This chapter provides a chronological overview of the popular revolts, and examines the social composition of their participants. It considers the aims and demands they embodied, within the common framework of rebellions in the name of the tsar. In some cases the revolts in provincial towns were triggered by news of the events in Moscow. The social composition of the revolt was fairly heterogeneous, including representatives of relatively privileged groups, such as the gentry and merchants. The role of the bond-slaves in the Moscow revolts was a somewhat ambiguous one. The composition of the participants in the urban revolts in the provinces in 1648-50 reflected the varied social structures of the towns affected. The Razin revolt was the most heterogeneous of all the later seventeenth century uprisings. In the revolts which took place under the first Romanovs, the rebels commonly described their main targets as 'traitor-boyars'. In most popular revolts, the 'evil' traitor-boyars were contrasted with the 'good' tsar.