raw materials - to their opponents. The Moscow government preferred neutrality, banning the export of masts to both warring states during hostilities.

Trade competition and diplomatic intrigue are accompanied by ideological struggles. Contemporaries wrote that the Dutch

"They tried to humiliate and ridicule the British, drew cartoons on them, wrote libels".

British representatives in Moscow complained that

"The Dutch deliberately put a false English mark (a tailless lion with three crowns overturned) on their worst cloth to discredit British goods, and also spread all sorts of fables about England."

But the most effective way to win over the sympathies of the Moscow elite was through simple bribes. The Russian market was affected by the same factors that influenced the global economic situation. The Dutch were primarily trade intermediaries. But this is precisely what predetermined their dominant role in the 17th century.

“The lagging behind the Dutch from the British in the formal-legal area,” writes the Dutch historian Ya.V. Veluvenkamp, ​​was offset by an obvious lead in practical commerce. In essence, the foreign trade of the British consisted in the export of British products, primarily woolen fabrics, and in the import of goods intended for sale in England. The Dutch were engaged in international intermediary trade, and therefore could supply all those goods for which there was a demand, and buy all those that were offered. This meant that in Russia they could offer a much wider range of goods than the British. "

They imported a large number of silver necessary for the state to mint its own coin, as well as gold. Two-thirds of the silver supplied to the Russian market came from Holland, and from England - no more than a quarter.

Throughout the 17th century, the positions of the Moscow Company were weakening, and Dutch merchants were strengthening their presence in the Russian market.

“Their goods,” wrote the Soviet researcher, “were of a higher quality. The British themselves recognized this. Further, they were wealthier and had more opportunities for bribery, although they resorted to it only in extreme cases. But their gifts and tributes to the king were both splendid and splendid than the English ones. Finally, they were able from the very beginning to build themselves a reputation for disinterested and honest merchants. "

Historians often add to this that the Dutch acted more in the spirit of free enterprise, while the British were organized around the monopoly "Moscow Company" in a trade and political structure closely associated with the state. Thus, the defeat of the English in the 17th century was caused by the same thing that ensured their impressive success in the middle of the 16th century. The Moscow Company, being closely associated with the royal court in London, was the ideal partner for Ivan the Terrible during the preparations for the Livonian War and in the midst of hostilities. In these times, as Lyubimenko writes with admiration, the British ambassador "dared to enter the tsar's house without taking off his hat." But after the defeat in the war, all this no longer mattered to the Moscow government. As long as Ivan the Terrible was alive, the previous relationship remained, but with his death everything inevitably had to change.

Chapter "The English Tsar".

Falsification of history to the detriment of the interests of the Muscovite ...

And the cruelty of the tsar, who "trimmed" the little people together with the "strong in Israel" (Kurbsky's claim to him), who destroyed "many and many", with the ruin, depopulation of the center of the country (incl. the forest cover around Moscow has risen to almost the current level- instead of the "great plowing" under his really Terrible grandfather, and even his father) - the usual payment for the country's opening to the market, see the consequences of reforms in Russia and Ukraine. The free market (or European integration) for some reason does not take root without "bloodshed", see the exploits of Pinochet

Holy prince-ancestor and Yaroslavl connections

Secondly, Ivan the Terrible, like the liberal reformers, is mystically connected with the city of Yaroslavl -. See the record of S.V. Gorodilin's report on the cult of St. Fyodor and his veneration by the "English tsar" at the conference on the cult of saints in the Middle Ages of Western and Eastern Europe on November 12-14, 2014.

The first positive evidence of the sovereign's veneration of the Yaroslavl princes refers to the period after his marriage to Elena Glinskaya: with his new wife, he was in 1528-1529. went to the shrines of northern cities and monasteries. Chronicle news suggests that the ruling couple visited Yaroslavl twice: at the beginning, on the way from Rostov to Vologda, and at the very end: "and back," going to Moscow, was in Yaroslavl ".

The next stage in the development of the cult of Fedor, David and Constantine is the era of Ivan Vasilyevich himself. An important aspect The transformation of perception and veneration of Fedor that took place was recorded by a new edition of the Life, created for the Book of Degrees (SK). In comparison with the Anthony edition that preceded it, all the motives of the Horde episode associated with the succession of the prince of royal power from the khan are deliberately strengthened there:

"I always oppose myself to come to command yours, and put your royal orders on his head all the days, and in your drachma to blachache him and in other royal clothes"

"Having sent him away with great honor, and put a royal crown on him,"

and with the transfer by Khan Fedor of the cities whose names are given: they turn out to be Kazan, "Blagary", "Balamata", "Aresk", Korsun, Chernigov.

Fyodor and his sons are included in the UK among the relatives of the Moscow princes, representing in some way their forerunner in power over the "kingdoms". In this context, the images of the Yaroslavl miracle workers on the frescoes of the Annunciation and Archangel Cathedrals (probably the Golden Chamber) in the Kremlin and the Assumption Cathedral in Sviyazhsk, as well as the Church of Fyodor, David and Constantine built in Kazan after its capture, can also be considered.

In the middle of the XVI century. the limits of the princes-Rurikovich, the duty of maintaining the memory of which as the deceased "relatives" takes on the Moscow sovereign, is extremely expanding. As A.V. Sirenov, then, on the initiative of Ivan Vasilyevich, descriptions of princely necropolises in the main cathedrals of the centers of Muscovite Rus were made, and lists of regular memorial services for deceased princes were determined by sovereign decrees. The expression of these processes is the Tsar's Synodikon sent to Patriarch Joasaph II in 1557, where the commemoration of the relatives of “the faithful Tsar and Grand Duke Ivan Vasilyevich of All Russia” already includes about 200 representatives of Rurikovich. At the same time, the list of holy princes - royal relatives, whose holiness is beginning to be revered already at the state level - also increases. This is also reflected in the Tsar's Synodikon, which opens with a list of holy princes - Rurikovich. There is also "the prince in the foreign shop Theodore" with "his children" David and Constantine.

But what have the liberal reformers to do with it (apart from the understandable similarity in compradation with today's replacement for the Mongols - a power comparable to the Horde in terms of marketability, aggressiveness and the number of innocently killed)? Since 1991, Yaroslavl has been a testing ground for reforms, an invariably pro-market region (at least, the authorities). Yes, and today's icon of Messrs. liberals - B.E. Nemtsov - was able to be elected to the regional Duma there, which the "popular opinion" could not admit somewhere else, the reputation of the reformers was too specific. And for the love of the fair sex, Boris Efimovich is compared with Ivan Vasilievich - with an amendment for the worst administrative resource and b O the greatest humanity of this age. Speaking with the frankness of a Roman, both tend to drink everything that moves; a mystical connection, it manifests itself in unexpected places, the spirit blows wherever it wants.

Actually, St. Fyodor Cherny should have long ago become the patron saint of the "liberal opposition", incl. because to please the Mongols he took by storm his own city (Mozhaisk, possibly Yaroslavl), if they were better read in Russian history. It was on the example of St. Fedor, the tsar (in correspondence with Kurbsky) justified the opinion that the ruler could commit any crime, kill many and many - and nevertheless be revered as a saint.

Serious worship of foreigners

Thirdly, it was Grozny who began to worship the West, which so outraged the patriots under other autocrats, which remained in the USSR, like the dead man suffices the living:

“… We are used to thinking that the influx of“ Germans ”, people from the West, falls on the eve and the era of reform. But this is also typical for the rule of Grozny, albeit in more modest forms. He allows the Lutherans to start a church in Moscow, takes care of it (recovering from the Metropolitan for some offense caused to her), praises German customs. There are many foreigners among the guardsmen, they are held in high esteem (Russian sources call Johann Taube "Prince Ivan Tuv"), they are appointed regimental commanders, as if anticipating Peter's hired generals.

Grozny goes so far as to read Magnus of Livonsk as heirs. The tsar expresses this intention to Magnus in the presence of foreign ambassadors and the Zemstvo Boyar Duma in June 1570. This is how an eyewitness who was in Magnus's retinue on that day conveys the speech of the Terrible:

“My dear brother, in view of the trust you and the German people have in me, and the devotion to my last (for I myself am of German origin and Saxon blood), despite the fact that I have two sons, one seventeen and the other thirteen years old, - Your Grace when I am gone, he will be my heir and the sovereign of my country. "

Let the tsar bend his heart and speak in such a way in order to intimidate the eldest son and the relatives around him by his mother, the late Anastasia Romanova, who constituted the most influential group in the Zemstvo Boyar Duma. But even in this case, the tsar's speech is eloquent to the highest degree. However, there is information that Grozny did indeed provide foreigners with special privileges. G. Staden directly writes about this, claiming that all of them, except Jews, are given fodder money and estates. To this he adds:

“Previously, the Grand Duke often issued letters to some foreigners stating that they had the right not to appear in court on the claims of the Russians, even if they accused them, except for two terms in the year: the day of the Nativity of Christ and Peter and Paul<…>The foreigner had the right to complain about the Russians at least every day. " So, foreigners are given advantages over the indigenous people. They are almost not subject to jurisdiction ... ".

A.M. Panchenko. Russian culture on the eve of Peter's reforms // From the history of Russian culture. T. 3.M. 1996.S. 179 - 180.

Sovrisk and performance

Fourthly, the "English tsar" quoted all cultural forms supported by the "democratic intelligentsia" before the performance and so on. ", See the story about Khariton Beloulin). And he himself belonged to this latter - the best writer of that time, however, with the minds and feathers of not rich, like Akunin and Ulitskaya today. But compare his style ("And what they finished on the watchmen! There is no one to close the monastery, there is no one to close the monastery, the grass grows at the meal", see the Epistle of 1573, though translated) with the style of Kurbsky, also a good rhetorician - but too traditional, without individuality language and innovations. language archaic and rather clumsy.

I summarize

Spiritual highlight of Messrs. liberals with pro-Europeans are so strong and emotionally colored because they express a problem called projection by psychologists - when an external event suddenly touched the bad, shameful that the individual feels in himself, but does not dare to admit. And then he denounces others, because he wants to realize this inclination in himself, but he does not dare. In contrast to their competitively successful version - the Black Hundreds, guardians, etc., the Zaputins (since they are implementing the same reforms for the same - murderous - dependent development, but under the anesthesia of patriotic demagogy). And the "English tsar" is, yes, quite a symbol of this policy: it is only important to understand it correctly.

Peripheral Empire: Cycles of Russian History Kagarlitsky Boris Yulievich

Chapter IV "THE ENGLISH KING"

Chapter IV "THE ENGLISH KING"

ENGLISH "OPEN" MOSCOW

At the beginning of the 16th century, the economy of the Muscovy was developing in about the same way as in other European countries. In 1534, Elena Glinskaya, the mother of the future Tsar Ivan the Terrible, carried out a monetary reform, which replaced the coins of various appanage principalities with a single system. Conditions are emerging for the formation of an all-Russian internal market. Production and trade are growing. The paradox is that the economic upturn is accompanied by an increase in the backwardness of Russia from the West. This seeming contradiction is caused by the fact that, being involved in the general process of development and socio-economic transformation, Russia finds itself on its periphery.

The growth of the economy is taking place against the background of the expansion of the borders of the state. If Western European countries begin to create colonies in America and on the coast of Africa, then Russia is moving east.

The estates are losing their isolation. "The transformation of bread into a commodity," Pokrovsky notes, "made the land that provided bread also a commodity." Previous relationships of ownership and mutual responsibility are now in question. However, the boyar patrimony is not sold or divided, it remains a family inheritance.

Market relations are most quickly assimilated in Russia by monasteries. On the contrary, large boyar estates turned out to be a brake on development. Nevertheless, it was impossible to divide them or sell them on the market due to the remaining political power of the boyars. This also makes the Russian situation much like the Spanish one (in contrast to England, where, after the War of the Red and White Rose, the old aristocracy was largely exterminated, and its political influence was undermined). Since the expropriation of the boyars was politically difficult and risky, external expansion seemed to be a reasonable decision: it was possible to obtain land and supply grain to the market without sacrificing the interests of the boyars. However, the war in the Kazan Khanate was not as easy as it seemed at first. After the capture of Kazan, the resistance of local residents in the form of a partisan struggle lasted for about 6 years. The victory was achieved only due to the mass resettlement of Russian colonists from the interior regions of the country to the Volga region. Thousands of peasants died, but they changed the demographic situation in favor of the conquerors. The nobility, on the other hand, was the loser. For 6 years of the war, it was never able to seize new estates for itself, and the number of peasants in the western regions became even smaller. The merchants won more. Merchant capital gained access to the river routes leading to Persia, but this only whetted his appetites.

Now Russia is striving to get rid of trade intermediaries - German merchants who control trade in the eastern Baltic through Riga, Revel, Narva. Meanwhile, Russia is not the only country thwarted by German trade intermediation. In the West of Europe, a new trading power begins to rise - England. She has not yet become the ruler of the seas, and the main problem for the development of British commercial capitalism is the Spanish-Portuguese monopoly in the Atlantic. But German domination in the Baltic also holds back the development of British trade. New markets and new sources of raw materials are needed. Russia can provide both for the British merchant capital.

In 1553, three ships set sail towards Norway, officially with the aim of finding the northern sea route to China, Japan and India. The idea was initially unrealistic. The Northern Sea Route, bypassing Siberia and Chukotka, could not really be laid even in Soviet times with the help of icebreakers. However, in the 16th century, the idea of ​​opening a northern route to China did not seem crazy either in England or in Russia itself. Thirty years after the failure of the English expedition, the Stroganov merchant house made a second attempt of this kind. The Dutch sailors hired by them in 1584 tried to do what the British did not succeed, and, naturally, also failed.

Meanwhile, the British expedition initially pursued a much wider range of goals. Its organizers were looking for new markets, because "our merchants discover that the goods and products of England are not in great demand from the countries and peoples around us." The ships leaving for the voyage carried with them a message from King Edward VI, addressed to no less than "all kings, princes, rulers, judges and governors of the land." This was not only a confirmation of the powers of the travelers, who were both merchants and official representatives of their country. “The letter described the benefits of free trade in terms that would be appreciated by the economists of the 19th century free-trading school,” writes the English historian T.S. Willan.

Two ships were lost because the crews were not prepared to sail in the Far North. Together with them, the leader of the expedition, Hugh Willoughby, died. But the third ship - "Edward Bonaventure" under the command of Captain Richard Chancellor - entered the mouth of the Northern Dvina. In February 1554, Chancellor was received in Moscow by Ivan the Terrible as the British ambassador. The tsar granted the British trade privileges in Russia, including the right to duty-free trade throughout the country In 1567, the Cossack ataman Ivan Petrov was sent to them with a letter “to unknown peoples”. Together with the Cossack Burkash Yelichev, he walked from the Urals to Beijing, having received in Mongolia a letter to pass through the "iron gates" of the Chinese wall, and then compiled a description of the lands he saw].

After that, Chancellor and his companions returned safely to their homeland. A year later, the Moscow Company was established in London. Its importance is evidenced by the fact that it turned out to be the first such company, the charter of which was approved by parliament. In a sense, the Moscow Company turned out to be not only the prototype of trade and political organizations created to operate in the West Indies and East Indies, but also the predecessor of the transnational corporations of the 20th century.

The commercial activity of the company was closely related to the diplomatic one. The British embassies at the royal court defended the interests of merchants, and the company's representative office dealt with the affairs of the English crown. While in Muscovy, the British wasted no time. Unlike the notes of other travelers, the texts prepared by Chancellor and his comrade John Hass most closely resemble the instructions for the commercial use of Russia. They describe in detail the economic geography of the kingdom of Ivan the Terrible: where and what is produced, what can be bought, what and where can be sold. Soon after this, the English Court appears in Moscow - first one building, and then a whole complex of buildings - residential, commercial, industrial, the remains of which exist in Moscow to this day.

The stone house on Varvarka was presented to the British as a gift from the tsar "as a sign of his special favor." Soon "English houses" appeared in Kholmogory, Yaroslavl, Borisov and other cities. The company's offices were in Novgorod, Pskov, Yaroslavl, Kazan, Astrakhan, Kostroma, Ivan-gorod. In Yaroslavl, the British set up large warehouses for goods, which were then sent to Asia. Protestant churches also appeared in Muscovy. In general, in relation to the Western Reformation, the Moscow rulers took by no means the position of outside observers. "The Russian government," notes the well-known researcher I. Lyubmenko, "being extremely hostile to Catholics, often showed great tolerance towards Protestants."

NORTHERN ROAD

The new trade route was important not only for the British, but also for Muscovy. In 1556, the Russian embassy arrived in England, headed by the boyar Osip Nepeya. Chancellor died bringing the ambassador to London, but he fulfilled his mission. Nepea went down in the history of diplomacy by the fact that he "achieved in London the same benefits that the British received in Moscow." However, Russian merchants could not use them. They did not have a fleet capable of making long sea voyages.

Regular trade along the northern route began in 1557. Initially, these travels were accompanied by numerous casualties. 6-7 ships left England for navigation, and sometimes no more than half made it back safely. The navigation season was short - the sea froze for 5-6 months. However, as the British sailors gained experience in sailing in the northern latitudes, these voyages became less risky. Nevertheless, the company periodically complained about losses - the raids of the Tatars, pirates, northern storms - all this damaged trade. The raid of the Crimean Khan Devlet-Girey on Moscow caused the company a loss for a huge amount of 10 thousand rubles at that time (which, incidentally, testifies to the huge turnover of the company). About 40 of the 60 Englishmen who were in Moscow at the time were killed in the fire. The Tatar pogrom apparently made a strong impression on the company's management, and therefore already under Tsar Fedor, the British donated 350 pounds for the construction of a new stone wall around Moscow.

The shareholders of the company were repeatedly called upon to make additional investments - 50 pounds per share in 1570, 200 pounds in 1572. But they were not going to wind up the case. And the reason for this is not only in the high profits that from time to time it was possible to get from trade with Muscovy, but also in the importance of these supplies for the general military-political situation in England. They brought from Russia not just northern goods, but strategic raw materials.

As Willan notes, 16th century Anglo-Russian trade "was in many ways reminiscent of the exchange between England and her colonies." Wood, wax, leather, meat, bacon, sometimes grain, flax, hemp, blubber, resin, ropes, and ship masts were supplied from Russia to England. The king himself bargained. According to the British, he was "one of the most important suppliers of wax and sable furs."

Wax was an extremely profitable commodity - candles were made from it, and a huge amount of them was required to illuminate Gothic cathedrals. This made it possible for the king to assert that wax is not a simple commodity, but a sacred, "reserved" one. And the kings should trade it. Such a monopoly for other Russian merchants was a sheer punishment, and the British were not cheap, but for Tsar Ivan it turned out to be extremely profitable. As for the goods brought from England, the king demanded the right of the first sale, and paid inaccurately. In this, however, the tsar also did not differ from his contemporaries. Elizabeth of England also did not like to pay debts.

During the oprichnina, the English company tried to get the tsar to return the money owed to her by the boyars executed by the tsar. The tsar listened to the claims, but did not give the money, recommending to his English partners to lend out to Muscovites less often. However, sometimes bad debts were returned. During the Bose embassy, ​​Ivan the Terrible suddenly ordered the payment of 3,000 marks, which had already been written off by the company.

"MOSCOW COMPANY"

The British brought to Moscow paper, sugar, salt, textiles, dishes, copper, lead tiles for roofing, and luxury goods. London cloth in Russian markets was called "lundysh". Of no small importance were the "exotic" goods that came to Russia from America and Asia through the "Moscow Company". In the lists of supplied goods, we also find almonds, raisins, horse harnesses, medicines, musical instruments, halberds, jewelry, dishes and even ... lions. Bells and precious metals were also transported, which were prohibited for export from England, but an exception was made for Russia by a special order of the crown. And yet, it was especially important for Moscow that lead, gunpowder, saltpeter, sulfur and, apparently, weapons and ammunition arrived on the British ships.

Of course, the Moscow Company was not a monopoly in trade with the West. German, Dutch, Italian, Danish, even Spanish and Italian entrepreneurs rushed to Muscovy. However, it was the British in the 16th century who managed to bring trade cooperation to the level of state policy.

In 1557 the British set up a rope-making facility in Kholmogory. Vologda became another production center of the company. By 1560, local workers had already mastered the technology, and most of the English craftsmen were returning to their homeland. English craftsmen were paid 9 pounds a year during their stay in Kholmogory (of which 2 pounds a year were deposited into their account in England). It was quite decent money for that time, but the influx of precious metals from America caused a frenzied inflation that went down in history as the "price revolution". As it turns out, this happened not only in Western Europe. 25 years after the first English workshops appeared in Muscovy, a certain John Finch, referring to the high cost, already demanded an increase in salary of up to 42 rubles a year - for English money this amounted to 28 pounds. As T.S. Willan, this is evidence that the 'price revolution' has reached Russia during this time. "

In 1558, Anthony Jenkinson, a representative of the Moscow Company, received the Tsar's permission for an expedition to Persia and Bukhara along the Volga route. Although a significant part of the purchased goods was lost on the way back, the brought was enough to justify the company's activities in a commercial sense for a long time. At the same time, the English merchant carried out in Persia and the diplomatic assignment of Ivan the Terrible. The Moscow tsar sought an alliance with the Persians against the Turks.

In the early days of capitalism, politics was overtly intertwined with trade. Azerbaijani researcher L.I. Yunusova notes that Jenkinson's commercial success was largely determined by the fact that he was "not just an English merchant, but an envoy of the Russian Tsar."

Jenkinson's mission marked the beginning of a long period of rivalry-cooperation between English and Russian capital in the Caspian. On the one hand, Moscow, and later Petersburg, needed foreign partners. Trade with Persia was largely transit. The British helped to establish trade routes, on British and later Dutch ships Persian silk and other goods were exported further to Europe. But, on the other hand, the partners waged a fierce struggle among themselves. Both of them sought to retain the maximum share of the profits from the Persian trade.

Jenkinson achieved trade privileges in Persia similar to those in Moscow. English expeditions to Persia followed one after another - in 1564, 1565, 1568, 1569 and 1579. This caused fears in Moscow, where they did not want to give up such a lucrative trade route to foreigners. In the future, the royal court takes measures to ensure that the Volga trade remains under its control, and the activities of the British in this direction are limited. Trade expeditions to the south could only be undertaken with the royal permission and joint forces. Despite all the problems, the Persian trade was a real "gold mine" for the company, but by the beginning of the 17th century another, safer and easier route to Persia across the Indian Ocean was being established. The East India Company began exporting Persian goods to the West in significant quantities, thereby reducing the commercial attractiveness of the Volga route. Later, another transit route appeared - through Turkey. Nevertheless, trade with Persia through the Caspian continues, leading to the heyday of Astrakhan.

PARTNERS OR COMPETITORS?

Subsequently, the activities of the Moscow Company became a topic of heated discussion among Russian historians. The 19th century historian N. Kostomarov drew attention to the fact that the British merchants, organized around the Moscow Company, were closely associated with their government, acted in concert, often even to the detriment of their compatriots who did not have political support in London. Kostomarov is convinced that the British had "extensive types of political dominance in Russia."

It is easy to guess that this thesis was very popular among Soviet historians, especially in the early years of the Cold War. A number of Soviet authors argued that the British had found a backward country in Russia and "strove in every possible way to consolidate this backwardness," "prevented the Russians from mastering and studying advanced technology," followed "by pressure and blackmail."

On the contrary, historians of the "Westernizing" wing saw in the English merchants representatives of an advanced civilization who carried knowledge to the backward Russian people. Only at the beginning of the 60s of the XX century Ya.S. Lurie tried to demythologize the history of Anglo-Russian relations in the 16th century.

In fact, the activities of the British in Russia were accompanied by numerous mutual claims between Russian and British partners. Complaints of Russian merchants about foreign competition were repeated regularly, starting from the second half of the 16th century and ending with the era of the first Romanovs. In the petition of 1646, filed with the tsarist government against the "English Germans", the claims are about the same as in the documents of an earlier period. The Russians accused the British of manipulating prices, the British, in turn, complained about the unreliability of Russian merchants, frequent delays, and fraud.

Often the complaints of the British (and foreigners in general) who were in Muscovy in the 16th-17th centuries look rather comical. Thus, foreigners complained that they were being “fed”, clearly trying to harm their health with excessive treats. In Muscovy of those times, it was indecent to get up from the table on your own, and if the next day the guests did not complain of feeling unwell due to excessive food and drink, then the feast was considered unsuccessful.

Communicating with Russian partners, the British noticed that those words did not hold, "and if they start to swear and swear, they probably want to cheat." The Russians' ability to combine ingenuity and enterprise with carelessness and dishonesty could not fail to amaze the Protestants, however, as Kostomarov notes, the mutual claims of Russian and Western merchants never prevented them from "deceiving the government together."

In fairness, it should be noted that in hindsight, the situation always looks more dramatic than it actually is. The fact is that the cases when the parties dispersed amicably leave fewer traces in the documents. It is when mutual claims arise that people begin to write complaints, apply to various authorities, thereby providing material for future historians. Paradoxically, it is the sheer number of all kinds of complaints that testifies to the scope and intensity of trade relations between the British and the Russians.

In reality, of course, the main problems were not at all in cultural contradictions. Having settled in Muscovy, the British began to trade in the domestic market, successfully competing with local merchants. They organized their own network of suppliers and a system of bulk purchasing, providing loans to manufacturers. Such an order, notes Kostomarov, "was beneficial for small traders and for the people in general, but ruinous for Russian wholesalers." The law of commercial capitalism is that the market is controlled by the one with the big capital. Having an advantage in financial resources, the British also took a stronger position than their Russian competitors.

The behavior of English merchants in Muscovy aroused discontent not only among their competitors among the Russian merchants, but also among many in England itself. There was a belief in London that the Russian soil was corrupting the employees of the company. Once in Muscovy, they rapidly enriched themselves, built luxurious mansions, which London shareholders could not afford, adopted local customs, kept servants, dogs and bears. They began, like the Moscow boyars, to overeat to stomach cramps. In London, it was believed that Russia was corrupting the British with the temptation of excessive freedom, and those who lived in Moscow did not want to return to puritanical abstinence. Ambassador Bowes openly complained about his poverty to Grozny. When company employees were recalled, they did everything to stay. Some for the sake of this switched to the Russian service and even accepted Orthodoxy.

Later, in the 17th century, the English ambassador John Merik complained to the tsarist officials about his own people, merchants and clerks, who, without the knowledge of the company, marry Russian women. The ambassador was worried about such marriages only by the material side: converting to Orthodoxy on the occasion of marriage, the British became Russian subjects and avoided paying debts to their compatriots. Merik demanded not to allow marriages until the company confirms the payment of all the promissory notes. However, the Russians pretended not to understand what they were talking about and assured the Englishman that “they don’t marry by force and they don’t leave anyone by force in the Moscow state.”

Trade with the British was so important for Ivan the Terrible that he ordered the boyar Boris Godunov, at that moment, the rising star of the Kremlin administration, to deal with their affairs. The British called Godunov in their own way "protector". The English astrologer, known in Moscow as Elisha Bomelius, was especially influential at the tsar's court. In addition to predicting the future, he also performed more practical tasks of the ruler: he prepared poisons for him, collected information about the boyars suspected of treason. “The fame of Bomelia,” writes S.F. Platonov, - was so broad, and the fame of his power was so noisy that even a dull provincial chronicle of that time told about him in an epic and fairy-tale tone. " According to the chronicler, the "fierce sorcerer" Bomelius was guilty of all the troubles that the reign of Grozny brought down on the country. The English astrologer instilled in the tsar "ferocity" in relation to his own subjects and tuned him in favor of the "Germans" Platonov, in a number of sources. For example, the clerk Ivan Timofeev complains that the tsar, instead of "good-minded nobles", brought foreigners closer to him and fell under their influence to such an extent that "all his inner barbarian was in his hand" Platonov remarks to this that we are dealing with a clear exaggeration. for "foreigners, although they were kept in the oprichnina, did not have any meaning in it" (ibid.). Which, in a technical sense, is certainly true. But this is not only about the personal participation of certain overseas states in making specific decisions. Pointing to the influence of foreigners, Ivan's contemporaries instinctively felt that the very essence of the Tsar's policy, its logic was dictated not only by internal circumstances, but also by some other motives, more understandable for foreigners than for Russians].

The question, however, is not what was the behavior of the British, but what the Russian government expected of them. Karamzin is sure that establishing ties with England, the Tsar of Muscovy used the opportunity to "borrow from foreigners what was most needed for her civic education." Historians note that Ivan the Terrible patronized foreigners so much that there was "a lot of insult to his subjects, whom he willingly belittled before foreigners." However, the Russian tsar's interest in foreigners was quite practical. Ivan the Terrible tried to find an English military-trade ally in Elizabeth.

STRATEGIC UNION

The fact that both the British and Russian governments gave preference to organized merchants from the Moscow Company over single merchants, both Russians and British, indicates that both sides tried to solve their problems at the state level. The mutual interest of Elizabeth of England and Ivan the Terrible is completely natural. If the Swedes and Germans needed to maintain their commercial dominance in the eastern part of the Baltic, the British, on the contrary, needed to gain access to Russian resources without the intermediation of the Riga and Revel merchants. Likewise, Muscovy tried to find direct access to European markets. However, the trade tasks of England and Muscovy could not be solved peacefully.

The German cities of Livonia, which controlled the flow of Russian goods to the West, sought to preserve the position of monopoly intermediaries at any cost. K.N. Bestuzhev-Ryumin in his Russian History recalls that the Hanseatic merchants “tried to derive as much benefit from this trade as possible, furnishing it to others with the most embarrassing conditions: foreigners, especially the Dutch, were forbidden to study in Russian and trade directly with the Russians; the import of silver into Russia was prohibited, trade with Russians on credit was prohibited, etc. " ...

In 1547, artists and craftsmen recruited for the Russian tsar in Germany were detained at the request of the Livonians in Lubeck, despite the fact that there was permission from Emperor Charles V to recruit specialists. Later, a certain Schlitte, a Saxon who was recruiting personnel for Moscow, was taken into custody in Livonia, and one of his men was executed.

In order to understand why government intervention from both London and Moscow was so intense, just look at the list of goods supplied to each other by both sides: it was not only and not so much about commerce, but about military-technical cooperation.

Individual consignments of weapons can also be supplied by individual traders, but systematic military supplies were already coordinated at the state level in the 16th century. The effectiveness of such cooperation is ensured by the fact that the sale of weapons is combined with the supply of military materials and the transfer of technology, the arrival of specialists, etc. Deliveries from Russia were a decisive factor in the development of the British navy. Russian-English cooperation was part of the Anglo-Spanish confrontation. The Spanish king Philip II was preparing to invade England, and Elizabeth of England was urgently creating a fleet.

“To cut off England and the Netherlands from Eastern European raw materials meant to destroy these states,” wrote the historian Ya.S. Lurie. - This is exactly the goal that Philip II sought in Poland, Sweden and Russia. In Poland, his diplomats had little success. In Russia they have failed completely. " “The English fleet, built during these years and defeating the Spanish Invincible Armada in 1588, was equipped mainly with Russian materials,” notes the Swedish historian Arthur Attman.

The Moscow Company was the official supplier of the Royal Navy. “Russia was not a monopoly supplier of ropes and gear, which were also imported from the Baltic countries, but Russian supplies were especially important for Elizabeth’s fleet, and ropes and tackle for the then fleet were as important as oil for the modern,” Willan writes. The British sailors admitted that the tackle supplied from Russia was "the best brought into the country." In addition, the ropes and tackles that came from Muscovy were cheaper than those that were supplied from other places. Therefore, Willan concludes, northern trade "was more important to England than to Russia."

In turn, Ivan the Terrible asked England for the supply of military materials, weapons, engineers, knowledgeable in artillery, architects familiar with the construction of fortifications. As soon as the Livonian War began in 1557, rumors spread throughout Europe about British weapons in the hands of the Muscovites. Poland and Sweden protested. In Cologne and Hamburg, large consignments of weapons purchased by the British were blocked, as the Germans feared that the equipment was actually intended for the troops of Ivan the Terrible. Elizabeth of England, of course, denied everything. Not only did she assure other monarchs that there was no military cooperation with Muscovy, she in every possible way belittled the scale of trade, claiming that we were talking about several merchant ships that almost accidentally swam into the mouth of the Northern Dvina. The merchants, of course, were peaceful people, thinking exclusively about commercial benefits.

One episode testifies to how “peaceful people” the employees of the “Moscow Company” were. In 1570, at the height of the Livonian War, Swedish corsairs attacked English merchants transporting "Russian" cargo. As a result of the ensuing battle, the flagship (!) Of the Swedes was taken on board and captured by "peaceful merchants". The victorious report was immediately sent by representatives of the company to Moscow and brought to the attention of the Russian authorities.

Nevertheless, British diplomats across Europe denied "rumors" of military cooperation: for this purpose a special embassy was sent to the continent. In the meantime, the troops of Ivan the Terrible, from nowhere, appeared weapons and military technology, suspiciously reminiscent of the British.

In 1558, an employee of the company, Thomas Alcock, captured by the Poles, admitted that military supplies had taken place, but justified himself by the fact that "only old, useless weapons were imported." Engineer Locke would hardly agree with this, boasting in his letters that with his help Moscow learned to make the most advanced weaponry in Europe. In the meantime, not only British doctors and pharmacists are arriving in Russia, but also architects and specialists "for the construction of stone buildings." Taking into account the fact that Ivan the Terrible several times wrote directly to London about the fact that he needed help in carrying out fortification works, it becomes clear what kind of "stone buildings" we are talking about.

The surviving documents also leave no doubt about what was in the holds of the ships of the Moscow Company. They brought in saltpeter, lead, sulfur, gunpowder. Although, of course, not all supplies were strategically intended. The British, not being winemakers themselves, brought wine to Muscovy. Moscow consumers were undemanding. That is why they imported "various spoiled wines, sweet wines, wines with a large admixture of cider." Probably, they were carrying many other things, because not all deliveries were documented.

Cooperation between England and Muscovy was strategic as well as commercial. Trade of the XVI-XVII centuries is inseparable from the war. Having opened the way from Northern Europe to the mouth of the Northern Dvina, the British quickly made it attractive to other Western countries. However, the Russian Pomors themselves did not have either the technology or the resources to build a serious fleet. Moreover, it was in principle impossible to create a serious fleet in the north, even if the British had helped in its construction. This required not only a lot of forest and know-how. In the end, specialists can be ordered from abroad, as Peter I did later. But a strong fleet can only be based in large port cities. The Northern Dvina was too remote from the rest of Russia, there were too few resources and people to compete with Riga. And it was unprofitable to develop trade there - the sea freezes in winter. The main flow of Russian goods went through the German-owned Revel and through the Swedish Vyborg.

The "Moscow company" was in the fiercest competition with them [Attman notes that up to the beginning of the Livonian War, it was through Revel that most of Novgorod's exports passed through and, in fact, it was precisely as a transit port for Novgorod that this city developed and flourished (P. 35)]. In order to gain access to new trade routes, Russia needed trading positions in the Baltic, and therefore German merchants, who at first were opponents and then leading partners of the Novgorodians, are again turning into opponents - now for Muscovy. Russia needed its own large port on the Baltic. And with the outbreak of the Livonian War, she received it.

THE LEBON WAR

In his study of the origin of the modern world economic system, Immanuel Wallerstein argues that during the Livonian War Ivan the Terrible tried to "achieve the autonomy of the Russian state in relation to the European world economy," and in this sense, the Tsar's policy that led to the war was not only not a defeat, but on the contrary, it was a "gigantic success." As a result of Ivan the Terrible's policy, “Russia was not drawn into the European world economy,” which allowed our country to preserve a developed national bourgeoisie and subsequently become not a periphery, but a semi-periphery of world capitalism. It is curious that Wallerstein's reasoning coincides with the official propaganda myth that prevailed in Stalin's times. Meanwhile, the Livonian War was not only a military disaster, but was also caused by the desire of the tsarist government at any cost to achieve inclusion in the emerging world system.

At first glance, the integration of Russia into the world system proceeded quite successfully in the 16th century. As Artur Attman notes, Russia has always had an active trade balance in relation to Western countries. "As for the Russian market, from the Middle Ages and at least until the middle of the 17th century, each of these countries had to spend precious metals to cover their trade deficit." The situation for Russia as a whole was better than for Poland - despite the fact that both countries often traded the same goods (but Poland, unlike Russia, could not act as a supplier of furs on the world market) [Wallerstein believes that Ivan's policy Grozny helped the Russian bourgeoisie and the monarchy avoid "at least during that period, the fate that befell the Polish elites." the number can be seen as "luck". But in reality, Moscow's military defeats did not at all isolate it from the world system, but simply forced it to integrate on less favorable terms. As for Poland, the struggle between it and Russia for a place in the world system continued until Poland disappeared from the map of Europe].

Yet Russian trade in the 16th century is a paradoxical phenomenon. On the one hand, there is a positive balance, a constant influx of hard currency. In other words, Russia benefited from world trade by providing capital accumulation. On the other hand, the trade structure is clearly peripheral. Willan's similarity to the American colonies is far from coincidental. Colonies in North America (New England) were originally conceived as raw material bases that were supposed to replace or supplement the products received from Russia. However, as noted colonial historian JL Beer, "attempts to secure supplies from New England of tar, tar, hemp and other products necessary for shipbuilding, which continued for a long period, ended in complete failure." Free American colonists from the very beginning produced not what the mother country needed, but what was beneficial to them. The economic structure of New England spontaneously reproduced the British economy. In such a situation, the supply of raw materials from Russia remained indispensable for the British fleet and industry throughout the entire 17th and 18th centuries.

Russia is exporting raw materials and importing technologies. It competes in the world market with other countries and territories that make up the periphery of the emerging world system. This combination of strength and vulnerability predetermined the inevitable aggressiveness of Muscovy's foreign policy, as well as its subsequent failures.

When Wallerstein, comparing Russia with Poland, concludes that Ivan the Terrible fought to avoid the fate of Poland, which became an appendage of the European world system, he is deeply mistaken. The Russian tsar sought just the opposite, unsuccessfully trying to occupy in the emerging world system the very place that Poland occupied in the 16th-17th centuries. Contemporaries were well aware of the fact that Russia and Poland were competitors on the world market. In the 17th century, Dutch trade representatives in Moscow directly discussed these issues with the tsar, insisting on the expansion of Russian grain exports.

Contrary to Wallerstein's opinion, the ruling circles of Russia did not strive to resist the expansion of the West, but, on the contrary, to join the world system - as its periphery, but on their own terms. In turn, Poland and Sweden in this war defended the places that they had already occupied in the world-economy by the middle of the 16th century.

At first, the Livonian War developed successfully for the Russian troops. Starting hostilities, Ivan the Terrible took advantage of a completely ridiculous and deliberately far-fetched pretext, recalling the non-payment of the tribute by the Dorpat bishop, which had never been recalled for 50 years. Ideologically, the order was undermined by the reformation, its troops were few in number. Unlike the conflicts of the 17th century, the armament of the Russian troops was not yet much inferior to the western ones. The presence of British military specialists also affected. Artillery and metalworking were at a completely modern level for those years, which predetermined the rapid success of the tsarist troops at the first stage of the war. The Livonian Order suffered a crushing defeat. In May 1558, Russian troops took Narva, a key port and fortress that opened the way to the Baltic.

In turn, for England the capture of Narva opened up direct access to Russian raw materials. However, for the shareholders of the Moscow Company this was by no means good news, since the northern route, which it had mastered with such difficulty, was losing its attractiveness. After the Russians took Narva, English ships arrive there. In fact, the Narva port was not very convenient, and the conditions for doing business were incomparably worse here than in Reval. However, Narva attracted western traders. As noted by the American researcher Walter Kirchner, "as in the case of the northern route, traders here were attracted to Russia by the potential of this market, and not by the actual state of affairs." In 1566, 42 ships already visited Narva, and trade is booming. Compared to this, the 6-7 ships sailing the northern route seem like an insignificant trade operation. The monopoly of the "Moscow Company" does not extend to Narva, everyone who wants to float here.

In turn, the company protests, complains that traders who have no experience of working in Muscovy are bringing in all sorts of rubbish and undermining the reputation of British goods. If in the case of the Northern Sea Route, official London was completely on the side of the Moscow Company, in every possible way protecting its monopoly, then in the conflict around the Narva voyage, the company has to yield. Here trade is already reaching such proportions that military-strategic considerations cannot but be pushed aside by commercial ones. It is significant that Elizaveta, who previously supported the Moscow Company in everything, this time is in no hurry to take measures against the Narva merchants. The company was not only a trading company, but also a political instrument of England in Russia, however, with the capture of Narva, one of the key political goals was achieved. Of course, this does not indicate a change in policy, especially since the compromise reached between the company and its competitors keeps the company in a dominant position. All English merchants can now reap the benefits of her efforts. The issue of Narva trade is discussed in parliament, the monopoly is ultimately confirmed, but in such a form that for the company, in a commercial sense, it turns out to be a Pyrrhic victory.

NARVA SWIMMING

Before the Livonian War, Narva was not so much a trading port as a fortress that blocked the Russians' access to the Baltic. But after 1559, Narva trade developed rapidly: in addition to the British, merchants from many European countries appeared here. The largest number of ships arrived in Narva from the Netherlands. Having extensive experience in trading in the Baltic, the Dutch immediately took advantage of the new opportunities that had opened up. Large-scale construction begins in the city, business life is in full swing. In 1566 98 ships from Narva passed through Riga, and only 35 ships left Riga to the west. In 1567, no less than 70 English ships were sent here. With the passing of Narva under the rule of Russia, the Revel port fell into decay (even after the end of the war, Narva continued to undermine its position). Another German port on the Baltic, Königsberg, suffered less damage, for Polish exports went through it.

At first, the Swedes tried to compensate for the losses by introducing duty-free trade for Russian merchants in Vyborg. At the same time, Swedish pirates terrorized merchants heading to Narva [Attman notes that Vyborg trade was an item for the bots of Swedish kings during the 16th-17th centuries. They deliberately pursued a policy that was supposed to direct Russian trade flows through Swedish ports. In 1550, Gustav Vasa prepared a corresponding study of the Russian market. In 1640, the Swedish resident in Moscow Peter Loofeldt prepared a new study, where he drew attention to the growing activity of the British and Dutch in Arkhangelsk and proposed measures to strengthen the Swedish position in the Russian market]. To protect the port, the tsar was forced to hire the German privateer Carsten Rode and asked for help from the British.

Despite all the efforts of the Swedes, Vyborg was unable to occupy a dominant position in the eastern part of the Baltic. The trade objectives of the Livonian War were achieved. Meanwhile, starting the war, Ivan the Terrible relied not only on the merchants, but also on the land-poor nobility. “The bourgeoisie was satisfied,” writes Pokrovsky, “for them the continuation of the war no longer made sense. When the order's embassy arrived in Moscow to seek peace, it found support from the Moscow merchants. But the success made a completely different impression on the "army". The campaign of 1558 yielded a huge booty - the war in a rich, cultured country was not at all the same as the fight against foreigners in distant Kazan or the pursuit of the elusive Crimeans across the steppes. The landowners already dreamed of a lasting conquest of all of Livonia and the distribution of German knights to the estates of the rich manors. This distribution has actually begun. But the transition to the rule of Russia of the entire southeastern coast of the Baltic lifted the whole of Eastern Europe to its feet: neither the Swedes nor the Poles could allow this. " With the entry of Sweden and Poland into the war, the balance of forces is changing. It was already difficult to deal with the Polish army. When superbly armed, organized and trained Swedish troops (perhaps the best in Europe at that time) appeared on the battlefield, the state of affairs became simply catastrophic. Prince Kurbsky, the best of the governors of Grozny, lost the battle of Nevel to 4 thousand Poles, having 15 thousand troops, and in 1564 near Orsha the Russian army was completely defeated. Senior warlords were killed, the enemy got guns, carts. And most importantly, the fighting spirit of the Moscow army was broken. A split occurred in the coalition that supported Grozny's reforms.

Oprichnina

The more difficult the military situation became, the more the tsar had a field for maneuvers. “In an atmosphere of foreign policy failures,” writes the Soviet historian R.G. Skrynnikov, - the tsar's associates strongly advised to establish a dictatorship in the country and crush the opposition with the help of terror and violence. But in the Russian state, not a single major political decision could be made without approval in the Boyar Duma. Meanwhile, the position of the Duma and the church leadership was known and did not promise any success for the enterprise. "

Trying to put pressure on the Duma, the tsar left Moscow, announced his abdication from the throne. Before the whole country, the tsar presented himself as offended and "expelled" by the boyars from his own capital. The Duma was forced to reject the tsar's abdication and itself turned to him with assurances of loyalty.

Having undermined the political positions of the Duma, the tsar announced that in order to "protect" his life, he was forced to divide his entire land into "Zemshchina" and "Oprichnina". If the "Zemshchina" remained under the control of the Boyar Duma, then the oprichnina was subordinated to the personal power of Ivan the Terrible. Here everything was organized as in an appanage principality, the affairs of the king's appointees, who did not have a noble past, were in charge. Here they selected "artistic" nobles who had no ties with the boyar aristocracy. They willingly took foreigners to the guardsmen service. The oprichnina army staffed in this way became a reliable instrument of the tsar in the struggle against internal opposition.

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So, after Chancellor's arrival in Moscow (1553), regular trade and diplomatic ties were established between the Russian and English states. The Russian state did not have the opportunity to trade with the countries of Western Europe through the Baltic Sea. In these conditions, the connection between Russia and England along the White Sea route acquired great importance. Facts show that Ivan the Terrible patronized the development of Russian-English trade. He granted the merchants of the English Moscow Company the right of free entry, movement and duty-free trade in the Russian lands. British merchants and nobles, members of the Moscow Company, pursued the goal of subjugating the Russian market and establishing direct trade ties with Iran, Central Asia and India along the Volga route through Russia.

In the 1560s, disagreements began over Anglo-Russian trade.

In 1566 Jenkinson came to Russia again. His arrival was caused by unforeseen complications for English merchants in Russia, which arose in connection with the activities of R. Barberini, a Dutch merchant, a competitor of the British. Barberini presented a forged letter from Elizabeth and urged the tsar to deprive the Moscow company of its privileges. Jenkinson was carrying a real letter from Elizabeth, but his negotiations with the king were now going in a different direction. Yuzefovich L.A. "As in the customs of the embassy ...". Russian ambassadorial custom of the late 15th - early 17th centuries. S. 56-67.

At the end of the 60s, at a difficult moment for Russia in the Livonian War, due to the growing danger from the Polish king Sigismund, Ivan the Terrible sought to gain allies in Europe against the Habsburgs, who provided covert support to his opponents. The tsar had the idea of ​​"eternal end", that is. alliance with England. Moreover, in 1567 the British were granted new trade privileges (for example, to trade in Kazan, Shemakha, Bulgaria) and it was proclaimed that no state, except England, could use the Russian harbors in the White Sea. The payment for these concessions, according to the plan of Ivan the Terrible, was to be a political and military alliance with England. The best guarantee of the strength of the contract in those days was considered a marriage union.

It is believed that in the years 1566-1567. the tsar had a plan to marry Elizabeth, and Grozny also cherished the idea of ​​the possibility of obtaining political asylum in the event of internal turmoil and conspiracies. Filyushkin A. Russian "English Tsar". // Motherland. - 2003. - No. 5-6. - P. 14.

At this time, in 1567, Russian merchants Stepan Tverdikov and Fedot Pogorely arrived in London - on behalf of the tsar, they exchanged furs for gems for the Russian treasury. They brought the tsar a letter from Elizabeth with a request to expel from Russia merchants who traded outside the Moscow company, but this time the request was not satisfied and the question of merchants violating the company's monopoly for a long time was the cause of friction in Anglo-Russian relations.

In October 1568, the tsar did not like the letter of Ambassador T. Randolph in Moscow, since it did not give a direct answer to the proposal to conclude an alliance. True, in 1569 the ambassador managed to achieve new trade privileges for England. The English trading houses were attributed to the oprichnina and they did not depend on the zemstvo, which meant for the merchants the safety of English trade in the conditions of the oprichnina terror.

Together with Randolph in 1569, the Russian embassy of the tsarist nobleman Andrei Sovin departed for England with the translator D. Sylvester, the company's clerk. The purpose of the embassy is to get the queen to formally conclude a friendly alliance and provide real military assistance to Russia. In words, Elizabeth expressed such readiness, in deeds, practically nothing was done. Sovin's report and the union act delivered by him aroused the wrath of Ivan the Terrible.

In response to this, Ivan the Terrible deprived the Moscow company of a number of privileges in 1570 (later on, part of the privileges taken away was restored). In his famous message to Elizabeth, Ivan the Terrible reproached her for the fact that in London with the Russian ambassador they negotiated only about trade affairs... Threatening disfavor with the English merchants, he declared: "And the Moscow state was not poor yet without English goods." In the letter, parliamentary order, alien to the tsar, was also vilified, feudal disdain for the "merchant peasants" was expressed, and the groom's male offense was evident. Nakashidze N.T. Russian-English relations in the second half of the 16th century. P. 67.

As a result, in 1570 the period of rapid growth of Anglo-Russian trade relations was replaced by a cooling that lasted more than 10 years. The British were deprived of the right to trade freely along the Volga and with the eastern countries. But Ivan the Terrible did not go to the complete rupture of trade relations.

In the first half of the 70s of the 16th century, the correspondence between Grozny and Elizabeth did not stop. Elizabeth expressed delicate diplomatic tact, dignity, restraint. She promised to grant asylum to the king if necessary, but she herself refused such asylum. The tsar, in conversations with D. Sylvester, threatened to enter into an alliance with her opponents. But Elizabeth was also threatened by the Polish king Sigismund, which would take the life of her subjects who carry weapons, goods and craftsmen to Muscovy (it became unsafe for English merchants to trade through Narva, conquered during the Livonian War).

In the early 80s, negotiations were again conducted with Elizabeth regarding the conclusion of a Russian-British military-political alliance, the initiator of the negotiations was the tsar. By his decree in 1582 the embassy to England of the nobleman V. Pisemsky and the clerk N. Khovralev was being prepared. In the main instruction to Pisemsky, the question of matchmaking to the niece of Queen Mary Hastings was directly linked to the question of an alliance between the two states. The conclusion of an alliance was a preliminary and indispensable condition for marriage. Nakashidze N.T. Russian-English relations in the second half of the 16th century. P. 70.

The resumption of negotiations with Britain was caused by the deterioration of the military situation in Russia in the late 70s and early 80s. In 1579 the Swedes invaded the Novgorod land, and the Polish king Stefan Batory took Polotsk by storm. In 1580 Batory laid siege to Velikie Luki. The first royal letters to Queen Elizabeth were sent with the representative of the Moscow company D. Gorsey and were in the nature of diplomatic sounding. In personal conversations with Horsey, the tsar spoke approvingly of the English fleet. Pisemsky's embassy was already official. The ambassadors were advised to leave Kholmogory on English ships, but together with the ships of other foreign merchants, which the British objected to, but the Russians insisted on their own. Historians see this as a deliberate demonstration of the Russian government that Moscow is not going to conduct relations, including trade, only with England, but also with England's competitors - Holland - will maintain trade relations. Sokolov A.B. Towards each other: Russia and England in the 16-18 centuries. P. 30.

The ambassadors described in detail, in their report, how they were received in the suburbs of London, since it was a matter of honor for the Russian sovereign. At the first audience with the adviser f. With Walsingham, they pointed to the special nature of relations between Russia and England: "For no one our sovereign has such love, how to have brotherhood and love with you." F.A. Pisemsky. P. 110. The ambassadors announced the death of the son of Tsar Ivan Ivanovich.

All external signs of attention were shown to the Russian embassy: firing from cannons, gifts, hunting. But the ambassadors noted that the government is delaying discussion of the main issues. Then negotiations began.

The meaning of the conditions and requests of the Russian ambassadors consisted in the hope of military and financial assistance, for these services the tsar would retain the British the right of duty-free trade in Russia: “For all enemies, stand for one, help each other with people with a different treasury and a fiery outfit. cannons, and squeaks, and armor and copper, and tin, and lead ... military and handicraft people ... and our sovereign orders all kinds of goods to be allowed into the land of England ”. F.A. Pisemsky. P.114.

After weeks of waiting, in January 1583, through the mediation of the leaders of the Moscow Company, a second audience took place in the hall, where at that time the ladies of the court were dancing, which offended the Russian ambassadors. It was in January that Pisemsky spoke with the queen about the king's desire to marry Mary Hastings, which was followed by a negative reaction from the queen. According to the ambassadors, the queen referred to the fact that she knows how the king of red maidens loves, that her niece is ugly, ill, but promised to present her portrait and show it to the ambassadors, but later. In the same place. P. 119. The embassy was finally transferred to London.

On March 19, the ambassadors received a response to their proposals for an alliance. Elizabeth agreed to recognize the enemies of the king only if the peaceful mediation of England was rejected by a third party. This meant the right of Elizabeth to understand the tsar's strife and provide him with assistance not unconditionally, but according to circumstances. The British also expressed a desire to have a monopoly on trade in the north, which provoked the objection of the Russians. Indeed, after the loss of Narva, which served as a base for trade with other countries, the northern marinas became the only sea gates of Russia. The British did not discuss this issue and asked to convey these requests to the Russian Tsar. In the same place. S. 123-125.

In May Pisemsky saw Maria Hastings and described her as tall, thin, white-faced, in a word attractive. In the same place. S. 129. He also received her portrait for transfer to the king.

To complete the negotiations with the Russian embassy, ​​D. Bowes, recommended by the Moscow company, was sent to Moscow.

The Boes embassy was faced with the daunting task of getting British merchants to have a monopoly in trade along the entire northern coast of Russia. At the same time, it was impossible to agree to an alliance with Ivan on his terms, and to dissuade him from marrying. As a result, the actual rejection of the Russian proposals had to be masked. But the hot-tempered Bowes did not immediately cope with the task. The negotiations reached an impasse, as the tsar set a condition for England to enter the war with Poland if Batory did not return Polotsk and Livonia to Russia, while Bowes began to clarify whether Livonia was really the royal fiefdom. Negotiations and meetings were interrupted now by the anger of Ivan the Terrible, now by promises. During January - March, Boes achieved monopoly trade of the British in the north of Russia, which was contrary to the national interests of the country, the tsar punished Boes' offenders, had already prepared a letter for the ambassador, but on March 18, 1584, Grozny died.

The death of the tsar overturned the hopes of Bous and, as you know, made many people happy with regard to English affairs, the Russian courtiers hated the situation of a sharp rapprochement with the British, Ivan the Terrible was called the English tsar behind his back. Yuzefovich L.A. "As in the customs of the embassy ...". Russian ambassadorial custom of the late 15th - early 17th centuries. S. 73-74.

In the 16th century, the difference in goals pursued by Britain and Russia in establishing diplomatic relations is clearly visible: the interests of the queen are limited to trade, while the tsar persistently seeks a political alliance (which implied aid in money and military actions, as well as dynastic ties) against Poland and the Livonian Order - an alliance, to which Britain could not go and which was not going to conclude; however, in the interests of her own merchants, she sought to maintain in the Moscow tsar the hope of the likelihood of concluding an agreement as long as possible. It is in the hope of a political alliance that Ivan the Terrible grants British merchants numerous privileges, and when the hope for a treaty fades away, many privileges are taken away and Moscow begins to give preference to Dutch merchants, British competitors. History of diplomacy. T. 1.P. 261.

The invitation of qualified craftsmen was the second, after the conclusion of the political union, the interest of the Moscow state. Nakashidze N.T. Russian-English relations in the second half of the 16th century. P. 10.

Thanks to Jenkinson's mediation, British doctors, pharmacists, craftsmen skilled in metal mining, and construction specialists were invited to Russia. The emergence of the opportunity to bring craftsmen by sea was very important for the Moscow state, since the arrival of invited experts by land was hindered by the Livonian Order, which was not interested in the technical growth of the Russian army. Under these conditions, Jenkinson's work became for the Moscow state, which is interested in foreign specialists, tantamount to "breaking the blockade."

So, the second half of the 16th century was the time of mutual acquaintance between Britain and Russia, going on against the background of the rapid development of the privileged British trade in the Moscow state. Russian interest in Britain is due not so much to trade as to political interests and the desire to invite foreign artists to Moscow.

Ibraev Gennady Alimovich

In the winter of 1552, a lively meeting of the largest English merchants and shipowners took place in London. An extremely important circumstance was the reason for this meeting. In the middle of the XVI century. England was going through a severe economic crisis, one of those crises when, in the limited conditions of trade routes, the acquisition of new sales and export markets becomes a matter of life or death.

England's maritime trade fell catastrophically every year. The oceans were dominated by the Spanish and Portuguese in those days. By right of "pioneers" the Spaniards monopolized the sea routes to the New World (North America) across the Atlantic Ocean, and the Portuguese - the Circum-African route to the East Indies and jealously guarded them with weapons in their hands. Access to America, India, China and the "Spice Islands" (Maluku Islands, Indonesia), to places where all kinds of exotic treasures are found, was practically closed to English sailors.

It was possible to penetrate there only secretly, with the greatest danger, for the Spaniards and Portuguese in their zone of influence captured or sunk all foreign ships as pirates. The disruption of Britain's maritime, that is, foreign trade, had a disastrous effect on the state of her domestic trade. Not yet possessing a sufficiently strong military fleet, England did not dare in those years to enter into an open struggle with Spain and Portugal.

In such circumstances, the only way out for trading England was the search and construction of its own, a new sea route to overseas lands. In this regard, the leaders of commercial circles in England turned to Sebastian Cabot, the famous navigator and geographer of the first half of the 16th century. Cabot, an Italian by birth, believed that similar routes in the north should correspond to the southern sea routes to the Far East.

It was assumed that the western route there goes past Greenland, the eastern one - along the northern coasts of Europe and Asia. The aged Cabot (he was then already 80 years old) had been repeating for a long time about the necessity of laying a northeastern route to Asia. Cabot was sure that sailing the Arctic Ocean in the warm season and using favorable winds and currents, one could easily reach the mysterious Sipango (Japan) in three months, from where it was not so far from the "gold bearing", according to the stories of Marco Polo, China and to the cherished "Spice Islands".

Cabot presented his views on this matter in detail and convincingly at a crowded meeting of London's "money people". They fully approved the project and established the "Company of Merchants-Explorers for the Discovery of Unknown Countries" with a fixed capital of 6,000 pounds sterling. Following this, three ships began to be equipped, and in May 1553 a small flotilla under the general command of Hugh Willoughby sailed from the coast of England.

Due to bad weather, the voyage was very slow. Near the northwestern shores of Scandinavia, a violent storm severed the ships. Two of them, as it turned out later, perished in ice off the coast of Russian Lapland, the third - "Edward is a good enterprise", whose commander was Richard Chancellor, safely sailed to the southern coast of the White Sea. Having landed on land, at the mouth of the Northern Dvina, not far from Kholmogory, Chancellor learned that he was in the possession of the Moscow Tsar. “The same summer,” says the Dvina Chronicle of 1553, “on the 24th day of August, a ship arrived from the sea at the mouth of the Dvina River and sent a message: ambassador Knightsart arrived at Kholmogory in small ships from King Edward of Aglina, and with him guests.” Merchants were called "guests" in old Russia. So during the reign of Ivan the Terrible, the British, in search of a new sea route to the Far East, accidentally "discovered" something almost unknown to them until then

Muscovy or, in Western European terminology, Muscovy. After looking around at the new places, Chancellor, who had a royal letter of recommendation with him, took on the role of ambassador. With Grozny's permission, in November he set off along the sledge route to Moscow, where he was very favorably received by the tsar. Chancellor's request to allow the British to continue to use the White Sea route for trade relations with Russia was respected:

“The Tsar Tsar and the Grand Duke (Dvina Chronicle) of the royal ambassador Knightsart and the guests of the Aglinskaya lands granted them to their Russian state with bargaining from across the sea on ships, they ordered them to walk safely and buy and build their yards unsecured.” Until the spring of 1554, Chancellor lived in Russia, first in Moscow, then on the Northern Dvina. And here and there he carefully collected information about Russian trade, about the requirements of the Russian market, about the roads leading to Asia. In the spring, having profitably sold out the goods brought with him in Kholmogory and loaded the ship with furs, leather, whale oil and samples of other Russian goods, Chancellor sailed to his homeland with a letter from Grozny.

From that moment on, permanent trade and diplomatic relations between Russia and England began. In London, the fascinating story of a brave sailor about Muscovy, a country he had discovered, its size and the abundance of its natural resources, made a great impression. True, Muscovy was not China or India, but on the other hand it was much closer to England and as a market for sales and export was a very valuable acquisition; this was clearly evidenced by the goods brought by Chancellor. The "Company of Merchants-Seekers" was transformed into a "Russian or Moscow Company", which, without giving up the idea of ​​paving a new path to the Far Eastern markets, set monopoly trade with Russia as its main goal. Chancellor's second trip to Muscovy was made in 1555 on behalf of the company.

He was accompanied by two agents equipped with special instructions containing a program of widespread commercial operations. In Moscow, the British were expected to receive an even more gracious welcome than the first time. At the request of Grozny, a trade agreement was approved, according to which the British received broad rights and advantages. Among them, extremely important was the right to duty-free trade throughout Russia, the right to set up trading posts (trading yards) in a number of cities, as well as the right to freely enter Russia and leave it to other countries, in other words, the right to a free path to the east. On top of this, Grozny personally presented the British with a large house on Varvarka, in Kitai-Gorod.

The favor shown by the Terrible towards the British was due to the political considerations of the far-sighted tsar. Poland, the Livonian Order and Sweden have long hindered Russia in its peaceful relations with the rest of Europe. Therefore Russian state urgently needed a free road to the West, and just at this time Moscow was on the eve of the Livonian War for the possession of harbors on the Baltic shores. Because of this, strong, regular relations with England acquired particular importance for Moscow. It was necessary to closely interest the British in "Muscovite" affairs, because the British had the full opportunity to freely deliver to Russia not only various goods, but also military equipment, so necessary for the war, by the free northern route. Chancellor himself did not have to take advantage of the fruits of his successful "discovery" of Muscovy.

In 1556, returning to England, accompanied by the tsar's ambassador Osip Nepeya (the first Russian to visit England), Chancellor died in a shipwreck off the coast of Scotland. Nepea escaped and was received with great honor in London by Queen Mary, nobility and representatives of the commercial circles. In London, in accordance with the privileges received by the British in Russia, the Moscow ambassador negotiated, in general, the same privileges for the Russians in case they came to England on commercial matters.

In addition, he received (which was very important) permission to hire doctors, engineers, gunsmiths and other technicians for the Russian service. For its part, the Moscow company decided, without wasting time, to use the favorable circumstances to penetrate deep into Asia. In achieving the goals set by the company, great services were rendered by one of its agents, a very experienced merchant-traveler, Anthony Jenkinson, who arrived in Moscow in 1557 with Osip Nepeya. Jenkinson was charged with the mission to carry out an expedition to China through Muscovy and Central Asia.

In those years, the company had not yet completely abandoned its intention to reach the Bogdykhan empire by this route, since there were persistent rumors in the West that merchant caravans were going from China to Bukhara and back. The situation was very suitable for such a journey: at that time (1552-1556), the Volga khanates fell one after another - Kazan and Astrakhan and the entire great Volga road, the "high road to India", as the West thought then, already belonged to Russia.

Jenkinson, now taking over from Chancellor, was both a bold traveler and a clever diplomat. He managed to please Grozny so much that he not only allowed the British to pass the Volga, but also provided them with letters of recommendation to the sovereign princes of the Caspian regions. These letters more than once rescued Jenkinson and his companions from trouble, for the name of the Russian Tsar was highly respected in the East. In the spring of 1558 Jenkins left Moscow by water on an expedition to Central Asia. This was the first trip in the 16th century. Western Europeans to Asia through Muscovy.

Descending the Moskva River and the Oka River, the British sailed to Nizhny Novgorod, where they waited for the arrival of the voivode, who was traveling with 500 large ships, archers, provisions, ammunition and goods to Astrakhan to manage the newly conquered land. Under the protection of the archers, the voyage along the Volga to Astrakhan went quite well. In those days, famine and plague raged in Astrakhan, and therefore the British hastened to get out to the sea. A week later, having withstood a strong storm, they landed in the Dead Kultuk Bay. Having unloaded their ship here and hiring 1000 camels from the local khan, the British moved on by dry road, carrying a huge load of goods for exchange. This part of Jenkinson's journey shows why it was no longer possible to use the caravan routes in the Transcaspian region.

There were no road guards yet, the desert was teeming with gangs of robbers, and the rulers of those places through which the caravan line ran, themselves condoned robberies. Only eight months after leaving Moscow, the British, having endured a series of dangerous clashes with nomads, suffering terribly from the heat and lack of water in the sandy steppes, finally arrived in the big city of Bukhara. Here the travelers were in for a complete disappointment.

It was not possible to go further in the direction of China due to the military actions of the Samarkand Khan. As prudent as he was enterprising, Jenkinson, having finished trading operations, made his way back in time, thanks to which he happily escaped the siege of the city and the subsequent massacre. Jenkinson returned to Moscow almost a year and a half later in the same way and, in general, with the same adventures.

As a gift to Grozny, he brought 25 Russian slaves, ransomed by him in the Trans-Caspian lands, the tail of a white yak (Tibetan bull), a Chinese bunchuk and a Tatar drum. From his trip Jenkinson got the impression that the British needed to establish trade relations with Iran, where he organized an expedition in 1562. Having descended the Volga in the spring of this year, Jenkinson sailed for the second time into the Caspian Sea and crossed it towards Derbent. The voyage was very difficult because of the frequent shoals, the storm lasting seven days, and the possibility of falling into the hands of the pirates.

Having reached Derbent, the British bought camels and horses and moved on through the Shirvan land to the city of Shemakha, where they were hospitably greeted by the local prince Abdul-Khan. Jenkinson very colorfully describes the fertile lands of the southeastern Caucasus, through which he passed, but in which he did not always feel well, despite the richest nature and beautiful views... Travelers constantly had to fear the attack of the semi-wild mountaineers, who took the prisoners to their auls. Only six months after leaving Moscow did the British reach the Iranian city of Qazvin, where the Shah was then.

Here the Persians, mistaking the unknown Englishmen for the Portuguese hostile to Iran, were about to seize Jenkinson and send him to Constantinople as a gift to the Sultan. The intercession of the aforementioned Shirvan Khan, the Shah's vassal, saved Jenkinson from such a sad fate.

Jenkinson lived in Qazvin all winter, learning about local market conditions and establishing trade relations with Iranian and Indian merchants. The indefatigable agent of the Moscow company returned to Moscow with rich gifts for Grozny from the shah in the same way, traveling in the East, like the first time, for a year and a half. Jenkinson's travels across Muscovy and Asia did not pass unnoticed for geographical science. In those days, trade expeditions were not given a scientific character, but usually a merchant traveler or one of his companions was also a geographer.

For purely practical purposes, it was necessary to become familiar with geography new country, the location of its trading cities, large fairs, roads to them, etc. detailed descriptions sketched out drawings. In accordance with this, Jenkinson, an educated man, always carefully described his routes, noting the longitude and latitude of the places he passed, their particular features, corrected and supplemented the information already available on this score. In the sixties of the XVI century. Jenkinson's report on his first expedition to the Trans-Caspian regions was published, to which a land map was attached: "Russia, Muscovy and Tartaria."

Compiled by Jenkinson on the basis of several astronomical points he himself determined, this map was, despite some errors against reality, a big step forward compared to at least Herberstein's map (1549). Reproduced for the first time in the atlas of Ortelius (1571), Jenkinson's map is illustrated with pictures from the life of nomadic peoples, images of various animals, mountains, woodlands, etc. The drawings are accompanied by explanations in Latin, beginning like this: “The inhabitants of these countries worship the sun in the form of red canvas ... "," These rocks, reminiscent of the appearance of people, beasts of burden, other livestock ... "," The Kyrgyz people live in crowds, that is, "hordes", etc.

Thanks to such explanations, Jenkinson's "descriptive" map is now of well-known interest as a historical document. Notes (reports) of Jenkinson, as well as other agents of the company, which are part of the vast literature in our historiography, known as common name"Legends of foreigners about the Moscow State" are also very valuable historical and geographical material. Iran has been a supplier of raw silk from ancient times, a product highly valued in the West.

In this regard, the Moscow company organized several expeditions to the "land of silk and roses" in Jenkinson's footsteps. These trips, despite the high costs and dangers associated with sailing along the Volga and the Caspian Sea and traveling in the Transcaucasus, turned out to be extremely profitable for the British. For example, the expedition of 1578 - 1581. brought the shareholders of the company 106% of the income; earlier trips to Iran were also quite lucrative.

But the greatest income, and, moreover, with much less risk than from Iranian trade, the British received from their business operations directly in Muscovy itself. Regularly every year, English ships with a large load of various goods came to the mouth of the Northern Dvina. On the voyage from England to Pomerania, it took only a month in favorable weather. The notes and reports of the company's agents give a clear idea of ​​what the British traded, what were the prices of various products, which goods were preferred by the trading parties, etc.

The British brought cloth, paper fabrics, tin, weapons, ammunition, sulfur, saltpeter, horse harness, and various metal products; they supplied special fabrics, gilded halberds, pistols, pharmaceuticals, musical instruments to the royal court. In addition, they traded in products of foreign manufacturers, which was later pointed out to the Moscow government with displeasure by representatives of other Western European states.

From Russia, the British exported furs, leather, blubber, flax, salted fish, lard, oil, wax, hemp, walrus bone (in the old days - a surrogate for ivory), timber, etc. Thanks to the activities of the Moscow company, trade relations between Russia and the West in the 16th century. have significantly increased and expanded.

The greatest demand in Russia was for cloth, followed by cotton fabrics and metals: lead prepared with tiles for roofs, tin in the form of pewter dishes, copper and iron. The size of the profits of the British can be judged by the following example: they sold a piece (cut) of cloth in Russia three times more expensive than the cost price plus transportation costs. In turn, the British were most of all interested in blubber, wax (in Russia a "reserved commodity" in view of its very widespread consumption for church needs) and hemp. Interest in the latter is explained by the following circumstance.

Having initially dealt exclusively with the export of raw materials from Russia, the company soon came to the conviction that it would be more profitable to process some products on the spot with the help of specialists sent from England. Grozny willingly gave permission to establish English factories in Russia; he even donated to the company for this purpose large areas land, in the expectation that the British, according to their promise, will teach the Russians new useful crafts. The main English production in Moscow was rope. The first ropeway arose in Vologda, the second in Kholmogory; later, their number increased. These businesses were doing excellently. Due to the cheapness of Russian raw materials and local labor, the company prevailed over other Western European competitors and over time became the main supplier of ship gear for the British fleet.

The cheapness of this equipment was not at the expense of its quality. Back in 1582, William Borrow, controller of the English fleet, officially certified the "Russian ropes" as the best delivered to England. Moreover, many believed that one of the main reasons for the great victory of the English in 1588 over the "Invincible Armada" of the Spanish king was the excellent equipment of the English fleet, exported from Muscovy, from where the magnificent timber for the masts was also delivered. Under Grozny, the British were allowed to search for iron ore at Vychegda, where an iron-smelting plant was set up in 1569. Workers for this business were discharged from England. The news has survived that it was also possible to smelt ore in the English court in Moscow.

The company received the right to export finished iron to England with payment to the Russian treasury "one money per pound." The hopes of Grozny that the British would acquaint the Russian workers with the techniques of their production were not justified; contrary to their solemn promise, the British did not even think of doing it. In general, the "enlightened navigators" in every possible way tried to use Muscovy exclusively as their colonial market for sales and an abundant source of all kinds of raw materials. They drew from Russia everything they could, trying to give it as little as possible.

Living for a long time and in large numbers in the country that had so hospitably accepted them, the British, in addition to trade, then, if possible, then avoided getting closer to local population, in their eyes, of course "barbaric." The nature and methods of activity of the company's agents and other English "culture traders" convincingly testifies to the fact that the British in Russia at that time were very far from any truly cultural assignments. In a short time, the British opened their trading yards, in addition to Moscow and Kholmogor, in Vologda, Yaroslavl, and later in Novgorod, Kazan and Narva, temporarily (1558-1581), which belonged to Moscow.

With special comfort they settled down in the mouths of the Northern Dvina, on Yagorny Island, which they called "The Island of Roses," because in the spring it was covered with red rose hips. Here, next to a stream with excellent drinking water, they built a spacious home for visitors and large warehouses for goods.

From this base, the British, in winter and summer, by water and by land, on horses, boats, and reindeer, traveled to all directions of the vast Pomorie, to Mezen, Pechora, to Perm, exploring the region and looking for new places of profitable bargaining. At the same time, they were interested in the Trans-Urals, where there were regions rich in furs, and the great Ob River flowed. Comparatively not far behind it, according to the geographical concepts of that time, there was allegedly Kambalu (Beijing), the capital of China, as it is depicted, for example, on the map of Herberstein.

So, to get to the Ob meant to lay through the "land of furs and snow" new road to the Far Eastern markets. In this regard, the British undertook several expeditions towards Siberia, which, however, did not give positive results. In the White Sea Pomerania, the British over time faced very dangerous rivals in the person of the Dutch. Dutch merchant ships began to appear on Murman as early as 1565, and after 10 years they also penetrated into the mouth of the Northern Dvina, where a little later (1583-1584) a new “haven” (harbor) was founded specifically for the “overseas bargaining”. . Arkhangelsk. Despite all sorts of tricks, intrigues and even open violence on the part of the British (they tried to detain Dutch ships), they failed to "drive" the Dutch from the Russian market.

However, until the death of Grozny, the British generally retained almost all the privileges, and under the successors of Grozny - Fyodor Ivanovich, Boris Godunov, Vasily Shuisky, they, in comparison with other foreigners, still continued to enjoy some advantages. The project of seizing Muscovy by England "Black days" began for the British at the beginning of the 17th century, during the years of the peasant war and foreign intervention, when the established ties between Russia and the West were temporarily severed, and trade life inside the country came to a standstill. The "income" of the British from Muscovy at this time completely stopped.

Then the British, fearing that ultimately the Polish intervention, as well as the Swedish one (Sweden captured Novgorod), might be crowned with success, decided to occupy Pomorie and the Volga route by armed means. This military expedition was to be headed by Colonel Chamberlain, who served in a hired foreign detachment under Vasily Shuisky. All expenses for this "profitable enterprise" were borne by the Moscow company, and the expedition project, developed by the company's agent John Merrick, was, after a detailed discussion in London, sanctioned by King James I.

The draft shamelessly stated that "there is no injustice or resentment for anyone, there is no violation or evasion of agreements concluded with any of the other states" and that, on the contrary, there is a lot of "philanthropy towards the oppressed Russian people" , who, as if, having fallen in love with the British for their excellent properties and (behavior, "longs to surrender under the rule of the English king more than anyone else."

In case of success, which was not doubted, personally King James should regularly receive considerable income from the "newly acquired lands" in the future. But, as one would expect, this "brilliant project" remained just a project. When, in the spring of 1613, Merrick and Roussel (also an agent of the company) arrived in Moscow, the Russian people had already expelled from their land the most dangerous invaders - the Poles.

A new permanent government was formed in Russia, which the British prudently hastened to "recognize". The unrealized "Merrick-Chamberlain project" reminds of the historical milestones in the history of Western raids on Russia, where England was always ready to share the "pie" with the winner in order to save her economic, narrowly selfish interests.