Simeon Bekbulatovich

Simeon Bekbulatovich (Russian: Симеон Бекбулатович; born Sain-Bulat; Russian: Саин-Булат; died 15 January [O.S. 5 January] 1616) was a Russian statesman of Tatar origin who briefly served as the figurehead ruler of Russia from 1575 to 1576.[1] He was a descendant of Genghis Khan.[2]

In this name that follows Eastern Slavic naming conventions, the patronymic is Bekbulatovich.
Simeon Bekbulatovich
Portrait by an unknown painter, late 16th or early 17th century
Grand Prince of all Russia
ReignOctober 1575 – September 1576
PredecessorIvan IV
SuccessorIvan IV
Khan of the Tatar Qasim Khanate
Reign1567–1573
PredecessorShahghali
SuccessorMustafa Ali
Grand Prince of Tver
Reign1576–1585
MonarchIvan IV
Died15 January [O.S. 5 January] 1616
Moscow, Russia
Burial
Simonov Monastery
SpouseAnastasia Mstislavskaya
ReligionRussian Orthodox
prev. Islam

He was born into a Muslim family and served as the khan of the Khanate of Qasim before converting to Christianity and becoming an aide to Ivan IV of Russia. He participated in the Livonian War as a commander of the main regiment (bol'shoi polk) of the Russian army.[3] In 1575, Ivan made Simeon the grand prince of all Russia,[4] though Ivan remained the de facto ruler and returned to his throne a year later. Subsequently, Simeon became the grand prince of Tver and Torzhok (1576–1585). He went blind (or was blinded) in 1595 and was allegedly tonsured as a Christian monk under the monastic name Stefan in 1606.

Biography

Simeon was the son of Bek-Bulat, and a great-grandson of Ahmed Khan bin Küchük.[5] The first mention of Simeon is in the Supplement to the Nikon Chronicle in 1561 when he came to Moscow in the entourage of his aunt, Kochenei (baptized as Maria), when she married Ivan IV that year.[6][7] The earliest evidence he was the khan of Qasim comes from a statement from the Russian ambassador to Constantinople, Ivan Novosiltsev, to the Ottoman sultan Selim II in 1570.[8][6]

In 1575 (either September or October),[9] Ivan IV appointed Simeon as the grand prince of all Russia,[10] and styled himself merely as "Ivan of Moscow". Historians have a number of opinions concerning why Ivan did this. According to the most popular theory by contemporary diplomat Giles Fletcher, the Elder, Ivan aimed to confiscate the land that belonged to monasteries without attracting the ire of the Church. Simeon issued the decrees of confiscation instead of Ivan, while Ivan pretended to disagree. During his one-year "rule" in the Moscow Kremlin, Simeon married Anastasia Mstislavskaya, the great-great-granddaughter of Ivan III.[1][11]

In September 1576,[9] Simeon stepped down as the grand prince of all Russia as Ivan returned to the throne, and was given the title of grand prince of Tver and Torzhok.[12] In 1585, Tsar Feodor Ivanovich removed his title as grand prince of Tver and Torzhok, and confined him to his estate at Kushalov. In 1595, Simeon went blind. According to Jacques Margeret, Simeon blamed Spanish wine that Boris Godunov sent him for his birthday. When Boris was elected tsar in 1598, he required those at the court to sign a loyalty oath, which prohibited them from recognizing Simeon as tsar or corresponding with him. False Dmitry I required Simeon to be tonsured at the Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery, where he took the monastic name Stefan on April 3, 1606. When Vasilii Shuiskii was elected tsar, he ordered the elder Stefan taken to the Solovki Monastery on May 29, 1606.[1]

In 1612, as the result of a decree issued by Prince Dmitry Pozharsky and "on the advice of all the land" (Zemsky Sobor), Stefan was returned to the Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery. Under Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich, he returned to Moscow and resided in the Simonov Monastery until he died in 1616. He was buried in the Simonov Monastery next to his wife, who had died June 7, 1607, after having been veiled as the nun Alexandra.

Ancestry

References
  1. "How a Tatar Khan ruled Russia" (in Russian). Russia Beyond The Headlines. 2019-09-27. Retrieved 2020-01-29.
  2. Perrie, Maureen; Pavlov, Andrei (2014). Ivan the Terrible. Routledge. p. 173. ISBN 9781317894681. Retrieved 6 November 2020.
  3. Sinbirskii sbornik, vol. 1: Chast' istoricheskaia (Moscow: A. Semen, 1844), 31-35, 39.
  4. Payne, Robert; Romanoff, Nikita (2002). Ivan the Terrible (1. Cooper Square Press ed.). New York, NY: Cooper Square Press. p. 361. ISBN 0815412290.
  5. Pavlov, A. P.; Perrie, Maureen; Pavlov, Andrej Pavlovič (2003). Ivan the Terrible (1. ed.). London: Pearson/Longman. p. 173. ISBN 9780582099487.
  6. Russia's people of empire: life stories from Eurasia, 1500 to the present. Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana Univ. Press. 2012. p. 28. ISBN 9780253001764.
  7. Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisei, 13:333.
  8. Puteshestviia russkikh poslov XVI-XVII vv., edited by D. S. Likhachev (Moscow: Akademiia nauk SSSR, 1954), 77. Novosil'tsev left Moscow on January 24, 1570, so Sain Bulat had to be khan by then.
  9. Rude & barbarous kingdom: Russia in the accounts of sixteenth-century English voyagers. Madison, Wis.: Univ. of Wisconsin Press. 1968. p. 166. ISBN 0299047644.
  10. De Madariaga, Isabel (2006). Ivan the Terrible: first Tsar of Russia (First printed in paperback ed.). New Haven London: Yale University Press. p. 301. ISBN 0300119739.
  11. Norris, Stephen M.; Sunderland, Willard (2012). Russia's people of empire: life stories from Eurasia, 1500 to the present. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. p. 31. ISBN 0253001846.
  12. De Madariaga, Isabel (2006). Ivan the Terrible: first Tsar of Russia (First printed in paperback ed.). New Haven London: Yale University Press. p. 311. ISBN 9780300119732.
  13. Vasilii Vladimirovitch Barthold, Four Studies on the History of Central Asia, Vol. 3 (1962), p. 33.
  14. Babur, Zahīr ud-Dīn Muhammad (2006). Babur Nama : journal of Emperor Babur (PDF). Hiro, Dilip., Beveridge, Annette Susannah. New Delhi: Penguin Books. p. 739. ISBN 9780144001491. OCLC 144520584.
  15. Godet, Martine (2004). Stratégies impériales: Expansion, colonisation, intégration, conversion. Éd. de l'École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales. p. 14. ISBN 978-2-713-22008-1. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  16. Cahiers du monde russe, Volume 45. Centre d'études sur la Russie, l'Europe orientale et le domaine turc de l'Ecole des hautes études en sciences sociales. 2004. p. 14. ISBN 978-2-713-22008-1. Retrieved 25 August 2021.
  17. Khodarkovsky, Michael (October 18, 2011). Bitter Choices: Loyalty and Betrayal in the Russian Conquest of the North Caucasus. Cornell University Press. p. 9. ISBN 978-0-801-46289-4. Retrieved 25 August 2021.

Further reading
  • Ostrowski, Donald (2013). "Simeon Bekbulatovich's Remarkable Career as Tatar Khan, Grand Prince of Rus', and Monastic Elder". Russian History. 39 (3): 269–299. doi:10.1163/18763316-03903001.
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