AI IMAGE - Portrait of Vladimir Lenin, 1910s, (2023). Lenin (1870-1924) was a Russian lawyer, revolutionary and Soviet politician who played a leading role in Russia's move from a feudal system under the tsar, to an independent federal state. Lenin was the founder and leader of the Bolsheviks, who led the October Revolution that established the world's first socialist state in 1917. He died of a stroke, and his body was embalmed and put on public display in the Red Square mausoleum in Moscow.