Rus·sia    Audio Help   /ˈrʌʃə/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[ruhsh-uh] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation

–noun

1.	Also called Russian Empire. Russian, Rossiya. a former empire in E Europe and N and W Asia: overthrown by the Russian Revolution 1917. Capital: St. Petersburg (1703–1917).

2.	Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

3.	Russian Federation.

Russia leather

–noun

a fine, smooth leather produced by careful tanning and dyeing, esp. in dark red: originally prepared in Russia.

Also called russia.

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[Origin: 1650–60]

Rus·sia    Audio Help   (rŭsh'ə)  Pronunciation Key  (click for larger image in new window) A former empire of eastern Europe and northern Asia. Originally settled by Slavs from the third to the eighth century, the region was long a conglomerate of independent principalities until Moscow gained ascendancy in the 14th, 15th, and 16th centuries. The empire achieved the height of its power and territorial influence under Peter the Great and Catherine the Great in the 17th and 18th centuries. The early 1800s were a period of reactionism, and although some liberal reforms were effected in the late 1800s, discontent remained and led directly to the Revolutions of 1905 and 1917, an internal power struggle, and the formation of the USSR in 1922. Officially Russian Federation Formerly Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic. A country of eastern Europe and northern Asia stretching from the Baltic Sea to the Pacific Ocean. It was proclaimed a republic in 1917 after the Russian Revolution, and as a constituent republic of the USSR (1922-1991), it constituted 75 percent of the country's total land area. In 1990 Boris Yeltsin became president of the Russian republic, and in 1991 he was reelected to the position in the republic's first popular election. When the Soviet Union disintegrated later that year, Yeltsin took control of the central government, and with Belarus and Ukraine, Russia formed (December 1991) the Commonwealth of Independent States, which was then joined by most of the other breakaway Soviet republics. In March 1992 Russia signed a treaty with most of the remaining Soviet republics, establishing the Russian Federation. Moscow is the capital. Population: 143,000,000. See Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

A vast nation that stretches from eastern Europe across the Eurasian land mass. It was the most powerful republic of the former Soviet Union; ethnic Russians composed about half of the population. It is the world's largest country. Its capital and largest city is Moscow.

Note: Russia was ruled by czars of the Romanov family from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries.

Note: Peter the Great, a czar who reigned in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, attempted to westernize Russian government and culture.

Note: During the Russian Revolution of 1917, the Bolsheviks, under Lenin, took control of the government; communists governed from 1917 until 1991.

Note: Russia now occupies the seat on the Security Council of the United Nations formerly held by the Soviet Union.

Russia, OH (village, FIPS 69344) Location: 40.23240 N, 84.41087 W
Population (1990): 442 (143 housing units)
Area: 0.9 sq km (land), 0.0 sq km (water)
Zip code(s): 45363

New Russia, NY Zip code(s): 12964

Russia

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