Tsarina or tsaritsa is the title of a female autocratic ruler of Bulgaria, Serbia or Russia, or the title of a tsar's wife. The English spelling is derived from the German czarin or zarin, in the same way as the French tsarine/czarine, and the Spanish and Italian czarina/zarina. For a Tsar's daughters see tsarevna. "Tsarina" or "tsaritsa" was the title of the female supreme ruler in the following states:
Bulgaria: in 913–1018, in 1185–1422 and in 1908–1946
Serbia: in 1346–1371
Russia: officially from about 1547 until 1721, unofficially in 1721–1917.
Russia
Since 1721, the official titles of the Russian male and female monarchs were emperor and empress, respectively, or empress consort. Officially the last Russian tsarina was Eudoxia Lopukhina, Peter the Great's first wife. Alexandra Feodorovna, the wife of Nicholas II of Russia, was the last Russian empress. Eudoxia Lopukhina was sent to a monastery in 1698, and she died in 1731. In 1712 Peter married in church Catherine I of Russia. The Russian Empire was officially proclaimed in 1721, and Catherine became empress by marriage. After Peter's death she became ruling empress by her own right. In following centuries the title "tsarina" was in unofficial informal use – a kind of "pet name" for empresses, whether ruling queens or queen consorts. For a list of Russian empresses in the 18th and 19th centuries, see empress of Russia. choosing his bride in 1648. Painting by Grigory Sedov, 19th century De jure tsarinas in Russia existed from 1547 until 1721. Among the most famous tsarinas of this period were six or seven wives of Ivan the Terrible, who were poisoned by his enemies, killed or imprisoned by him in monasteries. However, only the first four of them were crowned tsarinas, as the later marriages were not blessed by the Orthodox Church and were considered as cohabitation. Polish noblewoman Marina Mnishek also became tsarina of Russia by her marriage to the impostor False Dmitry I and later to False Dmitri II. Many wives were chosen by bride-show, when hundreds of poor but handsome noblewomen gathered in Moscow from all the regions of Russia and the tsar chose the most beautiful. This deprived Russia of the benefits of royal intermarriage with European monarchs, but protected from inbreeding, as well as from the political influence of foreign princesses. The only foreign wife of a Russian tsar in this early era was Maria Temryukovna, a Circassian princess, who converted to Orthodoxy.
The first Serbian tsarina was Helena of Bulgaria, sister of Bulgarian Tsar Ivan Alexander and wife of Tsar Stephen Uroš IV Dušan of Serbia. She was the empress consort of Serbia from 1346 until Dušan's sudden death in 1355. The second, and the last, Serbian tsarina was Ana Basarab, from the Wallachian noble house of Basarab. She married Dušan's son, Tsar Stephen Uroš V of Serbia somewhere between 1356 and 1360, and ruled until the Serbian empire's demise in 1371.