The Time of Troubles ends with Michael Romanov's election
Famine, false heirs, and foreign occupation give way to a new dynasty that will rule for 300 years
Quick facts
- Crisis began
- 1598, death of Tsar Feodor I
- Famine
- 1601-1603, killed roughly a third of the population
- New Tsar elected
- Michael Romanov, 21 February 1613
- Dynasty span
- Romanov dynasty, 1613-1917
What happened
The death of the childless Tsar Feodor I in 1598 ended the Rurikid dynasty and opened the Time of Troubles. Boris Godunov ruled as an elected but resented boyar until 1605, while famine from 1601 to 1603 killed roughly a third of Russia's population. A pretender known as False Dmitri, backed by Polish and Russian nobles hoping for reward, took the throne after Godunov's death, only to be overthrown within a year. Continued factional war and a Polish-Lithuanian occupation of Moscow followed, until Prince Dmitry Pozharsky and Novgorod merchant Kuzma Minin led a resistance that reclaimed the capital in 1612. The Zemsky Sobor, an assembly of nobles, clergy, and merchants, elected the 16-year-old Mikhail Romanov as Tsar on 21 February 1613.
Why it matters
Michael's election began the Romanov dynasty, which would rule Russia for the next 304 years, until Nicholas II's abdication in February 1917. The Time of Troubles left a lasting fear in Russian political culture of dynastic collapse and foreign occupation that shaped how later tsars, especially Peter the Great and Catherine the Great, justified centralizing power.
How we know
The Zemsky Sobor's proceedings and the accession of Michael Romanov are recorded in period Muscovite records; the famine's scale is corroborated by tax and population records showing sharp population decline in the affected years.
Sources
- Lumen Learning / SUNY (World History). The Time of Troubles · General sourcecourses.lumenlearning.com · Cited as a "reference" source (no stronger domain match). · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
- Lumen Learning / SUNY (World History). The Time of Troubles · General sourcecourses.lumenlearning.com · Cited as a "reference" source (no stronger domain match). · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
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