Vorotynsky

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Ancient gravestones in Vorotynsk

The Vorotynsky family was a

Grand Duchy of Moscow and the Tsardom of Russia. Their lands lay principally in the Upper Oka region and comprised the towns of Peremyshl and Vorotynsk as well as parts (дольницы) of Novosil and Odoyev
.

History

Between Russia and Lithuania

Originally lords of

Prince Belsky, Ivan did nothing to help him when the Tatars routed Belsky's army four years later. On this event, Vorotynsky fell into disgrace until 1525, when he solemnly promised to forget his enmity against Belsky and to suspend all the contacts with his Lithuanian relatives. The suspicion as to his plans of defecting to Lithuania still lingered, however. It was the reason given by regent Elena Glinskaya when she ordered him to be taken into custody and immured in the distant Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery, where he died on July 21, 1535.[citation needed
]

The Vorotynskys and Ivan the Terrible

Kirillov Monastery
(photo from 1909)

Ivan Mikhailovich had three sons, all of whom played a part in Muscovite politics as

Ivan IV's baby son during the tsar's grave illness in 1553 but died himself on September 27 that year. The youngest, Prince Alexander Ivanovich, was recorded in 1558 as governing the stronghold of Kazan but later lost the tsar's favor and died as a monk in the Sretensky Monastery of Moscow on February 6, 1565.[citation needed
]

Prince Mikhail Ivanovich Vorotynsky was one of those commanders who led the

Great Abatis Belt. His bold leadership made itself felt at the Battle of Molodi, where he routed the larger Tatar army in the three-day battle (1572).[citation needed
]

According to memoirs of Ivan's opponent

Prince Kurbsky, a year later, one of Vorotynsky's menials, incriminated in theft, insinuated that Vorotynsky was plotting the tsar's death by magic charms. Ivan the Terrible, who never wanted a pretext to execute a boyar, put Vorotynsky to the torture. Mikhail's body was placed between two bonfires, and the tsar personally "raked the burning coals closer to his holy body with an accursed staff". Following the torture, the badly burnt boyar was taken to Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery. He died on the way and was buried in that monastery close to his father.[citation needed
]

The official register books (Razriady) briefly report that Vorotynsky was executed along with two other military leaders, without further details.[1]

Time of Troubles

Mikhail's son, Prince Ivan Mikhailovich Vorotynsky, was eventually released from the monastery and sent to subdue minor risings in the land of

Ipatiev Monastery to inform Mikhail about his election. Later, he governed Kazan and Moscow during the tsar's absence from the capital. He died as a monk on January 8, 1627.[citation needed
]

Thenceforward the Vorotynskys didn't figure prominently in national politics. Ivan's only son, Prince Aleksey Ivanovich (1610–42), died at the age of 32, survived by his wife, a sister of Tsarina

Galitzine. Anastasia died on December 12, 1691, and was buried by the Patriarch in Epiphany Monastery of Moscow.[citation needed
]

References