Concise Russian history for a traveler

Russia under the Romanovs

Michael. The military drive that finally expelled the Poles from Moscow led to the election of Michael Romanov as the new tsar in 1613. The Romanov government required more than a decade to establish itself politically and to restore economic and social order. The Romanov government wisely avoided any significant participation in the Thirty Years’ War, in which most European states were engaged. The political recovery of the Russian state after the so-called Time of Trouble was due largely to the survival of the central bureaucracy and ruling oligarchy.

The reign of Peter the Great (1689-1725). The accession of Peter I established the social, institutional, and intellectual trends that were to dominate Russia for the next two centuries.
Both Russian and Western historians evaluate Peter’s reign as one of the most formative periods of Russian history. Peter’s first political aim was to secure Russian southern borders against the threat of raids by Crimean Tatars. For lack of adequate sea power, his initial attempt, in 1695, failed to gain a foothold on the Sea of Azov.

Undaunted, Peter built up a navy – he was the first Russian ruler since early Kievan times to do so – and succeeded in capturing Azov a year later. The experience convinced him of necessity of extending his own technical knowledge and of securing tools and personnel from the West. To this end Peter traveled to western Europe, something no Russian tsar had ever done; he spent almost a year in Holland and England acquiring mechanical and maritime skills, hiring experts in various fields, purchasing books and scientific curiosities, and carrying on diplomatic negotiations for a crusade against the Turks.