History of Sino-Russian Relations - First Contact

First Contact

See also: Russian–Manchu border conflicts

Lying at opposite ends of Eurasia, the two countries had little contact before about 1640. Both had to deal with the steppe nomads, Russia from the south and China from the northwest. Both were ruled by the Mongols (Golden Horde in Russia (1240–1480), and Yuan Dynasty in China (1271–1368)), but this led to little contact. Russia became a northern neighbor of China when in 1582-1643 Russian adventurers made themselves masters of the Siberian forests. There were three points of contact: 1) south to the Amur River basin (early), 2) east along the southern edge of Siberia toward Peking (the main axis) and 3) in Turkestan (late).

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