The Terrible Queen. Women and Power in Russia of the 16th-17th Centuries

The new book by Konstantin Yerusalimskiy - an author of historical bestsellers and a Doctor of Sciences - is dedicated to the formation of gender inequality and patriarchal ideologies in Russia and Europe in the 16th-17th centuries. The book contains over 100 illustrations, including rare images from museums and Russian and foreign archives. This comprehensive study explores how, during the era of Ivan the Terrible and the early Romanovs, women influenced politics, the dynasty, and the very nature of autocratic power. The author demonstrates that behind the external isolation of the terem and the strict court rituals lay a complex system of women's presence in power - from regency and court intrigues to participation in diplomacy and the shaping of the kingdom's ideology.