In 1670, Razin, while ostensibly on his way to report at the
Cossack headquarters on the
Don, openly rebelled against the government, capturing
Cherkassk and
Tsaritsyn. After taking Tsaritsyn, Razin sailed down the Volga with his army of almost 7,000 men. The men traveled toward
Cherny Yar, a government stronghold between Tsaritsyn and Astrakhan. Razin and his men swiftly took Cherny Yar when the Cherny Yar streltsy rose up against their officers and joined the Cossack cause in June 1670. On 24 June Razin reached the city of Astrakhan. Astrakhan, Russia's wealthy "window on the East", occupied a strategically important location at the mouth of the Volga River on the shore of the Caspian Sea. Razin plundered the city - despite its location on a strongly fortified island and the stone walls and brass cannons that surrounded the central citadel. The local rebellion of the streltsy allowed Razin to gain access to the city. After massacring all who opposed him (including two Princes
Prozorovsky) and giving the rich
bazaars of the city over to pillage, Razin converted Astrakhan into a Cossack
republic, dividing the population into thousands, hundreds, and tens, with their proper officers, all of whom were appointed by a
veche or general assembly, whose first act was to proclaim Razin their
gosudar (
sovereign). After a three-week carnival of blood and debauchery, Razin quit Astrakhan with two hundred barges full of troops. He intended to establish a Cossack republic along the whole length of the Volga as a preliminary step towards advancing against Moscow.
Saratov and
Samara were captured, but
Simbirsk defied all efforts, and after
two bloody encounters close at hand on the banks of the
Sviyaga River ( 1 and 4 October), Razin was ultimately routed by the army of
Yuri Baryatinsky and fled down the Volga, leaving the bulk of his followers to be extirpated by the victors. But the rebellion was by no means over. The emissaries of Razin, armed with inflammatory proclamations, had stirred up the inhabitants of what became the governorates of
Nizhny Novgorod,
Tambov, and
Penza, and penetrated even as far as Moscow and
Novgorod. It was not difficult to stir the oppressed population to revolt by promising deliverance from their yoke. Razin proclaimed that his object was to root out the
boyars and all officials, to level all ranks and dignities, and establish Cossackdom, with its corollary of absolute equality, throughout Russia. , (1918) State
Russian Museum in
St Petersburg. Even at the beginning of 1671 the outcome of the struggle remained in doubt. Eight battles had been fought before the insurrection showed signs of weakening, and it continued for six months after Razin had received his quietus. At Simbirsk his prestige had been shattered. Even his own settlements at Saratov and Samara refused to open their gates to him, and the Don Cossacks, hearing that
the Patriarch had
anathematized Razin, also declared against him. The tsar sent troops to suppress the revolt. As Paul Avrich notes in
Russian Rebels, 1600–1800, "The brutality of the repressions by far exceeded the atrocities committed by the insurgents." The tsar's troops mutilated the rebels' bodies and displayed them in public to serve as a warning to potential dissenters. In 1671, Stepan and his brother were captured at
Kagalnik Fortress (Кагальницкий городок) by Cossack elders. They were given over to Tsarist officials in Moscow, and on 16 June 1671, following the announcement of the verdict against him, Stepan Razin was quartered on the scaffold on
Red Square. A sentence of death was read aloud: Razin listened to this calmly, then turned to the church, bowed in three directions, passing the Kremlin and the tsar and said: "Forgive me." The executioner then proceeded to first cut off his right hand to his elbow, then his left foot to the knee. His brother Frol, witnessing Stepan's torment, shouted out: "I know the word and the matter of the sovereign!" (that is, "I am willing to inform upon those disloyal to the tsar"). Stepan shouted back, "Shut up, dog!" These were his last words; after them the executioner hurriedly cut off his head. Razin's hands, legs, and head, according to the testimony of the Englishman Thomas Hebdon, were stuck on five specially-placed stakes. The confession helped Frol to postpone his own execution, although five years later, in 1676, he was executed too. ==Implications==