Ivan the Terrible killed his own son

It is said that Ivan the Terrible killed his own son. Tsarevich Ivan's death was disastrous for Russia because it left no viable heir to the throne. After the Tsar died in 1584, his unprepared son Feodor I took his place, with Boris Godunov acting as de facto ruler. Following Feodor's death, Russia entered the Time of Troubles, a period of political turmoil, starvation, and conflict. The circumstances surrounding Tsarevich's death are obscure and contentious. The Tsarevich died in 1581 in the Alexandrov Kremlin, Tsar Ivan the Terrible's palace from 1564 to 1581, the center of his oprichnina, and the de facto capital of Russia.

Ivan the Terrible said in a letter to Nikita Zakharin and Andrey Shchelkalov in 1581, that he could not go to Moscow because of his son's illness, without naming the disease. Several contemporary Russian chronicles mention Tsarevich's death, but no specifics are given. The death occurred at midnight, according to the Piskarevsk Chronicle. None of these accounts suggest that Ivan Ivanovich's death was violent. Other versions present a more comprehensive account of Tsarevich's death, claiming that his father mortally injured him during an argument.

Ivan the Terrible and His Son Ivan on November 16, 1581, is a picture created between 1883 and 1885 by Russian realist artist Ilya Repin. It shows the bereaved Tsar of Russia, Ivan the Terrible, clutching his dying son, Tsarevich Ivan Ivanovich, immediately after the elder Ivan delivered a deadly blow to his son's head in a fit of rage. The artwork depicts the elder Ivan's grief and remorse and the gentleness of the dying Tsarevich weeping for his father.