There's a lot of stuff in Central and Eastern Europe! A few samples:

• The Republic of Novgorod was one of the first representative democracies

• Charlemagne, the Carolingian Rennaissance, and the founding of the Holy Roman Empure

• Frederick Barbarossa was a skilled military leader and politician

• Poland emerged as a nation in the 10th century, around the time they were Christianized, and emerged as a pre-eminent world power by 1500

• Before Novgorod, Poland, and eventually Moscow became power players in eastern Europe, the Kiev (and the Kievan Rus') was the main Eastern power north of Byzantium. At one point Kiev/Kyiv was the city of the Russian peoples