Russia,[b] or the Russian Federation,[c] is a country in Eastern Europe and North Asia. It
is the largest country in the world, spanning eleven time zones and sharing land borders
with fourteen countries.[d] With over 140 million people, Russia is the most populous
country in Europe and the ninth-most populous in the world. It is a highly urbanised
country, with sixteen of its urban areas having more than 1 million inhabitants. Moscow,
the most populous metropolitan area in Europe, is the capital and largest city of
Russia; Saint Petersburg is its second-largest city and cultural centre.
Human settlement on the territory of modern Russia dates back to the Lower Paleolithic.
The East Slavs emerged as a recognised group in Europe between the 3rd and 8th
centuries AD. The first East Slavic state, Kievan Rus', arose in the 9th century, and in
988, it adopted Orthodox Christianity from the Byzantine Empire. Kievan Rus' ultimately
disintegrated; the Grand Duchy of Moscow led the unification of Russian lands, leading
to the proclamation of the Tsardom of Russia in 1547. By the early 18th century, Russia
had vastly expanded through conquest, annexation, and the efforts of Russian
explorers, developing into the Russian Empire, which remains the third-largest empire in
history. However, with the Russian Revolution in 1917, Russia's monarchic rule was
abolished and eventually replaced by the Russian SFSR—the world's first
constitutionally socialist state. Following the Russian Civil War, the Russian SFSR
established the Soviet Union with three other Soviet republics, within which it was the
largest and principal constituent. The Soviet Union underwent rapid industrialisation in
the 1930s, amidst the deaths of millions under Joseph Stalin's rule, and later played a
decisive role for the Allies in World War II by leading large-scale efforts on the Eastern
Front. With the onset of the Cold War, it competed with the United States for ideological
dominance and international influence. The Soviet era of the 20th century saw some of
the most significant Russian technological achievements, including the first humanmade satellite and the first human expedition into outer space.
In 1991, the Russian SFSR emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as the
Russian Federation. Following the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis, the Soviet system
of government was abolished and a new constitution was adopted, which established
a federal semi-presidential system. Since the turn of the century, Russia's political
system has been dominated by Vladimir Putin, under whom the country has
experienced democratic backsliding and become an authoritarian dictatorship. Russia
has been militarily involved in a number of conflicts in former Soviet states and other
countries, including its war with Georgia in 2008 and its war with Ukraine since 2014.
The latter has involved the internationally unrecognised annexations of Ukrainian
territory, including Crimea in 2014 and four other regions in 2022, during an ongoing
invasion.
Russia is generally considered a great power and is a regional power, possessing
the largest stockpile of nuclear weapons and having the third-highest military
expenditure in the world. Its advanced economy ranks among the largest in the world,
relying on its vast mineral and energy resources, mainly oil and natural gas production.
Russia ranks very low in international measurements of democracy, human
rights and freedom of the press, and also has high levels of perceived corruption. It is
a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council as well as a member state
of the SCO and several other intergovernmental organisations. Russia is home to 32
UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Etymology
Main article: Names of Rus', Russia and Ruthenia
According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the English name Russia first appeared in
the 14th century, borrowed from Medieval Latin: Russia, used in the 11th century and
frequently in 12th-century British sources, in turn derived from Russi, 'the Russians' and
the suffix -ia.[19][20]
There are several words in Russian which translate to "Russians" in English. The noun
and adjective русский, russkiy refers to ethnic Russians. The
adjective российский, rossiiskiy denotes Russian citizens regardless of ethnicity. The
same applies to the more recently coined noun россиянин, rossiianyn, in the sense of
citizen of the Russian state.[21][22]
The oldest endonyms used were Rus' (Русь) and the "Russian land" (Русская
земля, Russkaya zemlya).[23] According to the Primary Chronicle, the word Rus' is
derived from the Rus' people, who were a Swedish tribe, and from where the three
original members of the Rurikid dynasty came from.[24] The Finnish word for
Swedes, ruotsi, has the same origin.[25] In modern historiography, the early
medieval East Slavic state is usually referred to as Kievan Rus', named after its capital
city.[26] Another Medieval Latin name for Rus' was Ruthenia.[27]
In Russian, the current name of the country, Россия (Rossiya), comes from
the Byzantine Greek name Ρωσία (Rosía).[28] The name Росия (Rosiya) was first
attested in 1387.[29] The name Rossiya appeared in Russian sources in the 15th century
and began to replace the vernacular Rus' during the rise of Moscow as the centre of a
unified Russian state.[30] However, until the end of the 17th century, the country was
more often referred to by its inhabitants as Rus', the "Russian land" (Russkaya zemlya),
or the "Muscovite state" (Moskovskoye gosudarstvo), among other variations.[31][21]
In 1721, Peter the Great proclaimed the Russian Empire (Rossiyskaya imperiya).[31] The
name Rossiya was used as the common designation for the multinational Russian
Empire and then for the modern Russian state.[32] Rossiya is distinguished from the
ethnonym russkiy, as it refers to a supranational identity, including ethnic
Russians.[32] After the Russian Revolution and the proclamation of the Russian SFSR in
1918, the "Russian" in the title of the state was Rossiyskaya, rather than Russkaya, as
the former denoted a multinational state, while the latter had ethnic dimensions. [33] In
modern Russian, the name Rus' is still used in poetry or prose to refer to either the older
Russia or an imagined essence of Russia.[26]
History
Main article: History of Russia
Early history
Further information: Ancient Greek colonies, Early Slavs, Huns, Turkic expansion,
and Prehistory of Siberia
See also: Proto-Indo-Europeans and Proto-Uralic homeland