The monograph examines a wide range of issues related to the history of foreign policy and cultural relations between Rus', Byzantium and Western Europe at the end of the 12th - first half of the 13th centuries. The contacts of Russian princes with the German king Philip of Swabia and Emperor Frederick II, the Byzantine Emperor Alexios III and the rulers of Nicaea, Popes Innocent III and Innocent IV, the Austrian Duke Frederick the Warlike, the Hungarian kings and the Polish princes are analyzed. Considerable attention is paid to the family ties of the Galician-Volyn princes, in particular, the marriage of Roman Mstislavich with the daughter of the Byzantine Emperor Isaac II Euphrosyne-Anna, whose influence explains the unusual name book of the Romanovichs, the appearance of highly revered Christian relics, the use of the royal title and other attributes of the power of the basileus, the specific construction and constituent activity.