ABSTRACT
Russia has been in one way and another a unit for some seven hundred years, though during that time first the east, then the west, provided the rulers of the country, and there was a long period of political disunity in between: the capital was first at Karakorum in Mongolia, then at Peking, then at Moscow. During these seven centuries, many very different kinds of peoples and cultures have lived and fought together. The main groups are:
