Rostov-on-Don is a port city and the administrative center of Rostov Oblast and the Southern Federal District of Russia. It lies in the southeastern part of the East European Plain on the Don River, 32 kilometers (20 mi) from the Sea of Azov, directly north of the North Caucasus. The southwestern suburbs of the city above the Don river delta. Rostov-on-Don has a population of over one million people and is an important cultural center of Southern Russia.

Since ancient times, the area around the mouth of the Don has been of cultural and commercial importance. The ancient indigenous peoples included the tribes of the Scythians, Sarmatians, and Savromats. It was the site of Tanais, an ancient Greek colony, Fort Tana, ruled by the Genoese, and Fort Azak during the Ottoman Empire.

In 1749, on the Temernik River, a tributary of the Don, by order of Empress Elizabeth, daughter of Peter the Great, a customs office was established to regulate trade with Turkey. It was combined with the fortress of Demetrius of Rostov, Metropolitan Bishop of the old northern city of Rostov the Great. Azov, a city closer to the Sea of ​​Azov on the Don, gradually lost its commercial importance in the region due to the new fortress.

In 1756, the Russian Trade and Trade Society of Constantinople was founded in the "Kupecheskaya Sloboda" (Kupecheskaya Sloboda) on the high bank of the Don. By the end of the eighteenth century, with the incorporation of the previously Ottoman Black Sea territories into the Russian Empire, the settlement lost most of its military-strategic importance as a border post.

In 1796 the settlement was registered, and in 1797 it became the seat of the Rostov district of the Novorossiysk province. In 1806 it was officially renamed Rostov-on-Don. In the 19th century, thanks to river communications with the inner parts of Russia, Rostov turned into a major trade center and communication center. The railway connection with Kharkiv was completed in 1870, in 1871 - to Voronezh, and in 1875 - to Vladikavkaz.

The most conspicuous architectural feature of the central part of the city is the Cathedral of Virgin's Nativity (1860–1887), designed by Konstantin Thon. In the Academic Drama Theater named after Maxim Gorky works Mikhail Bushnov, who is the national artist of the USSR and an honorary citizen of Rostov-on-Don. The small collections of the Art Gallery and the Museum of Arts include some works by Repin, Surikov, Perov, Levitan, Aivazovsky as well as of modern Rostov artists.

Other facilities include seven stadiums, a Palace of Sports, a circus, a zoo botanical gardens, and parks. Rostov-on-Don hosts the North Caucasian Science Center and research institutes. The city is also home to a Starbucks coffee chain, a true rarity in this geographical area of Russia.