During the 70 years of the existence of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the number of constituent parts changed, but most of the time there were 15 of them. Here is the list. In the beginning ...

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 ...

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 ...

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 Khanate of Sibir was an ancient Turkic state on the territory of present-day Siberia. It was older than Russia, but in the end, it was absorbed and destroyed… Siberia is a region in North Asia, ...

Global Look Press, Legion Media, Public domain The Bolsheviks oppressed the Orthodox Church after seizing power in Russia – but Stalin, despite all his ruthlessness, changed things for better in this ...

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 ...

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 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 ...

The expression ‘Potemkin villages’ means anything made for the sole purpose of concealing the truth. The legend goes that during Catherine the Great’s journey to Crimea in 1787, Grigoriy Potemkin, the ...

This architectural utopia of the Soviet authorities became one of the most outstanding examples of engineering and architectural thought. Albeit, only on paper. The Palace of the Soviets is the most ...

Soviet Union, the Congress of Soviets, Soviet of Federation – the word has been and is still widely used in Russia, but what does it exactly mean? During the Soviet times, the USSR was often called ...