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Ural Mountains
The worn 2,500-km range that divides Europe from Asia
The Urals are the conventional dividing line between two continents, a long, low chain running north to south for about 2,500 kilometres from the Arctic coast to the steppes of Kazakhstan. Far older and more eroded than the Alps or the Himalayas, they rarely rise above gentle, forested ridges, yet their position has given them outsized significance: cross the Urals and, by long agreement, you pass from Europe into Asia. Their real wealth lies less in height than in the minerals locked in their ancient rock.
These mountains are the deeply eroded roots of a range thrown up some 250 to 300 million years ago when the continents that became Europe and Asia collided. The highest point, Mount Narodnaya in the north, reaches only about 1,895 metres. What the Urals lack in altitude they make up in geology: the range is extraordinarily rich in iron, copper, gold, platinum, and gemstones, a mineral diversity that has been mined for centuries. The chain lies almost entirely within Russia, brushing northern Kazakhstan at its southern end.
Ore from the Urals helped forge the Russian state, fuelling armament works under Peter the Great and a great industrial buildup that accelerated during the Second World War, when Soviet factories were moved east of the range beyond the reach of German armies. Cities such as Yekaterinburg grew into major industrial centres. The boundary the Urals mark is more cultural convention than sharp natural break, but it remains one of the most enduring lines on the world map.