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Mongols from Central Asia, also know as the Tatars, make Russia part of their vast empire. The Mongols moved the capital to Moscow, a city in the state of Muscovy. Great Princes ruled over them.
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Ivan III becomes the Great Prince.
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Ivan III breaks away from the Mongol Empire and declares himself czar. He became known as Ivan the Great because he expanded Russia and created religious and political order.
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Ivan IV was Ivan III's grandson. In his early reign, he had victories over the Mongols and was a just ruler until his wife, Anastasia died. Ivan blamed boyers and probably went insane. He bacame known as Ivan the Terrible because of the many common people that he killed. He had secret police, and even killed his oldest son. He died in 1584, and numberous civil wars followed.
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Peter's main goal was to modernize Russia, so he traveled to Europe for ideas. When he returned, he built factories and school, modernized the government, and improved the army. He built a new capital, called St. Peterburg. He also enlarged the empire and made Russia a major European power by defeating the Swedes and extended territory over the Baltic Sea. He lost power in 1725.
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Peter the Great wanted to modernize Russia, and in doing so, he build St. Petersburg, close to Europe. This became a new capital.
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Lenin created a new country call the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. He followed the ideas of Karl Marx, a German political thinker. Marx believed that idustrialization was unfair because factory owners had much power while the workers had little. Lenin wanted to make everyone equal.
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Stalin was a harsh dictator who ruled after Lenin died. He had secret police that carried out his orders and killed anyone who disobeyed him.
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Boris Yeltsin became the president. Hard-liners attempted a coup, but failed. Yeltsin worked to build a democracy and to create a market economy.
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Vladimir Putin becomes president of Russia.
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Vikings land in Russia and set up trade routes on the Russian rivers that led from the Baltic Sea to Constatinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire. Around that time, Slavic people settled in the town of Kiev, which became the civilization of Kievan Rus.
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Missionaries bring Eastern Orthodox Christianity and a written language is brought to Keivan Rus.
