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 ...

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 ...

The square in Moscow has been associated with executions, violence and torture in the 20th century. It however has a dark past that goes back all the way to the 18th century. For Russians, the word ...

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 ...

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 ...

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 ...

Russia’s last tsar, Nicholas II who was shot dead by the Bolsheviks together with his family, could have escaped this grim fate and left Russia after the abdication in March 1917. His cousin King ...

The Motherland Calls is enormous. The tallest statue in Europe, it is 85 meters tall and weighs 8,000 tons! It is the best-known World War II monument in Russia. Every year, thousands of tourists come ...

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 ...

There is no shortage of sporting greats in the Soviet and Russian pantheon, but one world record-breaking finswimmer literally earned his hero’s badge by risking his life twice to save more than 20 ...

Russians couldn’t even make proper bricks before they hired Italians to work for them. The Italian engineers were proficient in war and architecture, and for lavish salaries, helped build the ...

This is one of the most terrifying pages in Soviet history, devoted to the forced industrialization and remote lands’ development at the expense of human lives. R504 Kolyma Highway isn’t a popular ...