This special issue is conceived as a Festschrift for Nelly V. Motroshilova, a Russian historian of philosophy who has made important and long-lasting contributions to the field. An academic Festschrift does not emerge by chance; it is a testimony to one’s influence in the profession. Nelly V. Motroshilova certainly deserves such a distinction. She is one of those who have shaped Russia’s intellectual landscape in the second part of the twentieth century. Largely thanks to her, Russian scholarship in the history of philosophy retained its creative character despite the dogmatism and orthodoxy that dominated philosophy in Soviet Russia in the 1950s–1980s. For more than 50 years she has been affiliated with the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the principal academic institution and the main research center in the field of philosophy in the country. For 27 years (1986–2013) she served as the Head of the Institute’s Division for the History of Philosophy that includes departments of the History of Western, the History of Eastern, and the History of Russian philosophy, and employs over one hundred research associates. During her academic career she mentored more than fifty doctoral students, young scholars, and postdoctoral fellows, many of whom have achieved professional success, becoming notable figures in the field.