Currency - Soviet Union - 50 Soviet Ruble - Year 1961

Item Code:   138/SU-1

Year	1961
Obverse	Bust of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (Volodya Ulyanov)
Reverse	Kremlin in Moscow
Size	140 x 70 mm
Watermark	Lenin's bust in profile.

Obverse Description

Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov (Lenin)

   

Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known as Lenin  (22 April 1870 – 21 January 1924) was a Russian lawyer, revolutionary, and the leader of the Bolshevik party and of the October Revolution. He was the first leader of the USSR and the government that took over Russia in 1917. Lenin's ideas became known as Leninism.

Early 1870 in the town of Simbirsk in the Russian Empire. His mother was a schoolteacher and his father was an education official. He began studying politics in high school. In 1887, he was thrown out of Kazan State University because he protested against the Tsar who was the king of the Russian Empire. He continued to read books and study ideas by himself, and in 1891 he got a license to become a lawyer.

While he studied law in St. Petersburg he learned about the writings of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. To talk or write about Marxism like it was a good thing was illegal in Russia, and Lenin was arrested for that and sent to prison in Siberia. In July 1898, when he was still in Siberia, Lenin married Nadezhda Krupskaya.

In 1903, Lenin had a major argument with another leader of the party, Julius Martov, which divided the party in two. In 1907 he travelled around Europe again, and visited many socialist meetings and events. During World War I he lived in big European cities like London, Paris and Geneva. At the beginning of the war, a big left-wing meeting called the Second International included the Bolsheviks.  Lenin and the Bolsheviks were one of only a few groups who were against the war because of their Marxist ideas.

In October 1917, the Bolsheviks, led by Lenin and Trotsky, headed the Petrograd Soviet and other Soviets all over Russia in a revolution against Kerensky's government, which was known as the October Revolution. They won, and announced that Russia was a socialist country. In November, Lenin was chosen as its leader.

Later, Lenin brought in the New Economic Policy to try and make things better for the country and move from capitalism towards socialism. Some private enterprise was still allowed, but not much. Businessmen, known as nepmen, could only own small industries, not factories. Factories and large industry became public property to be owned by the workers.

After a woman named Fanni Kaplan shot Lenin in 1918, he started having strokes in May and December 1922 (both of which he recovered from). In March 1923 a stroke paralyzed him and left him unable to speak, and in January 1924 a stroke killed him. Just before he died, Lenin had wanted to get rid of Stalin because he thought he was dangerous to the country and the government.

After his death: The city of St. Petersburg had been renamed Petrograd by the Tsar in 1914, but was renamed Leningrad in memory of Lenin in 1924. When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 Leningrad was again named St. Petersburg, which it remains to this today.

Before Lenin died, he said he wished to be buried beside his mother. When he died, Stalin let the people in Russia look at his body. Because people kept coming they decided not to bury him, and preserved his body instead. A building was built in Red Square, Moscow over the body so that people could see it. It is called the Lenin Mausoleum. Many Russians and tourists still go there to see his body today.

Reverse Description

Moscow Kremlin

The Moscow Kremlin, usually referred to as the Kremlin, is a fortified complex at the heart of Moscow, overlooking the Moskva River to the south, Saint Basil's Cathedral and Red Square to the east, and the Alexander Garden to the west. It is the best known of the kremlins (Russian citadels) and includes five palaces, four cathedrals, and the enclosing Kremlin Wall with Kremlin towers. Also within this complex is the Grand Kremlin Palace. The complex serves as the official residence of the President of the Russian Federation.

The name Kremlin means "fortress inside a city", and is often also used metonymically to refer to the government of the Russian Federation in a similar sense to how the White House is used to refer to the Executive Office of the President of the United States. It had previously been used to refer to the government of the Soviet Union (1922–1991) and its highest members (such as general secretaries, premiers, presidents, ministers, and commissars). "Kremlinology" refers to the study of Soviet and Russian politics.

Origin: The site has been continuously inhabited by Finno-Ugric peoples since the 2nd century BC. The Slavs occupied the south-western portion of Borovitsky Hill as early as the 11th century, as evidenced by a metropolitan seal from the 1090s which was unearthed by Soviet archaeologists in the area. Vyatichi built a fortified structure (or "grad") on the hill where the Neglinnaya River flowed into the Moskva River.

Up to the 14th century, the site was known as the 'grad of Moscow'. The word "Kremlin" was first recorded in 1331(though etymologist Max Vasmer mentions an earlier appearance in 1320). The grad was greatly extended by Prince Yuri Dolgorukiy in 1156, destroyed by the Mongols in 1237 and rebuilt in oak in 1339.

മോസ്കോ ക്രെംലിൻ അഥവാ ക്രെംലിൻ

മോസ്കോ നഗരത്തിന്റെ ഹൃദയഭാഗത്ത് സ്ഥിതിചെയ്യുന്ന ഒരു കോട്ടയാണ് മോസ്കോ ക്രെംലിൻ അഥവാ ക്രെംലിൻ. ക്രെംലിനിന്റെ തെക്ക് ഭാഗത്ത് മോസ്ക്വ നദിയും കിഴക്ക് ഭാഗത്ത് ചുവന്ന ചത്വരം, സെന്റ്ബേസിൽ കത്തീഡ്രല്ലും പടിഞ്ഞാറ് ഭാഗത്ത് അലക്സാണ്ടർ പൂന്തോട്ടവും സ്ഥി   തിചെയ്യുന്നു. അഞ്ച് കൊട്ടാരങ്ങളും നാല് കത്തീഡ്രല്ലുകളും ക്രെംലിൻ മതിലും ക്രെംലിൻ ഗോപുരങ്ങളും ചേർന്ന കെട്ടിട സമുച്ചയമാണ് ക്രെംലിനുകൾ (റഷ്യൻ കോട്ട). റഷ്യൻ ഫെഡറേഷന്റെ പ്രസിഡന്റിന്റെ ഔദ്യോഗിക വസതിയാണ് ക്രെംലിൻ.

നഗരമധ്യത്തിലുള്ള കോട്ട എന്നതാണ് ക്രെംലിൻ എന്ന പേരിന്റെ അർത്ഥം. അമേരിക്കയിലെ വൈറ്റ് ഹൗസ് പോലെ റഷ്യൻ ഗവൺമെന്റിന്റെ ആസ്ഥാനം സൂചിപ്പിക്കാനായി ക്രെംലിൻ എന്ന പദം ഉപയോഗിച്ചുവരുന്നു. സോവിയറ്റ് യൂണിയനിലെ സർക്കാരിനെയും ( 1922-1991) അതിന്റെ ഉന്നതാധികാരികളെയും സൂചിപ്പിക്കുന്നതിന് നേരത്തെ ക്രെംലിൻ എന്ന പദം ഉപയോഗിച്ചിരുന്നു. സോവിയറ്റ് യൂണിയൻ, റഷ്യ എന്നിവിടങ്ങളിലെ രാഷ്ട്രീയത്തെക്കുറിച്ചുള്ള പഠനമാണ് ക്രെംലിനോളജി.

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