* This study is drawn from the author's extensive research in the Soviet Union and foreign archives relating to Russia, under a series of research grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the International Research and Exchange Board (ÍREX), and in connexion with collaborative publication projects between the Institute of Ukrainian Archeography of the Academy of Sciences of Ukraine and the Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute. The article was prepared during 1991 while, under IREX sponsorship, the author was a guest of the Division of History of the USSR Academy of Sciences, and 1992, when the author was working collaboratively with the State Archival Service of Russia (Rosarkhiv; (then the Committee for Archival Affairs of the Russian Federation - Roskomarkhiv) and the State Public Historical Library (GPIB). The author is grateful for support from these many sources, and for the assistance of many friends and archival colleagues over the years. Special appreciation is due to colleagues who read and commented on earlier drafts of the text, most particularly, I^opold Auer, Charles Kecskeméti, V.P. Kozlov, I. V. Po/deeva, J.S.G. Simmons, E.V. Starostin, Wladyslaw Stçpniak, and V. V. Tsaplin. An earlier Russian version of this essay appears as "Zarubezhnaia arkhivnaia Rossika i Sovetika. Proiskhozhdenie dokumentov ili ikh otnoshenie к istorii Rovsii (SSSR), potřebnost' v opisanii i bibliografii," Otechestvennye arkhivy, 1993, 1 : 20-53. A Ukrainian version, dealing with parallel problems of the Ukrainian archival legacy, is in preparation for publication in Kiev by the Institute of Ukrainian Archeography. A preliminary shorter version appeared as a chapter in the larger study. Intellectual access to Soviet-area archives: What is to be done? (preprint published by IREX, Princeton, NJ, March, 1992).