Russia. The culture of the ethnic Russian people has a long tradition of achievement in many fields, especially when it comes to literature, folk dancing, philosophy, classical music, traditional folk music, ballet, architecture, painting, cinema, animation and politics, which all have had considerable influence on world culture. Russia also has a rich material culture and a tradition in technology. Russian culture grew from that of the East Slavs, with their pagan beliefs and specific way of life in the wooded, steppe and forest-steppe areas of Eastern Europe and Eurasia. Early Russian culture and Slavic people in Russia were much influenced by nomadic Turkic people and tribes of Iranian origin through intense cultural contacts in the Russian steppe and strongly by Finno-Ugric, Balts and Scandinavians through the Russian North, as well as by the people of the Byzantine Empire with which Old Russia maintained strong cultural links. In the late 1st millennium AD the Nordic sea culture of the Varangians and in the middle of the second millennium the nomadic people of the Mongol Empire also influenced the Russian culture. Early Slavic tribes in European Russia were much shaped by the fusion of Nordic-European and Oriental-Asian cultures which formed Russian identity in the Volga region and in the states of Rus' Khaganate and Kievan Rus '. Orthodox Christian missionaries began arriving from the Eastern Roman Empire in the 9th century, and Kievan Rus' officially converted to Orthodox Christianity in 988. This largely defined the Russian culture of the next millennium as a synthesis of Slavic and Byzantine cultures. Russia or Rus' was formed, developed its culture and was influenced through its location by Western European and Asian cultures so that a Russian-Eurasian culture developed. After Constantinople fell to the Ottomans in 1453, Russia remained the largest Orthodox nation in the world and eventually claimed succession to the Byzantine legacy in the form of the Third Rome idea. An important period in Russian history was the Tsardom of Russia from 1547 until 1721 where many Russian cultural peculiarities emerged and developed. At different periods in Russian history, the culture of Western Europe also exerted strong influences over Russian citizens. During the era of the Russian Empire which existed from 1721 to 1917, the Tsar's title was abolished and the rulers of Russia were called Emperors. Since the reforms of Peter the Great in the Russian Empire, for two centuries Russian culture largely developed in the general context of European culture rather than pursuing its own unique ways. The situation changed in the 20th century, when the distinctive Communist ideology imported from Europe became a major factor in the culture of the Soviet Union, where Russia, in the form of the Russian SFSR, was the largest and leading part. The culture of the Soviet Union has decisively shaped the former Soviet Russian Republic and thus Russian culture Although Russia has been influenced by Western Europe, the Eastern world, Northern cultures and the Byzantine Empire for more than 1000 years since ancient Rus' and is culturally connected with them, it is often argued that due to its history, geography and inhabitants which belong to different language families but were embedded in the Russian language and culture, the country has developed a character with many aspects of a unique Russian civilization which in many parts differs from both Western and Eastern cultures. Nowadays, the Nation Brands Index ranks Russian cultural heritage seventh, based on interviews of some 20,000 people mainly from Western countries and from the Far East. Due to the relatively late involvement of Russia in modern globalization and in international tourism, many aspects of Russian culture, like Russian jokes and Russian art, remain largely unknown to foreigners.