From the tiny apartment that he lived in during the 1990s to Stalin’s dacha and Romanov palaces, the leader of the largest country on Earth has quite a few places to work and relax in. This is the ...

Both paternal and maternal ancestors of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, have something to do with Russia and its Imperial family. Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (born Prince Philip of Greece and ...

According to one theory, ‘Russian roulette’ emerged in the Tsarist army as a relatively “safe” trick that easily impressed onlookers. Wulich […] invited us to sit around in a sign. [We] silently ...

Why visit Tobolsk? Well, for one, to look at the ancient capital of Siberia, feel what the great exile Fyodor Dostoevsky and Romanovs royal family experienced here and also admire how the city has ...

We at Russia Beyond cover this extremely fascinating time of history often, so we’ve put together your guide to the Soviet Union with our most noteworthy articles. Probably the first thing you ought ...

From the Arctic Circle to Kazakhstan, from the western borders to the Far East — the Gulag system in Stalin's time encompassed the entire USSR. “Gulag” is often used to describe any Soviet prison or ...

The Bolsheviks were in at the beginning of the Communist movement in China. However, it wasn’t the followers of Mao Zedong who became the USSR’s main allies in the country. In 1949, the Communists won ...

Sarah Welch/wikipedia.org Here’s a toast to the explorers and archaeologists who discovered the plant used to produce the drink of the ancient Indians. One of the most mysterious drinks in the history ...

These so-called vory v zakone - or zakonniki (‘Thieves in Law’) are the kings of the criminal underworld. This group of respected bigshots, who control the majority of the criminal world, both in ...

At the beginning of the 17th century, the Poles had a chance to crush their main rival and become the ruler of Eastern Europe. For centuries, Eastern Europe was a battleground between two Slavic ...

Seryozha Aleshkov was awarded the medal ‘For Combat Merit’, received a Browning as a trophy pistol from an army general and was even “promoted” to the rank of junior lieutenant. World War II affected ...

Lines were a sign of the times - most goods were in short supply and their rare appearance on shelves in shops sometimes caused actual stampedes. In every Soviet food store one could almost always buy ...