The Fall Of Novgorod The Great
The Czar of Russia is the one political deity in Europe, the sole
absolute autocrat. More than a hundred millions of people have delivered
themselves over, fettered hand and foot, almost body and soul, to the
ownership of one man, without a voice in their own government, without
daring to speak, hardly daring to think, otherwise than he approves.
Thousands of them, millions of them, perhaps, are saying to-day, in the
w
heart, for I must hold my tongue."
Who is this man, this god of a nation, that he should loom so high? Is
he a marvel of wisdom, virtue, and nobility, made by nature to wear the
purple, fashioned of porcelain clay, greater and better than all the
host to whom his word is the voice of fate? By no means; thousands of
his subjects tower far above him in virtue and ability, but,
puppet-like, the noblest and best of them must dance as he pulls the
strings, and hardly a man in Russia dares to say that his soul is his
own if the czar says otherwise.
Such a state of affairs is an anachronism in the nineteenth century, a
hideous relic of the barbarism and anarchy of mediaeval times. In
America, where every man is a czar, so far as the disposal of himself
is concerned, the enslavement of the Russians seems a frightful
disregard of the rights of man, the nation a giant Gulliver bound down
to the earth by chains of creed and custom, of bureaucracy and perverted
public opinion. Like Gulliver, it was bound when asleep, and it must
continue fettered while its intellect remains torpid. Some day it will
awake, stretch its mighty limbs, burst its feeble bonds, and hurl in
disarray to the earth the whole host of liliputian officials and
dignitaries who are strutting in the pride of ownership on its great
body, the czar tumbling first from his great estate.
This does not seem a proper beginning to a story from Russian history,
but, to quote from Shakespeare again, "Thereby hangs a tale." The
history of Russia has, in fact, been a strange one; it began as a
republic, it has ended as a despotism; and we cannot go on with our work
without attempting to show how this came about.
It was the Mongol invasion that enslaved Russia. Helped by the khans,
Moscow gradually rose to supremacy over all the other principalities,
trod them one by one under her feet, gained power by the aid of Tartar
swords and spears or through sheer dread of the Tartar name, and when
the Golden Horde was at length overthrown the Grand Prince took the
place of the Great Khan and ruled with the same absolute sway. It was
the absolutism of Asia imported into Europe. Step by step the princes of
Moscow had copied the system of the khan. This work was finished by Ivan
the Great, at once the deliverer and the enslaver of Russia, who freed
that country from the yoke of the khan, but laid upon it a heavier
burden of servility and shame.
Under the khan there had been insurrection. Under the czar there was
subjection. The latter state was worse than the former. The subjection
continues still, but the spirit of insurrection is again rising. The
time is coming in which the rule of that successor of the Tartar khan,
miscalled the czar, will end, and the people take into their own hands
the control of their bodies and souls.
There were republics in Russia even in Ivan's day, free cities which,
though governed by princes, maintained the republican institutions of
the past. Chief among these was Novgorod, that Novgorod the Great which
invited Rurik into Russia and under him became the germ of the vast
Russian empire. A free city then, a free city it continued. Rurik and
his descendants ruled by sufferance. Yaroslaf confirmed the free
institutions which Rurik had respected. For centuries this great
commercial city continued prosperous and free, becoming in time a member
of the powerful Hanseatic League. Only for the invasion of the Mongols,
Novgorod instead of Moscow might have become the prototype of modern
Russia, and a republic instead of a despotism have been established in
that mighty land. The sword of the Tartar cast into the scales
overweighted the balance. It gave Moscow the supremacy, and liberty
fell.
Ivan the Great, in his determined effort to subject all Russia to his
autocratic sway, saw before him three republican communities, the free
cities of Novgorod, Viatka, and Pskof, and took steps to sweep these
last remnants of ancient freedom from his path. Novgorod, as much the
most important of these, especially demands our attention. With its fall
Russian liberty fell to the earth.
At that time Novgorod was one of the richest and most powerful cities of
the earth. It was an ally rather than a subject of Moscow, and all the
north of Russia was under its sway and contributed to its wealth. But
luxury had sapped its strength, and it held its liberties more by
purchase than by courage. Some of these liberties had already been lost,
seized by the grand prince. The proud burghers chafed under this
invasion of their time-honored privileges, and in 1471, inspired by the
seeming timidity of Ivan, they determined to regain them.
It was a woman that brought about the revolt. Marfa, a rich and
influential widow of the city, had fallen in love with a Lithuanian,
and, inspired at once by the passions of love and ambition, sought to
attach her country to that of her lover. She opened her palace to the
citizens and lavished on them her treasures, seeking to inspire them
with her own views. Her efforts were successful: the officers of the
grand prince were driven out, and his domains seized; and when he
threatened reprisal they broke into open revolt, and bound themselves by
treaty to Casimir, prince of Lithuania.
But events were to prove that the turbulent citizens were no match for
the crafty Ivan, who moved slowly but ever steadily to his goal, and
made secure each footstep before taking a step in advance. His
insidious policy roused three separate hostilities against Novgorod. The
pride of the nobles was stirred up against its democracy; the greed of
the princes made them eager to seize its wealth; the fanatical people
were taught that this great city was an apostate to the faith.
These hostile forces proved too much for the city against which they
were directed. Novgorod was taken and plundered, though Ivan did not yet
deprive it of its liberties. He had powerful princes to deal with, and
did not dare to seize so rich a prey without letting them share the
spoil. But he ruined the city by devastation and plunder, deprived it of
its tributaries, the city and territory of Perm, and turned from
Novgorod to Moscow the rich commerce of this section. Taking advantage
of some doubtful words in the treaty of submission, he held himself to
be legislator and supreme judge of the captive city. Such was the first
result of the advice of an ambitious woman.
The next step of the autocrat added to his influence. Novgorod being
threatened with an attack from Livonia, he sent thither troops and
envoys to fight and negotiate in his name, thus taking from the city,
whose resources he had already drained, its old right of making peace
and war.
The ill feeling between the rich and the poor of Novgorod was fomented
by his agents; all complaints were required to be made to him; he still
further impoverished the rich by the presents and magnificent receptions
which his presence among them demanded, and dazzled the eyes of the
people by the Oriental state and splendor which had been adopted by the
court of Moscow, and which he displayed in their midst.
The nobles who had formerly been his enemies now became his victims. He
had induced the people to denounce them, and at once seized them and
sent them in chains to Moscow. The people, blinded by this seeming
attention to their complaints, remained heedless of the violation of the
ancient law of their republic, "that none of its citizens should ever be
tried or punished out of the limits of its own territory."
Thus tyranny made its slow way. The citizens, once governed and judged
by their own peers, now made their appeals to the grand prince and were
summoned to appear before his tribunal. "Never since Rurik," say the
annals, "had such an event happened; never had the grand princes of Kief
and Vladimir seen the Novgorodians come and submit to them as their
judges. Ivan alone could reduce Novgorod to that degree of humiliation."
This work was done with the deliberation of a settled policy. Ivan did
not molest Marfa, who had instigated the revolt; his sentences were just
and equitable; men were blinded by his seeming moderation; and for full
seven years he pursued his insidious way, gradually weaning the people
from their ancient customs, and taking advantage of every imprudence and
thoughtless concession on their part to ground on it a claim to
increased authority.
It was the glove of silk he had thus far extended to them. Within it lay
concealed the hand of iron. The grasp of the iron hand was made when,
during an audience, the envoy of the republic, through treason or
thoughtlessness, addressed him by the name of sovereign (Gosudar,
"liege lord," instead of Gospodin, "master," the usual title).
Ivan, taking advantage of this, at once claimed all the absolute rights
which custom had attached to that title. He demanded that the republic
should take an oath to him as its judge and legislator, receive his
boyars as their rulers, and yield to them the ancient palace of
Yaroslaf, the sacred temple of their liberties, in which for more than
five centuries their assemblies had been held.
This demand roused the Novgorodians to their danger. They saw how
blindly they had yielded to tyranny. A transport of indignation inspired
them. For the last time the great bell of liberty sent forth its peal of
alarm. Gathering tumultuously at the palace from which they were
threatened with expulsion, they vigorously resolved,--
"Ivan is in fact our lord, but he shall never be our sovereign; the
tribunal of his deputies may sit at Goroditch, but never at Novgorod:
Novgorod is, and always shall be, its own judge."
In their rage they murdered several of the nobles whom they suspected of
being friends of the tyrant. The envoy who had uttered the imprudent
word was torn to pieces by their furious hands. They ended by again
invoking the aid of Lithuania.
On hearing of this outbreak the despot feigned surprise. Groans broke
from his lips, as if he felt that he had been basely used. His
complaints were loud, and the calling in of a foreign power was brought
against Novgorod as a frightful aggravation of its crime. Under cover of
these groans and complaints an army was gathered to which all the
provinces of the empire were forced to send contingents.
These warlike preparations alarmed the citizens. All Russia seemed
arrayed against them, and they tremblingly asked for conditions of peace
in accordance with their ancient honor. "I will reign at Novgorod as I
do at Moscow," replied the imperious despot. "I must have domains on
your territory. You must give up your Posadnick, and the bell which
summons you to the national council." Yet this threat of enslavement was
craftily coupled with a promise to respect their liberty.
This declaration, the most terrible that free citizens could have heard,
threw them into a state of violent agitation. Now in defiant fury they
seized their arms, now in helpless despondency let them fall. For a
whole month their crafty adversary permitted them to exhibit their rage,
not caring to use the great army with which he had encircled the city
when assured that the terror of his presence would soon bring him
victory.
They yielded: they could do nothing but yield. No blood was shed. Ivan
had gained his end, and was not given to useless cruelty. Marfa and
seven of the principal citizens were sent prisoners to Moscow and their
property was confiscated. No others were molested. But on the 15th of
January, 1478, the national assemblies ceased, and the citizens took the
oath of subjection. The great republic, which had existed from
prehistoric times, was at an end, and despotism ruled supreme.
On the 18th the boyars of Novgorod entered the service of Ivan, and the
possessions of the clergy were added to the domain of the prince, giving
him as vassals three hundred thousand boyar-followers, on whom he
depended to hold Novgorod in a state of submission. A great part of the
territories belonging to the city became the victor's prize, and it is
said that, as a share of his spoil, he sent to Moscow three hundred
cart-loads of gold, silver, and precious stones, besides vast quantities
of furs, cloths, and other goods of value.
Pskov, another of the Russian republics, had been already subdued. In
1479, Viatka, a colony of Novgorod, was reduced to like slavery. The end
had come. Republicanism in Russia was extinguished, and gradually the
republican population was removed to the soil of Moscow and replaced by
Muscovites, born to the yoke.
The liberties of Novgorod were gone. It had been robbed of its wealth.
Its commerce remained, which in time would have restored its prosperity.
But this too Ivan destroyed, not intentionally, but effectually. A burst
of despotic anger completed the work of ruin. The tyrant, having been
insulted by a Hanseatic city, ordered all the merchants of the Hansa
then in Novgorod to be put in chains and their property confiscated. As
a result, that confidence under which alone commerce can flourish
vanished, the North sought new channels for its trade, and Novgorod the
Great, once peopled by four hundred thousand souls, declined until only
an insignificant borough marks the spot where once it stood.
It is an interesting fact that this final blow to Russian republicanism
was dealt in 1492, the very year in which Columbus discovered a new
world beyond the seas, within which the greatest republic the world has
ever known was destined to arise.
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On a day in the year 1835 the people of Nacogdoches, Texas, were engaged in the pleasant function of giving a public dinner to one of their leading citizens. In the midst of the festivities a person entered the room whose appearance was greeted with... The Hojo Tyranny
Under the rule of Yoritomo Japan had two capitals and two governments, the mikado ruling at Kioto, the shogun at Kamakura, the magnificent city which Yoritomo had founded. The great family of the Minamoto was now supreme, all its rivals being destro... The Horatii And Curiatii
Romulus was succeeded by a king named Numa Pompilius, of Sabine origin, who so loved peace that during his reign Rome had no wars and no enemies, so that the doors of the Temple of Janus were never once opened while he was on the throne. He built a ...