The history of medicine has known not only bright and progressive, but also dark, painful times. Far from all the Aesculapians left a clean mark on it, guided by the principle “do no harm”. Among them were unscrupulous businessmen, and selfish intriguers, and inept "butchers" who easily sent patients "to heaven" with one wrong movement of the scalpel. But the court physician of the Russian Tsar Ivan the Terrible seems to have surpassed many.
For almost ten years, Elisha Bomelius (Eliseus Bomelius) was a sinister and all-powerful temporary worker. Malyuta Skuratov himself was afraid of him. The boyars trembled, wondering who this time would be served with a bowl of poison at the royal feast. And Bomelius, bending over to the king's ear, whispered: “Everything is done as you ordered, sir. Prince Michael has to live until the sunrise ….
Miraculously escaping execution or life imprisonment for witchcraft in England, the physician Bomelius was rescued from a London prison by Andrei Savin, the ambassador of the Russian Tsar John IV.
The reasons that forced the diplomat to show such participation to the doctor "without a license", but with the glory of a sorcerer, are unknown. However, Savin offered Bomeliy the post of physician-in-chief under his sovereign. Appearing in Moscow, the cunning and eloquent Bomeliy fell in love with Ivan the Terrible, and soon took an important position at court.
First of all, Bomelius promised the Russian autocrat to compose a potion for him that would reliably protect him from poison, damage and the evil eye. Then he offered to prepare a poison that would kill the royal enemies exactly on the appointed day and hour.
The hot-tempered and manically suspicious ruler was delighted to see how the "damned thief" not only ascends the scaffold, but sits with a contented air at the banquet table or goes in a solemn procession. Observe, knowing at the same time that the hours of the life of the unfortunate are already literally numbered.
There were also more sophisticated means in the arsenal of the tsarist doctor-killer that deprived the “condemned” victim of reason. Some of those who had tasted the infernal potion forgot their name, stopped recognizing their relatives, tore expensive clothes on themselves and fought in writhings with foam at the mouth, and then disappeared, lost among the vagabonds and beggars.
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Tsar Ivan the Terrible admires Vasilisa Melent'eva / G. S. Sedov.
And it so happened that a person sentenced to death by the tsar's will perished at the hands of a relative, who was by no means accidentally distraught, but who had tasted wine or food before that, to which Bomelius potion was added. For example, the Prozorovsky princes perished: the brave voivode Alexander was poisoned, and his brother Vasily was killed by his third brother Nikita, who suddenly went mad.
The shooter voivode Fyodor Myasoyedov, who saved Pskov from a complete blockade during the war with Poland, bringing reinforcements to the besieged city, also received a bowl of poison instead of a reward and gratitude.
Not only advisers and military leaders were among the victims, but also royal relatives. The second wife of John himself, Tsarina Maria Temryukovna, as well as the wife of Tsarevich John Ioannovich, Praskovya, died under suspiciously similar circumstances. Rumor asserted that both were poisoned by the "doctor" on the orders of the king.
Tsar John the Terrible condemns his fifth wife Maria Dolgorukaya to death / S. Egorov.
The more Ivan, already nicknamed the Terrible, favored Bomeliy, the more the boyars and common people hated him. The Pskov chronicler wrote: “The Germans sent to John Nemchin, the fierce Magus, called Elisha, and we loved him in his approach and put insurance on the Tsar … and took the Tsar away from the faith. On the Russian people he laid the tsar with ferocity, and on the Germans - on love."
Sometimes even a poisonous potion was not required - only libel was enough. The hegumen of the Pskov-Caves Monastery, Cornelius, who believed that it was not proper for an Orthodox sovereign to keep a warlock with him, the tsar, having become enraged, killed with his own hand a staff.
With all the hatred for Bomelius, no one could say what kind of tribe the "sovereign foreign doctor" was. He was considered either Dutch or Westphalian. There was even a version (and Bomelius diligently fueled these rumors) about the illegitimate son of either the Pope of Rome, or the French king.
Ivan the Terrible and his mother / K. B. Wenig.
It was also said that the mother of the tsarist Aesculapius was a Russian Polonyanka, sold by the Tatars to European merchants and thus ended up in Italy. Moreover, the glade is not simple, but a hereditary witch. From her, de and Elisha himself, passed on the ability to read minds and foresee the future.
Time added a more fashionable version to these stories: they say, Bomelius, although a European in origin, studied medicine, along with magic, from the Indian and Tibetan enlightened sages. But in the deeds of the physician-in-chief, as preserved by Russian history, there is not enough "enlightenment".
This man was well versed in astrology. To observe the heavenly bodies, he often climbed the bell tower of the Kremlin Church of John Climacus, which still exists today - this is the famous Ivan the Great bell tower, built at the beginning of the 16th century and for about two centuries was the tallest structure not only in Moscow, but also in throughout Russia.
Tsar John, having read many astrological treatises, regularly accompanied his physician and astrologer during these observations. The fate of the unfortunate, whose stars formed into a dangerous combination for Ivan the Terrible, was immediately decided.
Peaceful Moscow residents, barely noticing dark silhouettes on the site of the bell tower, whispered in panic: "Again Eliseyka conjures!", And locked themselves on all locks, hoping that the evil cup of the royal disfavor would pass them.
The memory of this nightmare will pass through the centuries and will be imprinted in works of art. In Rimsky-Korsakov's famous opera The Tsar's Bride, a crowd of people is indignant when they see two young men leaving Bomelia's house: “Did you go to the German for medicines? After all, he is filthy! After all, he is infidel! Before you start rubbing around with him, the cross must be removed. After all, he is a sorcerer!"
But no matter how stealthily the people of Moscow whispered, Elisey Bomeliy continued to be the sovereign's favorite. Once the Terrible ordered Bomeliy to immediately predict the fate of the entire royal family. The astrologer got scared, but there was nowhere to go. And heavenly signs, as luck would have it, did not favor, predicted troubles and losses.
No matter how hard he tried to soften the truth Bomelius, the king fell into horror and anger at the same time. And this promised disgrace to the fortuneteller himself. And then it dawned on Bomelia. He suggested that John put in his place a kind of "substitute" king, as was the practice among the ancient pagans. So it turned out that from the fall of 1575 to August 1576, Khan Sain-Bulat, nicknamed Simeon Bekbulatovich in the Russian manner, sat on the Russian throne.
All this time, Grozny himself called himself only an appanage prince and lived in the "oprichnaya yard", and when he came to the Kremlin chambers he modestly sat among other boyars. When the stars assumed a more favorable position, John returned to the throne.
Although Bomeliy held the post of life-doctor, history does not connect any medical achievements and discoveries with his name. And the healings attributed to him are more like fairy miracles than the triumph of practical medicine.
For example, the salvation from certain death of the jester Osip Gvozdev, who, during the tsar's meal, gave out a sharpness that angered the sovereign. The enraged Ioann Vasilyevich threw a bowl of hot cabbage soup into the face of the poor fellow, and before the jester could escape, struck him with a dagger.
Jester of Ivan the Terrible. Fragment of the painting "Ivan the Terrible shows his jewelry to the English ambassador Gorsey" / A. Litovchenko, 1875.
Bomelius ran up to Osip, writhing in a pool of his own blood, who laid his hand on a fresh wound, and then gave the jester some kind of sleeping pill to drink. The jester slept for a long time, and after he woke up, he quickly recovered.
By what means Bomelius treated the tsar, the chroniclers of those years are silent. But the results of the examination carried out after the opening and examination of the tomb of Ivan the Terrible in the Archangel Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin are well known.
Specialists from the Scientific Research Institute of Forensic Medicine of the USSR Ministry of Health carried out chemical and toxicological studies of the remains. Mercury was found in the bones of Ivan Vasilyevich, the content of which was five times higher than the norm.
Where did it come from in such quantities? The fact is that in the 16th century in Russia, as in Europe, mercury-based medicines that came from the East were widespread. In China and India, long before our era, both native mercury and cinnabar were used to treat various diseases, including leprosy.
During the time of Ivan the Terrible, European and Russian doctors used mercury chloride for disinfection, calomel as a laxative, and again ointments containing mercury and its compounds. The best remedy for intestinal obstruction was then considered to be the ingestion of a large spoonful of metallic mercury, so that the heavy, flowing metal would straighten the twisted intestines.
There is a version that the king used mercury ointments for joint pain. Experts indeed found clear signs of osteochondrosis on his remains. It is believed that the drugs had nothing to do with it, and the Russian autocrat and his relatives were deliberately poisoned with mercury by doctors sent by foreign enemies, of which Bomelius was far from the first.
The purpose of the nefarious plan was not only to decapitate, but also to discredit the Rurik dynasty, since chronic mercury poisoning leads to the appearance of inferior offspring.
This explains the fact that after Tsarevich Dmitry, who died in childhood from a severe cold, and John, who did not show signs of congenital illness, the almost feeble-minded Fedor was born and Dmitry, who suffered from seizures, the same one who stabbed or was killed in Uglich.
Maria Nagaya and Tsarevich Dimitri / S. V. Blinkov.
It is not known for certain whether Bomelius was a sent poisoner or a "mediocre" physician who honestly used drugs known at that time. But he was clearly not a bad psychologist.
And it is likely that his influence (for almost ten years Bomelius was the right hand and adviser to the sovereign) was based on the fact that the doctor and astrologer recognized the peculiarities of John's character. I guessed that it was vital for him to periodically pour out his furious anger on someone.
A skilled manipulator can play on such strings of the soul for a long time. But if someone turns this weapon against himself, disaster cannot be avoided. And so it happened. The "rootless Eliseyka" had enough enemies, and one of them managed to give the tsar information that Bomeliy-de had entered into an agreement with the Pskov boyars hated by John and the Polish king Stephen Bathory.
Bathory near Pskov / Jan Matejko, 1872.
And then, as luck would have it, the king once again demanded predictions about the future of his kind. Bomelius walked up to the crystal ball as usual and put his hands on it. Then he was literally twisted in convulsions. Unable to control himself, he shouted that the second wife of the elder prince, frightened by the ferocity of her father-in-law, would give birth ahead of time and die with the baby, and John Ioannovich himself would be killed by his own father.
The middle son, Fyodor Ioannovich, will die early without leaving an heir, and the youngest, Dmitry, will die before reaching adulthood. The entire royal family will be suppressed, the time of hunger and confusion will come.
Furious, John threw a heavy silver goblet at his recent favorite. Bomelius survived, although the blow could have been fatal. But the fate with which the "dohtur" played for so long did not promise him an easy death, let alone salvation.
Ivan the Terrible and his son Ivan November 16, 1581 / I. E. Repin.
Barely recovering from the ill-fated prediction session and a blow to the head, the life-doctor fled from Moscow, but a day later he was caught and brought to the capital in shackles. Here he was executed after cruel torture, roasted alive on a spit in the middle of Bolotnaya Square.
Before his death, Bomelius cursed his recent benefactor and everyone who would get the most valuable thing from the medicinal property. He really had such a thing - an old clock with the signs of the Zodiac on the dial, made, according to legend, by Herbert Avrilak himself, the famous mechanic and alchemist, who, despite his free thinking and education, received the dignity of the Pope.
Indeed, a few years later, Ivan the Terrible died suddenly and the watch confiscated by him returned to the widow of Bomelia. She took them back to England, sold them to an antiquarian, but soon the woman herself and the collector fell into poverty and died.
Death of Ivan the Terrible / K. E. Makovsky.
Watches passed from hand to hand and ruined their owners in England, Europe, and Russia, where they were brought back in the 18th century. According to legend, this ominous series of deaths ended only after a young and simple-minded Nizhny Novgorod merchant cheaply bought a broken, dusty watch at a flea market in St. Petersburg and took it home.
They say that the broken mechanism came to life exactly at the hour when the future genius inventor Ivan Kulibin was born in the neighborhood.