Joseph Stalin is from the Russian Empire.
The 1917 Russian Revolution overthrew a centuries-old regime of official antisemitism in the Russian Empire . Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin ( [ ˈstɑːlɪn ] 18 December 1878 -- 5 March 1953 ) was a Soviet revolutionary , politician and political theorist . Stalin was born to a poor Georgian family in Gori , Russian Empire . Russian Empire . The House of Romanov ruled the Russian Empire from 1721 until 1762 , and its German-descended cadet branch , the House of Holstein-Gottorp-Romanov , ruled from 1762 .