Boyarin boris ivanovich morozov biography. Biography. The ascent of the new courtier

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Boris (Ilya) Ivanovich Morozov(1590 - November 1, 1661) - Russian boyar, one of the largest landowners of his time, educator of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. The eldest son of Ivan Vasilyevich Morozov and Agrafena Elizarovna Saburova.

Biography

In 1615 Morozov was taken "to live" in the palace. In 1634 he was elevated to the boyar and appointed "uncle" to Tsarevich Alexei Mikhailovich. He became even closer to the young tsar when he married the tsarina's sister - Anna Ilyinichna Miloslavskaya. Until the end of his life, Morozov remained the closest and most influential person in the royal court. Contemporaries characterized him as a smart and experienced person in public affairs, showing an interest in Western enlightenment. Probably he managed to instill this interest in his pupil.

He owned 55,000 peasants and a number of iron, brick and salt industries.

A dark spot in Morozov's biography is the abuse, which served as one of the reasons for the Salt Riot of 1648. At this time, Morozov was the head of several important orders (the Big Treasury, Pharmacies and Taxes).

The patronage of unworthy relatives, the introduction of new taxes and ransoms aroused indignation in the Moscow people against Morozov.

In an effort to increase treasury revenues, Morozov cut employee salaries and introduced a high indirect tax on salt. These measures sparked popular uprisings in May 1648. The rebels demanded the head of Morozov. His closest assistants (okolnichy PT Trakhaniotov and clerk G. Larionov), as well as judge of the Zemsky Prikaz LS Pleshcheev, were killed, he himself barely escaped in the royal palace.

The tsar was forced to remove his favorite - Morozov was exiled to the Kirillo-Belozersky monastery. This, however, did not change the attitude of Alexei Mikhailovich to Morozov.

Four months later, Morozov returned to Moscow.

Upon his return, Morozov did not occupy an official position in the internal government, probably because the tsar wanted to fulfill his promise to the people.

At the same time, in 1649, Morozov took an active part in the preparation of the Cathedral Code, a code of laws that existed until the 19th century.

Morozov was with the tsar all the time. When setting out on a campaign against Lithuania in 1654, the tsar granted Morozov the highest military rank - a courtyard commander, commander of the "sovereign's regiment."

When Morozov died in 1661, the tsar personally gave his last debt to the deceased in the church, along with others. He was buried in the Chudov Monastery, the grave was lost.

Inheritance

Morozov had no heirs, and after death the whole fortune passed to his brother Gleb, who, however, also died soon after. The entire joint fortune went to the young son of Gleb, and in fact - passed into the hands of his mother, the boyar Feodosia Morozova, known for her Old Believer activities.

Literature

• Household acts of the boyar B.I.Morozov. In 2 vols. - M.-L .: Publishing house of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, 1940-1945.
• Zharkov V.P. Boyarin Boris Ivanovich Morozov - statesman Russia XVII century. - M., 2001.
• Petrikeev D.I. Based on materials from the patrimony of the boyar B. I. Morozov. - L., 1967.
• Smirnov P.P.The government of B.I.Morozov and the uprising in Moscow in 1648 - Tashkent, 1929.

55,000 people, 45,000 acres of arable land, 9,000 peasant households, 330 settlements, 85 churches, 24 manor estates plus mills, smithies, workshops, metallurgical and potash plants, breweries, taverns, shops, barns, orchards, artificial ponds for fish farming - in the middle of the 17th century, all this belonged to one person. Boyarin Boris Ivanovich Morozov, educator and closest adviser to Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, as well as the head of his government, was famous for his wealth not only in Russia, but also in Europe. The Austrian envoy in Moscow, Augustine Meyerberg, wrote that he had the same greed for gold, "as usual thirst for drinking." Coming out in those days of Forbes, Morozov could head the list of Russian billionaires.

Servant oligarch

If where there was a myriad of myths, multiplied by an even greater number of ambiguities, it was in the genealogies and biographies of the old Moscow nobility before Peter I. Boyars Morozov, for example, claimed that they were descended from a certain Mikhail Prushanin. According to one version, he served Alexander Nevsky and even distinguished himself in the famous battle of 1240 with the Swedes on the Neva. According to another legend, the ancestor of the Morozovs came to Novgorod together with Rurik himself. However, the first person in the family, whose existence is documented, was the boyar Ivan, nicknamed Moroz, who served Dmitry Donskoy in Moscow - one of his sons died on the Kulikovo field.

The exact date of birth of the richest of the Morozovs, Boris Ivanovich, is absent in the documents. It is known that he began service immediately after the Time of Troubles in 1616, and got married a year later; the name of his first wife, however, is also unknown. His signature is on the letter of the Zemsky Sobor in 1613 on the election of Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov as Tsar.

Apparently, Boris was orphaned quite early and, as a scion of a noble family, together with his brother was taken to live in the royal palace. The English court doctor Samuel Collins argued that the king was personally involved in the upbringing of Morozov. In his youth and youth, Boris undoubtedly enjoyed the patronage of his uncle, the former Kazan governor Vasily Petrovich Morozov, who played a significant role in the militia of Minin and Pozharsky.

For all his nobility, however, Boris Morozov did not have any significant fortune. For the first ten years of his court service, he was a lager - he poured wine at royal dinner parties. Initially, he owned only 400 acres of land (tithe - 1.0925 hectares), half with his brother Gleb, and this was where his wealth began. After five years of service, Boris was personally given another 500 dessiatines. Over the next decade, he continually served a little more and more. For example, in 1618, when the Polish king again tried to seize Moscow, but failed, Morozov was given 300 acres of land "for the siege seat". By the time when in 1634 Boris Ivanovich was granted the boyar rank, the size of his possessions had increased at least three times. However, he was still far from the largest land magnates of Muscovy, such as, say, the tsar's closest relative, boyar Nikita Ivanovich Romanov, in whose personal possession, in addition to numerous villages, was the whole city of Romanov-Borisoglebsky, now Tutaev, on the Volga.

In that era, however, as in all other times in Russia, in order to become one of the richest, it was necessary to get into the immediate circle of the sovereign, and even better - to become related to the royal family. To begin with, Morozov became an uncle, he was appointed to lead the upbringing of the Tsarevich, the future Sovereign of All Russia, Alexei Mikhailovich. And as soon as Alexei became king, in the same 1645 he made his beloved uncle the head of key departments; in those conditions, this actually meant that Boris Morozov became the head of government. At the same time, from the tsarist possessions, Morozov was granted two of the richest Volga villages - Murashkino and Lyskovo with 23 villages in the Nizhny Novgorod district. With one stroke of the pen, the newly minted favorite received 3500 peasant households and about 10 thousand male peasant souls.

Next to the new Volga possessions of Morozov was the Makaryevsky Zheltovodsky Monastery, famous for the largest trade fair in Russia. In general, Nizhny Novgorod and the adjacent lands in the 17th century were among the most economically developed in the country. Unlike most other parts of the Muscovite kingdom, trade and crafts developed much faster there, the first manufactories appeared, and in some places hired labor was even used. Receiving such a tasty morsel of property here opened up broad prospects for enrichment for Morozov.

However, the growth of the land holdings of the magnate Morozov did not stop there. Soon the boyar consolidated his position at court, becoming a royal relative. He married Anna Miloslavskaya, the sister of Alexei Mikhailovich's wife Maria, whom a caring uncle personally selected for his pupil a little earlier. Now he no longer served the patrimony, but as a private person, Boyar Morozov bought them from Boyar Morozov, the Prime Minister.

It was all the easier to do this because even in the middle of the 17th century, almost 30 years after the Time of Troubles, many abandoned lands remained in the central districts, where villages and villages were once located. These lands belonged to the treasury, but did not bring any income. Here is the new head of government and decided to privatize unprofitable assets. As usual, on favorable terms. In a similar way, the village of Kotelniki fell into the hands of Morozov; now it is a fairly large village in the near Moscow region between Kapotnya and Dzerzhinsky. Some time later, when after 1654 the war between Russia and Poland for the Ukrainian lands began, the boyar obtained permission to resettle captured Belarusian peasants to the wastelands belonging to him. By the way, such "privatization", even with all its obvious corruption, was beneficial to the state: in the same Kotelniki, 20 years after the transfer of the village to Morozov, the size of arable land, which at first was 20 acres, increased more than 30 times. Another example: in the Vyazemsky district, on the site of 200 wastelands ransomed from the treasury, 18 villages were rebuilt and populated.

Business in Old Moscow

The growth of Morozov's wealth was not limited to the privatization of lands. The country was rebuilding after the Time of Troubles. And in Europe there is a steady trend towards the development of the market, entrepreneurship, monetary relations... New economic trends reached Russia as well. It all started with trade - then not only merchants, but also almost all segments of the population were engaged in it. A lower-ranking nobleman, setting off for the sovereign's service in a distant district, took with him at least a piece of cloth for sale - some kind of addition to the meager salary. What then can we say about the boyars with their colossal estates and weight at court - here it was impossible not to turn around. The first known trading operation of Boris Morozov took place in 1632, when, during the outbreak of the war with the Poles, he and his brother Gleb supplied 100 quarters of bread, which amounted to 600 poods, or about 10 tons, for the needs of the Russian army.

In the future, the high official position of boyar Morozov contributed to the fact that his deals with the treasury turned into one of the main sources of his personal income. During the next war, already in 1660, he, together with the merchant Guriev, sold 10 thousand quarters of rye to the army. The boyar was especially interested in the bread trade because of his Nizhny Novgorod possessions. The difference in the price of grain grown here compared to Moscow was three to four times. Such a profit prompted Morozov not only to sell the harvest collected on his own lands, but to start buying it nearby and reselling it. To store the purchased grain in Nizhny Novgorod, three huge grain yards with 38 granaries were built. Where there is bread, there is also bread wine - vodka. Moreover, Morozov sold the products of his own distilleries to his own peasants in rural taverns, and supplied the surplus to the market outside the estate. Only in 1651, 10 thousand buckets of wine (bucket - 12, 299 liters) were sold from his Nizhny Novgorod possessions to Kazan.

Morozov's trade was not limited to the domestic market. Part of the goods produced on his farm went abroad. Potash, obtained by repeatedly burning wood ash and used, in particular, in the production of soap, was in special demand in Europe at that time. In the middle of the 17th century, one Frenchman even proposed a whole scheme for the economic development of Russian resources: first, burn timber and process it into potash, and then grow bread on the resulting fields - all, of course, for the sake of income in the foreign market.

Morozov, apparently, was aware of this idea and was very fond of potash production. He owned the largest number of potash enterprises in Russia. Tellingly, not only peasants (mostly poor people who were not able to pay a normal quitrent) were employed in harmful work, but also special hired workers - "business people", as they were then called. One barrel of potash cost about 35 rubles, and in the Morozov estates they were produced in hundreds. The main foreign partners of the boyar were the Dutch. The Swedish resident in Moscow Karl Pommerening, not without reason, argued that it was at the suggestion of Morozov, who traded with Europe through the Netherlands, that the British were finally squeezed out of Russia in 1649 under the pretext of fighting the Cromwellian revolution. It is not hard to guess who immediately took their place.

The Dutchman, who converted to Orthodoxy, Andrei Vinius was both an adviser to the government and a business partner of Boris Morozov, who headed this government. In the 1640s, they jointly tried to build a metallurgical plant in Tula. Then this venture failed, but the boyar did not abandon the idea of ​​producing iron in Russia. In 1651, he invited a master from abroad, who was to organize a "mine at a mill" in his village of Pavlovskoye near Moscow. Since then only the so-called bog ore was used as a raw material (deposits at the bottom of the bogs of brown iron ore - limonite), low-quality metal was obtained from it. Nevertheless, the Pavlovsk "iron works" continued to work after the death of Morozov.

The boyar started another mine in the Volga Lyskovo. But before building a new plant here, he analyzed its possible profitability for a whole year, studying the experience of the neighboring Makariev Monastery. And in the end, I decided not to spare the investment. Other industrial assets owned by the boyar included a linen "boorish yard" in the village of Staroye Pokrovskoye, Nizhny Novgorod district, where Polish weavers worked. Morozov supplied yuft to the state treasury - specially made waterproof leather, which was then used in the manufacture of army boots. In 1661, 76 poods of yuft were sold from the boyar estates for the amount of 1,156 rubles 60 altyns.

Usury became another considerable source of income for the boyar. Of course, Morozov did not have his own banking house, like, say, the Rothschilds, but he was very willing to lend various amounts at interest. Petty nobles borrowed relatively small amounts - 200, 400, maximum 600 rubles. This is how his clientele was formed among the service people. Loans to foreign merchants, which were usually given at the conclusion of commercial transactions, were ten times more than those taken by poor service nobles. The largest known one-time loan amounted to 8 thousand rubles. The total number of Morozov's debtors could reach 80 people, and the annual amount of interest payments was about 85 thousand rubles. Even members of the royal family fell into his debt networks, as, for example, it happened with the Siberian prince Alexei Alekseevich.

And of course, under the conditions of a patrimonial state, which was the Muscovy, an important source of income was the position held in this state. Or rather, what one could get thanks to this position. One salary 900 rubles. (to tell the truth, it was a very large sum), of course, the case was not limited. Both Russian and foreign sources note an unprecedented increase in bribes in the period 1645-1648, when Morozov, using the boundless confidence of the new, still very young Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, reached the highest official posts and concentrated in his hands almost all government. As the foreign traveler Adam Olearius testified, at this time in Moscow a whole network was formed, consisting of clerical people and engaged in all sorts of informal extortions from the population. Its links were led by Morozov's confidants placed in the most important positions, and a chain of bribes led to the very top. As a result, for example, only the foreign company that brought "the most gifts" to the head of government personally could enter the Russian market.

In addition, Morozov, apparently, was an unsurpassed master of the development of state funds. Take, for example, the construction of fortifications in the Kirillo-Belozersky monastery carried out under the Morozov government. It was argued that the Swedes could allegedly go through this bearish corner to Moscow from the north. Hundreds of kilometers of rugged terrain ran up to Kirillov from the then Swedish-Russian border. And even if the river route was used for a short summer, the option of a massive invasion here was more hypothetical than real. At least, the Swedes themselves did not dare to do this, and tourists who visit here are still wondering why they built the largest fortress in Europe in the Vologda region, which, like everything the largest in Russia, was never used for destination. However, these walls were useful to Morozov personally: in the summer of 1648 he fled to the Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery to hide here from the Salt Riot, when Muscovites who disagreed with his methods of government demanded the extradition and execution of the tsar's favorite.

Costs and risks

The exact size of Morozov's fortune is unknown and difficult to calculate. Apparently, 350 years ago in Russia it was not customary to show all your income. Morozov's immunity was the "glory and strength" of the richest and most influential person after the tsar and the patriarch. According to Meyerberg, after his death, the boyar left "a myriad of silver rubles, gold ducats and Joachimthalers." The true wealth of Morozov can be judged at least by the fact that only one of the numerous distributions of alms in memory after his death was spent 10 thousand rubles. Actually, it is by the costs, both now and then, that one can indirectly judge about real incomes.

But not all wealth, especially in the 17th century, was measured only in money. Take, for example, the inventory of dining supplies preserved in the economic archive of Morozov, intended for his personal use and treats to distinguished guests. In January 1652, he wrote to his clerk Andrei Dementyev in the village of Pavlovskoye near Moscow, ordering him to salt and prepare 180 pork carcasses for the tsar's solemn reception. The meat was transported by 37 carts from another county, and as a result, it turned out that two poods were missing - one carts were lost along the way. Judging by the surviving documents, the boyar, who was quick to punish anyone, did not punish anyone for this "shrinkage-weariness" - apparently, the loss of 32 kg of meat was so insignificant for him. Another inventory, dated December 1650, testifies to the size of the natural rent, which the peasants of only one village of Troitskoye in the Nizhny Novgorod district had to put on the boyar table for Christmas: "from each smoke" it was supposed to take one goose, one chicken, and even poodu "pork meat, good and grain." Only one modest batch of live fish, which, at the whim of Morozov, was transported from the Volga to Moscow, could consist of 7 sterlets, 69 pikes and 163 crucians. According to another inventory, eight barrels of wine were delivered "for boyar use" - again on the occasion of the "sovereign's arrival" to visit Boris Ivanovich.

In Moscow and the near Moscow region, Morozov had at least four personal residences. Some of the chambers, as expected, are right in the Kremlin, next to the royal palace and the Chudov monastery. Another courtyard was located in the Vorontsov Pole area; after the death of the boyar, according to his order, an almshouse was set up here. The main suburban residence was the village of Pavlovskoe, now Pavlovskaya Sloboda, where it is now better to go around New Riga, and earlier, in the days of Morozov, we traveled through Tushino. In Pavlovsky there was a whole agro-town serving the boyar and his crowded courtyard. In addition to the already mentioned ironworks, gardens and fish ponds were built here, apparently so as not to go to the Volga again. The tsar and tsar's nobles could also come here for dinner parties. And Patriarch Nikon himself, a native of the Makaryevsky Zheltovodsky Monastery, soon began to build his residence along the same road - in New Jerusalem. A modest estate in Kotelniki served as a hunting lodge - Morozov was a passionate lover of falconry, to which he also taught Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. But in the village of Gorodnya on the Volga near Tver (it is still located behind Zavidovo on the Moscow-St. Petersburg highway), the boyar built a whole wooden castle. It has come down to this day in the description of the Dutchman Nicholas Witsen, and it is known that Morozov settled here when in 1648 he decided to move from exile in Kirillov closer to the capital.

It is difficult to imagine a wealthy person without a vehicle that befits his status. Bentley had not yet been invented, so the boyar had to be content with a carriage that Alexey Mikhailovich personally presented to him on the occasion of his wedding. The crew cabin was lined with gold brocade lined with expensive sables, and the rims and other external decorations were made of pure silver. It is a pity that the boyar was not able to use the luxurious gift for long: in June 1648, the participants in the Salt Riot turned the carriage into a pile of chips in a matter of minutes. In general, the entire richly furnished house of Morozov in the Kremlin was destroyed. With the words "this is our blood," everything that was there, the rebels "chopped up, smashed and pilfered, and what they could not take away - they spoiled." The boyar himself, in order to save his life, had to, forgetting about the gorgeous departure, run on horseback at full speed.

However, wealth and luxury were soon restored and became even greater. After leaving official government posts, the boyar, albeit to a lesser extent than before, still retained influence over the tsar. He was still able to "resolve issues" at the highest level. Only now Morozov had much more time to deal with his own household. The greatest prosperity of his patrimonial empire falls precisely on the 1650s.

Abnormal feudal lord

According to history textbooks, we are accustomed to believe that a boyar is the one who with a belly and a long beard, in a high throated cap and long caftan, sits next to the king on a bench in the Faceted Chamber and with all his might resists everything new and progressive. As Grigory Kotoshikhin, a clerk of the Ambassadorial Prikaz recruited by the Swedish intelligence and fled to the West, told his customers, “while other boyars, their brads, when they are tired, do not answer, because the tsar favors many of the boyars not according to their reason, but according to the great breed, and many of they are not scholars and not students who are literate. " This description, however, is not always consistent with reality. And there were not so few exceptions. Among the consumer spending of Morozov, for example, along with luxury goods, the purchase of books also occupied a certain place. In his home library, along with editions in Russian, which were published by the Moscow Printing House, there were books written out of Lithuania in Latin, including the political writings of Cicero and the historical ones by Tacitus.

Unlike many other large landowners, Boyar Morozov personally supervised his huge farm. He corresponded with clerks, supervised their activities, resolved internal disputes that arose, extinguished conflicts, punished and complained, intervened in every little thing. If not every day, then certainly several times a week, letters came out from under his pen with more and more new orders and instructions. In his colossal possessions, a rigid centralized management system operated, copying the vertical that existed at the state level. To coordinate the activities of individual sections of the economy in Moscow, a special private order was created, the apparatus of which collected information on the state of affairs in the field, carried out general control and accounting, prepared regular reports to the owner and was engaged in mailing correspondence. Morozov's officers had great power, they made up a single team and possessed significant weight not only in the boyar patrimony, but also outside it. The main executors were local clerks and bailiffs subordinate to them. Their functions were determined in special orders. The clerk was responsible for the boyar economy and trades, collected the peasant rent, supervised the execution of the corvee dues, and performed the functions of the court of first instance. The local administration had to report to the center about all the more or less significant details.

And here's another interesting thing: for all his unconditional rigidity and authoritarianism, Morozov was not a serf. On the contrary, he even strongly resisted the introduction of serfdom. Judge for yourself: the peasant rent was not a decisive share in his income. Most of Money, as far as can be judged, came from trade and crafts. In addition, with such a number of peasants, it was possible to take from them much less than other feudal lords collected. It is known that, by luring homeowners into their possessions, Morozov for some time provided them with complete exemption from quitrent and other duties. Some neighboring small landowner with his pitiful ten yards could sometimes turn out to be poorer than a peasant who lived for a "strong man." And collecting rent from ten people is not at all the same as from ten thousand. It was clearly better to live in the patrimony of such a magnate as Morozov: you need to pay less, and a loan, if anything, can be easily obtained, and protection from other strong or just dashing people will also be there. So the peasants fled - not so much to the Don, as to the large boyar latifundia. In turn, the nobles, who formed the basis of the militia in the Muscovite kingdom, constantly demanded from the state to prohibit this transition, that is, in fact, to introduce serfdom. As a result, under the pressure of the nobility, the magnates were forced to surrender, such was the price for the loyalty of the army in the conditions of the rebellious age. But even after the adoption of the Cathedral Code of 1649, which formally completed the establishment of serfdom in Russia, specific mechanisms for the search and return of the fugitive to their former owners were not spelled out for at least a decade. And here, of course, it was not without Morozov.

At the end of life one of richest people Russia suffered from gout and water sickness. At his service, of course, were the best foreign doctors from the Aptekarsky Prikaz, but, alas, everything has its limits. Boris Morozov died in 1661. Even in Last year life, rarely getting out of bed, he tried to control the affairs of his own huge household. And not only because he could no longer live otherwise. There was no one to transfer the management of the huge farm - the boyar Morozov never had children. As one of his contemporaries wrote, “he saw himself many times as a father,” but the children, apparently, died in infancy.

As a result, the circle of heirs turned out to be small. A year later, brother Gleb died, and after a while the widow of Boris Ivanovich, Anna Morozova-Miloslavskaya, also died. Immediately after her death, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich took over the lion's share - the villages of Pavlovskoye, Murashkino and Lyskovo. To manage them at the state level, the Order of Secret Affairs was created.

A considerable part of the remaining possessions passed to the widow of Gleb - the famous activist of the church schism Theodosia Morozova-Sokovnina and her son Ivan. But soon both of them were thrown into prison, where they ended their life. Moreover, some still believe that the reason for this was not so much religious disputes, but too much of the wealth that went to a rather young widow. All the property of those arrested was confiscated. So the economic empire of the boyar Boris Ivanovich Morozov, which grew up thanks to the proximity of this head of government to the state treasury, turned out to be the state and absorbed.

Servant oligarch

If where there was a myriad of myths, multiplied by an even greater number of ambiguities, it was in the genealogies and biographies of the old Moscow nobility before Peter I. Boyars Morozov, for example, claimed that they were descended from a certain Mikhail Prushanin. According to one version, he served Alexander Nevsky and even distinguished himself in the famous battle of 1240 with the Swedes on the Neva. According to another legend, the ancestor of the Morozovs came to Novgorod together with Rurik himself. However, the first person in the family, whose existence is documented, was the boyar Ivan, nicknamed Moroz, who served Dmitry Donskoy in Moscow - one of his sons died on the Kulikovo field.

The exact date of birth of the richest of the Morozovs, Boris Ivanovich, is absent in the documents. It is known that he began service immediately after the Time of Troubles in 1616, and got married a year later; the name of his first wife, however, is also unknown. His signature is on the letter of the Zemsky Sobor in 1613 on the election of Mikhail Fedorovich Romanov as Tsar.

Apparently, Boris became orphaned quite early and, as a scion of a noble family, together with his brother, was taken to live in the royal palace. The English court physician Samuel Collins claimed that the Tsar himself was personally involved in the upbringing of Morozov. In his youth and youth, Boris undoubtedly enjoyed the patronage of his uncle, the former Kazan governor Vasily Petrovich Morozov, who played a significant role in the militia of Minin and Pozharsky.

In that era, however, as in all other times in Russia, in order to become one of the richest, it was necessary to get into the immediate circle of the sovereign, and even better - to become related to the royal family. To begin with, Morozov became an uncle, he was appointed to lead the upbringing of the Tsarevich, the future Sovereign of All Russia, Alexei Mikhailovich. And as soon as Alexei became king, in the same 1645 he made his beloved uncle the head of key departments; in those conditions, this actually meant that Boris Morozov became the head of government. At the same time, from the tsarist possessions, Morozov was granted two of the richest Volga villages - Murashkino and Lyskovo with 23 villages in the Nizhny Novgorod district. With one stroke of the pen, the newly minted favorite received 3500 peasant households and about 10 thousand male peasant souls.

Next to the new Volga possessions of Morozov was the Makaryevsky Zheltovodsky Monastery, famous for the largest trade fair in Russia. In general, Nizhny Novgorod and the adjacent lands in the 17th century were among the most economically developed in the country. Unlike most other parts of the Muscovite kingdom, trade and crafts developed much faster there, the first manufactories appeared, and in some places hired labor was even used. Receiving such a tasty morsel of property here opened up broad prospects for enrichment for Morozov.

It was all the easier to do this because even in the middle of the 17th century, almost 30 years after the Time of Troubles, many abandoned lands remained in the central districts, where villages and villages were once located. These lands belonged to the treasury, but did not bring any income. Here is the new head of government and decided to privatize unprofitable assets. As usual, on favorable terms. In a similar way, the village of Kotelniki fell into the hands of Morozov; now it is a fairly large village in the near Moscow region between Kapotnya and Dzerzhinsky. Some time later, when after 1654 the war between Russia and Poland for the Ukrainian lands began, the boyar obtained permission to resettle captured Belarusian peasants to the wastelands belonging to him. By the way, such "privatization", even with all its obvious corruption, was beneficial to the state: in the same Kotelniki, 20 years after the transfer of the village to Morozov, the size of arable land, which at first was 20 acres, increased more than 30 times. Another example: in the Vyazemsky district, on the site of 200 wastelands ransomed from the treasury, 18 villages were rebuilt and populated.

Business in Old Moscow

The growth of Morozov's wealth was not limited to the privatization of lands. The country was rebuilding after the Time of Troubles. And in Europe there is a steady trend towards the development of the market, entrepreneurship, monetary relations. New economic trends reached Russia as well. It all started with trade - then not only merchants, but also almost all segments of the population were engaged in it. A lower-ranking nobleman, setting off for the sovereign's service in a distant district, took with him at least a piece of cloth for sale - some kind of addition to the meager salary. What then can we say about the boyars with their colossal estates and weight at court - here it was impossible not to turn around. The first known trading operation of Boris Morozov took place in 1632, when, during the outbreak of the war with the Poles, he and his brother Gleb supplied 100 quarters of bread, which amounted to 600 poods, or about 10 tons, for the needs of the Russian army.

Morozov's trade was not limited to the domestic market. Part of the goods produced on his farm went abroad. Potash, obtained by repeatedly burning wood ash and used, in particular, in the production of soap, was in special demand in Europe at that time. In the middle of the 17th century, one Frenchman even proposed a whole scheme for the economic development of Russian resources: first, burn timber and process it into potash, and then grow bread on the resulting fields - all, of course, for the sake of income in the foreign market.

The Dutchman, who converted to Orthodoxy, Andrei Vinius was both an adviser to the government and a business partner of Boris Morozov, who headed this government. In the 1640s, they jointly tried to build a metallurgical plant in Tula. Then this venture failed, but the boyar did not abandon the idea of ​​producing iron in Russia. In 1651, he invited a master from abroad, who was to organize a "mine at a mill" in his village of Pavlovskoye near Moscow. Since then only the so-called bog ore was used as a raw material (deposits at the bottom of the bogs of brown iron ore - limonite), low-quality metal was obtained from it. Nevertheless, the Pavlovsk "iron works" continued to work after the death of Morozov.

The boyar started another mine in the Volga Lyskovo. But before building a new plant here, he analyzed its possible profitability for a whole year, studying the experience of the neighboring Makariev Monastery. And in the end, I decided not to spare the investment. Other industrial assets owned by the boyar included a linen "boorish yard" in the village of Staroye Pokrovskoye, Nizhny Novgorod district, where Polish weavers worked. Morozov supplied yuft to the state treasury - specially made waterproof leather, which was then used in the manufacture of army boots. In 1661, 76 poods of yuft were sold from the boyar estates for the amount of 1,156 rubles 60 altyns.

Usury became another considerable source of income for the boyar. Of course, Morozov did not have his own banking house, like, say, the Rothschilds, but he was very willing to lend various amounts at interest. Petty nobles borrowed relatively small amounts - 200, 400, maximum 600 rubles. This is how his clientele was formed among the service people. Loans to foreign merchants, which were usually given at the conclusion of commercial transactions, were ten times more than those taken by poor service nobles. The largest known one-time loan amounted to 8 thousand rubles. The total number of Morozov's debtors could reach 80 people, and the annual amount of interest payments was about 85 thousand rubles. Even members of the royal family fell into his debt networks, as, for example, it happened with the Siberian prince Alexei Alekseevich.

And of course, under the conditions of a patrimonial state, which was the Muscovy, an important source of income was the position held in this state. Or rather, what one could get thanks to this position. One salary 900 rubles. (to tell the truth, it was a very large sum), of course, the case was not limited. Both Russian and foreign sources note an unprecedented increase in bribes in the period 1645-1648, when Morozov, using the boundless confidence of the new, still very young Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, reached the highest official posts and concentrated in his hands almost all government. As the foreign traveler Adam Olearius testified, at this time in Moscow a whole network was formed, consisting of clerical people and engaged in all sorts of informal extortions from the population. Its links were led by Morozov's confidants placed in the most important positions, and a chain of bribes led to the very top. As a result, for example, only the foreign company that brought "the most gifts" to the head of government personally could enter the Russian market.

In addition, Morozov, apparently, was an unsurpassed master of the development of state funds. Take, for example, the construction of fortifications in the Kirillo-Belozersky monastery carried out under the Morozov government. It was argued that the Swedes could allegedly go through this bearish corner to Moscow from the north. Hundreds of kilometers of rugged terrain ran up to Kirillov from the then Swedish-Russian border. And even if the river route was used for a short summer, the option of a massive invasion here was more hypothetical than real. At least, the Swedes themselves did not dare to do this, and tourists who visit here are still wondering why they built the largest fortress in Europe in the Vologda region, which, like everything the largest in Russia, was never used for destination. However, these walls were useful to Morozov personally: in the summer of 1648 he fled to the Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery to hide here from the Salt Riot, when Muscovites who disagreed with his methods of government demanded the extradition and execution of the tsar's favorite.

The exact size of Morozov's fortune is unknown and difficult to calculate. Apparently, 350 years ago in Russia it was not customary to show all your income. Morozov's immunity was the "glory and strength" of the richest and most influential person after the tsar and the patriarch. According to Meyerberg, after his death, the boyar left "a myriad of silver rubles, gold ducats and Joachimthalers." The true wealth of Morozov can be judged at least by the fact that only one of the numerous distributions of alms in memory after his death was spent 10 thousand rubles. Actually, it is by the costs, both now and then, that one can indirectly judge about real incomes.

But not all wealth, especially in the 17th century, was measured only in money. Take, for example, the inventory of dining supplies preserved in the economic archive of Morozov, intended for his personal use and treats to distinguished guests. In January 1652, he wrote to his clerk Andrei Dementyev in the village of Pavlovskoye near Moscow, ordering him to salt and prepare 180 pork carcasses for the tsar's solemn reception. The meat was transported by 37 carts from another county, and as a result, it turned out that two poods were missing - one carts were lost along the way. Judging by the surviving documents, the boyar, who was quick to punish anyone, did not punish anyone for this "shrinkage-weariness" - so insignificant, apparently, was his loss of 32 kg of meat. Another inventory, dated December 1650, testifies to the size of the natural rent, which the peasants of only one village of Troitskoye in the Nizhny Novgorod district had to put on the boyar table for Christmas: "from each smoke" it was supposed to take one goose, one chicken, and even poodu "pork meat, good and grain." Only one modest batch of live fish, which, at the whim of Morozov, was transported from the Volga to Moscow, could consist of 7 sterlets, 69 pikes and 163 crucians. According to another inventory, eight barrels of wine were delivered "for boyar use" - again on the occasion of the "sovereign's arrival" to visit Boris Ivanovich.

In Moscow and the near Moscow region, Morozov had at least four personal residences. Some of the chambers, as expected, are right in the Kremlin, next to the royal palace and the Chudov monastery. Another courtyard was located in the Vorontsov Pole area; after the death of the boyar, according to his order, an almshouse was set up here. The main suburban residence was the village of Pavlovskoe, now Pavlovskaya Sloboda, where it is now better to go around New Riga, and earlier, during the time of Morozov, they traveled through Tushino. In Pavlovsky there was a whole agro-town serving the boyar and his crowded courtyard. In addition to the already mentioned ironworks, gardens and fish ponds were built here, apparently so as not to go to the Volga again. The tsar and tsar's nobles could also come here for dinner parties. And Patriarch Nikon himself, a native of the Makaryevsky Zheltovodsky Monastery, soon began to build his residence along the same road - in New Jerusalem. A modest estate in Kotelniki served as a hunting lodge - Morozov was a passionate lover of falconry, to which he also taught Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. But in the village of Gorodnya on the Volga near Tver (it is still located behind Zavidovo on the Moscow-St. Petersburg highway) the boyar built a whole wooden castle. It has come down to this day in the description of the Dutchman Nicholas Witsen, and it is known that Morozov settled here when in 1648 he decided to move from exile in Kirillov closer to the capital.

It is difficult to imagine a wealthy person without a vehicle that befits his status. Bentley had not yet been invented, so the boyar had to be content with a carriage that Alexey Mikhailovich personally presented to him on the occasion of his wedding. The crew cabin was lined with gold brocade lined with expensive sables, and the rims and other external decorations were made of pure silver. It is a pity that the boyar was not able to use the luxurious gift for long: in June 1648, the participants in the Salt Riot turned the carriage into a pile of chips in a matter of minutes. In general, the entire richly furnished house of Morozov in the Kremlin was destroyed. With the words "this is our blood" everything that was there, the rebels "chopped up, smashed and pilfered, and what they could not take away - they spoiled." The boyar himself, in order to save his life, had to, forgetting about the gorgeous departure, run on horseback at full speed.

However, wealth and luxury were soon restored and became even greater. After leaving official government posts, the boyar, albeit to a lesser extent than before, still retained influence over the tsar. He was still able to "resolve issues" at the highest level. Only now Morozov had much more time to deal with his own household. The greatest prosperity of his patrimonial empire falls precisely on the 1650s.

According to history textbooks, we are accustomed to believe that a boyar is the one who with a belly and a long beard, in a high throated cap and long caftan, sits next to the king on a bench in the Faceted Chamber and with all his might resists everything new and progressive. As Grigory Kotoshikhin, a clerk of the Ambassadorial Prikaz recruited by the Swedish intelligence and fled to the West, told his customers, “while other boyars, their brads, when they are tired, do not answer, because the tsar favors many of the boyars not according to their reason, but according to the great breed, and many of they are not scholars and not students who are literate. " This description, however, is not always consistent with reality. And there were not so few exceptions. Among the consumer spending of Morozov, for example, along with luxury goods, the purchase of books also occupied a certain place. In his home library, along with publications in Russian, which were published by the Moscow Printing House, there were also books written out of Lithuania in Latin, including the political writings of Cicero and the historical ones by Tacitus.

Unlike many other large landowners, Boyar Morozov personally supervised his huge farm. He corresponded with clerks, supervised their activities, resolved internal disputes that arose, extinguished conflicts, punished and complained, intervened in every little thing. If not every day, then certainly several times a week, letters came out from under his pen with more and more new orders and instructions. In his colossal possessions, a rigid centralized management system operated, copying the vertical that existed at the state level. To coordinate the activities of individual sections of the economy in Moscow, a special private order was created, the apparatus of which collected information on the state of affairs in the field, carried out general control and accounting, prepared regular reports to the owner and was engaged in mailing correspondence. Morozov's officers had great power, they made up a single team and possessed significant weight not only in the boyar patrimony, but also outside it. The main executors were local clerks and bailiffs subordinate to them. Their functions were determined in special orders. The clerk was responsible for the boyar economy and trades, collected the peasant rent, supervised the execution of the corvee dues, and performed the functions of the court of first instance. The local administration had to report to the center about all the more or less significant details.

And here's another interesting thing: for all his unconditional rigidity and authoritarianism, Morozov was not a serf. On the contrary, he even strongly resisted the introduction of serfdom. Judge for yourself: the peasant rent was not a decisive share in his income. Most of the money, as far as can be judged, came from trade and crafts. In addition, with such a number of peasants, it was possible to take from them much less than other feudal lords collected. It is known that, by luring homeowners into their possessions, Morozov for some time provided them with complete exemption from quitrent and other duties. Some neighboring small landowner with his pitiful ten yards could sometimes turn out to be poorer than a peasant who lived for a "strong man." And collecting rent from ten people is not at all the same as from ten thousand. It was clearly better to live in the patrimony of such a magnate as Morozov: you need to pay less, and a loan, if anything, can be easily obtained, and protection from other strong or just dashing people will also be there. So the peasants fled - not so much to the Don, as to the large boyar latifundia. In turn, the nobles, who formed the basis of the militia in the Muscovite kingdom, constantly demanded from the state to prohibit this transition, that is, in fact, to introduce serfdom. As a result, under the pressure of the nobility, the magnates were forced to surrender, such was the price for the loyalty of the army in the conditions of the rebellious age. But even after the adoption of the Cathedral Code of 1649, which formally completed the establishment of serfdom in Russia, specific mechanisms for the search and return of the fugitive to their former owners were not spelled out for at least a decade. And here, of course, it was not without Morozov.

As a result, the circle of heirs turned out to be small. A year later, brother Gleb died, after a while the widow of Boris Ivanovich, Anna Morozova-Miloslavskaya, also died. Immediately after her death, Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich took over the lion's share - the villages of Pavlovskoye, Murashkino and Lyskovo. To manage them at the state level, the Order of Secret Affairs was created.

A considerable part of the remaining possessions passed to the widow of Gleb - the famous activist of the church schism Theodosia Morozova-Sokovnina and her son Ivan. But soon both of them were thrown into prison, where they ended their life. Moreover, some still believe that the reason for this was not so much religious disputes, but too much of the wealth that went to a rather young widow. All the property of those arrested was confiscated. So the economic empire of the boyar Boris Ivanovich Morozov, which grew up thanks to the proximity of this head of government to the state treasury, turned out to be the state and absorbed.

Among statesmen of pre-Petrine Russia, one of the brightest representatives of this era is the courtier, Boyarin Morozov Boris Ivanovich, who is closest to Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich. Assessment of his activities cannot be unambiguous: thus, in every possible way advocating for the welfare of the state and the inviolability of the throne, he sometimes shouldered the shoulders of ordinary people with an unbearable burden of economic hardships, which provoked unrest leading to bloody riots.

Rise of the new courtier

Boyarin Boris Morozov was born at the end of the 16th century. Fate was favorable to him - he was born not only as one of the heirs of an ancient and noble family, but also as a relative, albeit distant, to the sovereign himself. The Morozovs and the Romanovs became related even before Mikhail Fedorovich's accession to the throne.

In 1613, in Moscow, the first representative of the Romanov dynasty, a sixteen-year-old, was elected to the throne. Among the participants in the cathedral, who left their signatures under the historical charter, was the young boyar Boris Ivanovich Morozov. Since that time, his biography has been inextricably linked with the pinnacle of state power.

Wise educator

Boyars Morozovs - Boris and his brother Gleb - received the post of sleeping bags under the new tsar, which allowed them to quickly become one of "their" people and win the sympathy of the autocrat, especially since they were almost the same age with him. When the heir to the throne, the future Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich (the father of Peter the Great), who was born in 1629, was four years old, Boris Morozov was appointed guardian (or, as they said in those days, "uncle").

Thanks to Boris Ivanovich, the future tsar received a versatile education. In addition to comprehending the basics of grammar and the Catechism, the young prince got acquainted with engravings by Western artists and domestic popular prints. Looking at them with his mentor, he got an idea of ​​the movement of heavenly bodies, the diversity of flora and fauna, as well as the life of people in other countries. Preserved information that the history of the prince studied with the help of - a chronicle, illustrated with many engravings.

Formation of the personality of the future king

The works of the mentor were not in vain - the heir to the throne received extensive knowledge in various fields. The autographs that have come down to us indicate that he wrote competently and at the same time possessed a good literary style. But the main result of upbringing was that the personality of the king was not suppressed by the requirements of etiquette and court duties. In his letters to close people, he appears to be an open and warm-hearted person. It is not surprising that Alexei Mikhailovich considered Morozov his second father until the end of his days and treated him accordingly.

As for his own education, then, according to the memoirs of his contemporaries, the boyar Boris Morozov considered it extremely insufficient. Speaking about this, he apparently meant ignorance of them foreign languages and the inability to read European books. Documents compiled by him with his own hand testify that he was educated and literate, especially since a very extensive and interesting library was located in his chambers.

The need for government reforms

Sovereign Alexei Mikhailovich inherited the throne when he was barely sixteen years old, and literally a few months after that he lost his mother. Therefore, it is not surprising that at such a young age he wanted to have a wise and reliable ruler by his side, especially since the situation that had developed in Russia by that time required immediate and radical changes in many areas of domestic policy.

The most urgent measures were to be taken in the organization of cities, the tax system and the strengthening of the centralization of power. All these tasks were taken over by the government, which was headed by a loyal tsarist servant - Boris Ivanovich Morozov. The 17th century from the very beginning brought innumerable calamities to Russia. These are impostors who appeared under the name of Tsarevich Dimitri, and the invasions of the Poles, and terrible crop failures that caused the starvation of thousands of Russians. In addition, the obvious mistakes made in the previous reign also played a role. All this gave rise to numerous problems that required immediate solutions.

At the pinnacle of power

Having become the Russian autocrat, Alexey Mikhailovich almost completely changed, entrusting all key posts to his closest people, among whom was Morozov. Boris Ivanovich, a smart boyar and, what is very important, an economic one, began to implement state reforms with the same grip as to the management of his own fiefdoms.

The sovereign entrusted him with the management of several orders, the most responsible among which were the Order of the Big Treasury (finance), Inozemny and Streletsky. In addition, he was in charge of the trade in alcoholic beverages, which at all times constituted a significant part of the national budget. Thus, in the hands of Morozov enormous power was concentrated - money, the army and control over international politics.

Reforms dictated by life

The most important of the tasks facing him was putting things in order in the financial sector. To this end, Boris Morozov carried out a number of measures to reduce the costs of the administration, which had grown exorbitantly by that time. After carrying out the purge, he replaced many governors who were mired in corruption, and brought some of them to justice. In addition, the palace and patriarchal servants were reduced, and those who remained in their former positions were reduced salaries.

Reforms took place in local government bodies, as well as in the army. But, as often happens in Russia, putting things in order turned into new unrest. Reasonable and timely measures of Morozov led to the fact that most of the cases, which were previously submitted to the governors and heads of orders, passed into the jurisdiction of clerks and clerks, who immediately increased the extortions, causing general discontent.

Another problem that Morozov tried to solve was the collection of taxes from residents of cities, many of whom were exempted from taxes, since they were listed in the settlements of monasteries and the highest nobility. By conducting a general population census, he ensured that taxes were paid evenly by all citizens. Of course, having carried out such an important undertaking, he replenished the treasury, but made himself many implacable enemies. In addition, by increasing duties on the import of goods by foreign merchants, he turned against himself and the merchants.

Salt riots

The last straw that overflowed the patience of the residents of Moscow and many Russian cities was the increase in the price of salt, the sale of which was a state monopoly. With this measure, Boris Morozov tried to replace many direct taxes. The logic of action was simple - taxes could be evaded, but not a single person could do without salt. By buying this product from the state and overpaying a certain amount, he thereby contributed his share of the tax collection.

But as the proverb says: "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." Reforms aimed at strengthening the state and improving the lives of its citizens caused widespread discontent, which resulted in events called "salt riots". They were directed mainly against the boyar Morozov and the government headed by him.

By this time, his position at the court had significantly strengthened due to his marriage to the sister of Queen Maria Miloslavskaya, but even the closest relationship with the sovereign could not protect the hated boyar from popular anger. Dull murmur and general discontent poured into active action in May 1648.

The beginning of the unrest

From the chronicle of those years, it is known that unrest began with the fact that the crowd stopped the tsar, who was returning from pilgrimage at the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, and turned to him with complaints, reproaching Morozov and his officials for bribery. Perhaps the sovereign would have been able to calm the people, and everything went without an open revolt, but the archers, subordinate directly to Boris Ivanovich, rushed to beat the audience with whips. This served as a detonator for further events.

The next day, the crowd rushed into the Kremlin, where they were joined by the archers, also disadvantaged in their own interests by the latest reforms. The rebels defeated and plundered the royal palace. Some of the rebels entered the wine cellars, in which they found their death after the fire began. Following this, the houses of many boyars were destroyed and set on fire, and those of them who fell under the arm of the crowd were killed. But the main enemy of the crowd was Boris Morozov. The boyarin aroused such hatred among the people that everyone demanded his extradition for immediate reprisal.

last years of life

Only the tsar's personal promise to put Morozov aside from all matters calmed the crowd and allowed him to flee from the capital to the Kirillo-Belozersky monastery, where he hid until the rioters were completely pacified. Upon returning to Moscow, the fugitive boyar continued to engage in state affairs, but at the same time trying not to be in sight. When the famous "Cathedral Code" was being developed, which for many years became the basis for the legal basis of Russian legislation, boyar Morozov Boris Ivanovich also took part in the work on it.

His biography in this last period of his life testifies to the numerous mental and physical ailments that befell this once energetic and full of strength man. Boris Ivanovich died in 1661. personally saw off on the last journey his beloved mentor, who was for him Boris Morozov.

The deceased's inheritance went to his brother Gleb, since by that time he himself had neither a wife nor children. When soon the brother finished his earthly journey, the state passed to his son, but in fact his mother, the noblewoman Theodosia Morozova, who went down in history with her schismatic activity and immortalized in the famous painting by Vasily Surikov, was in control of him.