Everyone can imagine something about Russia and the Russians. But where do these ideas come from, what ideological overlays and historical events have shaped them, and do they correspond to the facts? The complexity of the question is mainly related to the historical upheavals that Russia has undergone, including the end of the Soviet Union, the seventy-year era of socialism, the several hundred years of Tsarism before that, and even further back to the Tatar occupation. Who were the Russians from a Swiss perspective before they became communists? Based on Swiss newspapers from the period of 1900 to 1917, the author systematically describes what was considered Russian at that time, highlighting the peculiarities of a Swiss viewpoint.