Everyone loves spreading gooey, sticky, sweet stuff on toast. You may not have heard of some of these fruits but trust us, they are delicious. Varenye (a kind of jam) is an old Russian word that means ...

The most famous Russian authors wrote not only voluminous novels but also plays for theater. Most of them retain their relevance and are staged the world over to this day. Russia Beyond asked Grigory ...

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 ...

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 ...

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 ...

Even Queen Elizabeth II has some old pieces of jewelry that once belonged to the Russian royal family. The diamond, emerald and sapphire tiaras of the Romanov dynasty were remarkable for their beauty ...

Everything you wanted to know about the USSR’s notorious security apparatus. From its inception and until the end of the Soviet Union, the KGB was a prominent force in Soviet politics and society. Its ...

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 ...

These rebel artists broke the classical canons of the Imperial Academy of Arts and became the forerunners of Russian avant-garde. The Society for Itinerant Art Exhibitions was registered in 1870 and ...

The oprichnina, the personal force of Russian Tsar Ivan the Terrible, was responsible for mass executions, the persecution of the monarch's enemies, and confiscation of property: They enjoyed and ...

The Russian stove has always been more than just a source of heating. It is an element of culture, a sleeping place, a character in fairy tales and the focal point in a traditional Russian house. Find ...

Despite its location deep within the former imperial Chinese province of Manchuria, Harbin has a peculiar Russian feel to it. The secret, we found out, lies in its history. Go back 150 years and the ...