Vasily Nikitich Tatishchev was a Renaissance man no worse than Lomonosov. All his occupations would hardly fit in three lines: statesman, diplomat, economist, mathematician, mining engineer, geographer, natural scientist, ethnographer, collector of antiquities, archaeologist, linguist, publicist, philosopher, educator... He was the founder of Yekaterinburg, Perm and Stavropol, later renamed Togliatti. He was the first Russian historian, having authored the History of Russia. And he also proposed to rename the Stone Belt into Ural Mountains and draw the boundary between Europe and Asia along the ridge.