The Tsars : Russian Autocrats, 1533-1917

London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. Very Good/Very Good. 1968. Hard Cover. Sm 4to 0297176528 Dust jacket price clipped. Bright covers with gilt titling and illustration. Illustrated end papers. No ownership inscription. Discoloured area on title page. 8 pages of colour illustrations 96 pages of black and white illustrations. 320 pages clean and tight. The Tsars is not another history of Russia, but an absorbing account of all Russia's autocrats from the accession of Ivan iv (the Terrible), who was the first ruler formally to be crowned Tsar, to the abdication of Nicholas ii in 1917 and the consequent end of the Tsars and their system of government. These absolute rulers are studied in action - and in inaction, since individually they tended to be either active or passive, and in either case to excess. Their subjects, too, are taken fully into account, as they veered between the extremes of anarchy and regimentation, and oscillated like their sovereigns between the turmoil of the characteristically Russian skandal and the decorum of the no less typical counter-skandal. Ronald Hingley begins his study with a description of the pre-Romanov Tsars, Ivan iv and the saintly Theodore i, whose reign ushered in the Time of Troubles. He goes on to show the first three Romanov Tsars presiding in ritual splendour over a country increasingly addicted to the autocratic principle despite the passivity or feebleness of its individual rulers; Peter the Great, who provides a violent contrast as the most active of all the Tsars, and who strove vigorously to make Russia part of Europe; and Catherine ii, who was outstanding in promoting the splendours of the Russian court and in increasing Russia's international prestige. After an account of the militant autocracy of Paul, Alexander i and Nicholas i, the book ends with a discussion of the last three Tsars, thrown increasingly on the defensive by the threat of revolution. Many Tsars dispensed death by violence on an impressive scale, and many Tsars themselves fell victims of assassination and palace revolution. They are described here neither as misunderstood martyrs nor as the ogres which later propaganda has made of them, but as rulers of widely varied character attempting to wield absolute power in their own or their country's interests. .