Ivan Liutyi

(also, Ivan Groznyi). Date of birth unknown; died 1574. Moldavian hospodar after 1571.

Ivan Liutyi spent part of his youth in Russia. As hospodar, he sought to centralize authority. In 1574 he began a war of liberation against the oppression of the Turks. A detachment of Zaporozh’e cossacks, led by Hetman Sverchovskii, came to the aid of the Moldavians. The combined Moldavian-cossack army defeated the Turks and crossed into Walachia and seized Bucharest. The grand boyars, fearing the growing power of the hospodar, betrayed Ivan in a decisive battle fought at Lake Kagul on June 10, 1574. They went over to the Turkish side with their armed retainers, and the Moldavian-cossack force was crushed. After a lengthy siege, Ivan surrendered and was killed by the Turks.