The Muscovite boyars pledge their support to the dethroned Vasily II.
Muscovy succession dispute that led to a protracted power
struggle. Throughout the Kievan and early Muscovite periods, the princes of
Russia followed the custom of lateral succession. The throne passed from
brother to brother, and when that generation died out, it passed to the eldest
son of the eldest brother who had held the throne before. Sons whose father had
died before holding the throne were excluded (izgoi) from the line of
succession. This changed in the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries,
when the grand princes of Moscow, after consolidating their power, at- tempted
to adopt a policy of linear succession to keep power in Moscow, rather than
allowing princes outside Moscow to gain the grand princely throne.
Dmitry Donskoi (r. 1359-1389) stipulated in his last testament
that his second son, Yury, was to succeed Vasily I should Vasily die without
male issue, but Vasily’s son, Vasily II, was born in 1415. In 1425, Vasily II
succeeded his father. A regency council was set up consisting of Vasily’s
mother, the Metropolitan Foty of the Orthodox Church, and Boyar I. D.
Vsevolozhsky. Vasily’s maternal grandfather, Grand Prince Vytautas (Witold) of
Lithuania, served as Vasily’s guardian.
Faced with this situation, Vasily’s uncle, Yury Dmitrevich,
argued that in his testament, Dmitry had stated that Yury was to succeed Vasily
I (ignoring the fact that this provision was to have no effect if Vasily had a
son). Further, by the custom of lateral succession, he, Yury, was the rightful
heir to the grand princely throne and refused to recognize Vasily II as grand
prince. He was joined in this dispute by his sons, Vasily Kosoi and Dmitry
Shemiaka.
The dynastic war of succession that ensued lasted for much
of Vasily II’s reign. Yury refused to come to Moscow and swear allegiance to
Vasily, but an outbreak of the plague, as well as Vytautas’s protection of
Vasily, led to a truce. The deaths of Vytautas in 1430 and Foty in 1431 allowed
Yury to renew his claim to the throne. Both Vasily and Yury appealed to the
Tartar khan of the Golden Horde for resolution of the dispute, and the khan
ruled in favor of Vasily. Yury, granted the principalities of Dmitrov by the
khan, would not accept the decision and marched against Vasily, defeating the
grand prince’s forces on the Klyazma River in April 1433. Yury marched into
Moscow and made peace with Vasily but was unable stay in power and soon ceded
the grand princely throne and his own principality of Dmitrov to Vasily. At
this point, Vasily launched a campaign against his cousins, who had not been
party to the agreement between Vasily II and Yury. The grand prince’s army was
again defeated (September 1433). Soon afterward, Yury again attacked Vasily and
defeated him yet again, in March 1434. Vasily fled, and Yury again occupied
Moscow, where he died on 5 June 1434.
Contrary to the custom of lateral succession and the decision
of the khan, Yury’s son, Vasily Kosoi, assumed the throne of the grand prince.
(By the rules of lateral succession, Vasily II, as eldest member of his
generation, was the rightful heir.) Despite his succession, Kosoi lost even the
support of his brothers and was defeated, captured, and blinded by Vasily II in
1436. (Kosoi means “squint-eyed” in Russian, referring to this
blinding.) Removed from the political scene, Kosoi died in 1447 or 1448.
Following Vasily II’s return to power, tensions continued over the next decade
between Dmitry Shemiaka and Vasily II. Also at this time, Vasily’s son Ivan
(the future Ivan III) was born in 1440. Disputes over the distribution of
inheritance, Shemiaka’s contribution to Vasily’s military ventures, and tribute
to the Golden Horde never resulted in open warfare. An unrelated incident was
the catalyst for renewed conflict. Khan Ulu-Muhammed, migrating with his horde
from Crimea, clashed with Muscovite troops near Murom and remained in the area
to pillage. Leading a small force, Vasily unexpectedly came upon Ulu-Muhammed
outside Suzdal, on 7 July 1445 and was wounded and captured.
Dmitry Shemiaka, the next senior member of this generation,
assumed the grand princely throne, but Vasily negotiated with the khan and was
released in November 1445, on the condition that he pay a large ransom and a
higher tribute than before. Rather than yield, Dmitry used the incident to
renew the dynastic struggle. He seized Vasily’s mother and wife while Vasily
was on pilgrimage to the Trinity Monastery north of Moscow and sent a force to
arrest Vasily. Vasily was accused of showing favoritism to the Tartars as well
as blinding Dmitry’s brother, Vasily Kosoi. In retaliation, Vasily II was
likewise blinded. Shemiaka then released Vasily in September 1466, on the
condition that Vasily renounce his claim to the throne and swear allegiance to
Shemiaka. Vasily immediately made a pilgrimage to the St. Cyril-Beloozero
Monastery, where the abbot absolved him of this oath. He then began gathering
his supporters against Shemiaka. In the face of growing opposition, Shemiaka abandoned
Moscow. Vasily returned in triumph in 1447 and continued the war, finally
defeating Shemiaka. Fleeing to Novgorod, Shemiaka was poisoned there in 1453.
Moscow and Novgorod
During and immediately after the war Vasily II was also able
to assert dominance over princes and lands beyond the territories attached to
Vladimir and Moscow. In 1449, he concluded a treaty with the prince of Suzdal’,
in which the latter agreed not to seek or receive patents for their office from
the Tatar khan. His position became dependent upon the prince of Moscow, not
the khan. When the prince of Riazan’ died in 1456, Vasily II brought his son
into his own household and sent his governors to administer that principality.
By that time Vasily had also entered into new agreements with the prince of
Tver’, who while not acknowledging Vasily’s seniority, nevertheless pledged his
co-operation in all ventures against the Tatars as well as their Western
neighbours; Boris also recognised Vasily as the rightful grand prince and as
prince of Novgorod.
Vasily also asserted his authority over Novgorod. In 1431,
Novgorod had concluded a treaty with the prince of Lithuania, Svidrigailo, and
accepted his nephew as its prince. But even though Svidrigailo was the
brother-in-law of Iurii of Galich, Novgorod had been neutral during Iurii’s
conflict with Vasily II. When Vasily II was engaged against Vasily Kosoi (the
Cross-Eyed), he negotiated with Novgorod to enlist its support; he indicated a
willingness to settle outstanding disputes over Novgorod’s eastern frontier.
But after he had defeated Kosoi, he reneged on his agreement. He sent his
officers to collect tribute and in 1440-1, after the Lithuanian prince had left
the city, he launched a military campaign against Novgorod and forced it to
make an additional payment and promise to continue to pay taxes and fees
regularly. During the 1440s, however, Novgorod was at war with both of its
major Western trading partners, the Hanseatic League and the Teutonic Order.
The Hansa blockaded Novgorod and closed its own commercial operations in the
city for six years. Novgorod lost commercial revenue. It suffered from high
prices and also from a famine. In the midst of these crises Novgorod accepted
another prince from Lithuania (1444). When Vasily II and Dmitrii Shemiaka took
their conflict to the north and disrupted Novgorod’s northern trade routes,
Novgorod gave support and sanctuary to Shemiaka.
In 1456, as Vasily II was asserting his authority over other
Russian principalities, he also launched a major military campaign against
Novgorod and once again defeated it. Novgorod was obliged to accept the Treaty
of Iazhelbitsii. According to its terms, it had to cut off its connections with
Shemiaka’s family as well as with any other enemies of the grand prince. It was
to pay taxes and the Tatar tribute to the grand prince; it was to accept the
grand prince’s judicial officials in the city; and it was to conclude
agreements with foreign powers only with the approval of the grand prince. It
was obliged, furthermore, to cede key sectors of its northern territorial
possessions to the grand prince.
The dynastic war ended in victory for Vasily II. It resolved
in his favour the issues of succession and of the prerogatives of the grand
prince. The outcome of the war left Vasily II with undisputed control over the
grand principality and its possessions as well as the territories attached to
the principality of Moscow. His relatives, who had shared the familial domain
when he took office, had all died or gone into exile or been subordinated. Only
one cousin, Mikhail of Vereia, retained an apanage principality. The remainder
of the apanage principalities, which had been the territories of Vasily’s
Iurevich cousins, of Ivan Andreevich of Mozhaisk, and of Vasily Iaroslavich of
Serpukhov, along with their economic resources and revenues had reverted to the
grand prince.
Vasily’s post-war policies towards his relatives and
neighbouring princes also provided the grand prince with more secure military
power. Although he still relied on them to supply military forces, they had
become subordinate to him or had committed themselves by treaty to support him.
Vasily, furthermore, established his Tatar ally, Kasim, on the Oka River. The
Tatars of the khanate of Kasimov became available to participate in the
military ventures of the Muscovite grand princes. Vasily II thus ensured that
the grand prince would not be as militarily vulnerable as he had been when the
wars began. His policies gave him access to larger forces than potential
competitors within north-eastern Russia without being dependent on support from
independent princes and the khans of the Great Horde and emerging khanates of
Kazan’ and Crimea.
Vasily II emerged from the war as the strongest prince in
north-eastern Russia. Shortly after he recovered Moscow, Vasily asserted his
sovereignty by using the title `sovereign of all Rus” on newly minted
coins. In late 1447 or early 1448, he also named his young son, Ivan, his
co-ruler; coins then appeared with the inscription `sovereigns of all
Rus”. While thereby making it more difficult for co-lateral relatives to
challenge his son’s succession, Vasily II also confirmed a vertical pattern of
succession for the princes of Moscow. When Ivan III assumed his father’s throne
in 1462, no other prince within the house of Moscow had the resources or the
status to mount a military challenge for the throne, as Iurii Dmitr’evich and
his sons had done. The Tatar khans also lost their decisive influence over
succession. Vasily II had appealed to Khan Ulu-Muhammed for a patent to hold
the throne of Vladimir. But it was his own military victory over his uncle and
cousins that confirmed the replacement of the traditional lateral pattern of
succession with a vertical one. Vasily II was able to leave the grand
principality as well as his Muscovite possessions to his son without acquiring
prior approval of a Tatar khan. Ivan III, followed by his son and grandson,
would expand those core territories to build the state of Muscovy.
