The very northwest is part of the Baltic Shield; most of the rest is within the East European Plain(1). The Ural Mountains bound the east and the Arctic Ocean the north.
The Baltic Shield consists of alternations of rocks scraped by glaciers with shallow depressions containing lakes or marshes. This area includes the Kola Peninsula(2) and other areas est of Finland and south of the White Sea(3).
The Baltic Shield is bounded to its south by a trough extending from the Gulf of Finland through Lakes Ladoga(4) and Onega(5).
This part of the East European Plain descends south and eastward, oftern with escarpments, of which the Valday Hills(6)--a watershed boundary--is the most known. During glacier melt lakes, such as Il'men', formed behind these hills. Much further east is an older watershed boundary, the Timan(7) Range, which separates two north flowing rivers systems, the Pechora(8) and the Northern Dvina(9). These account for most the plain's drainage. The Volga(10) just rouches the area, at the Rybinskoje Reservoir(11), and west of the Valday hills rivers drain into the trough--the Gulf of Finland and Lake Ladoga.
The Northern(12) Ural Mountains have only one tall ridge and that does not reach 2,000 meters. At their northernmost they bend northwest and point toward Novaja Zeml'a(13), a double island that separates the Barents(14) and Kara(15) seas. Yet further north is Franz Josef Land(16), a set of uninhabited islands.