the sceptre of tsar michael i of russia was decorated with a three-headed eagle, and representations of the design are found in russian symbolism. the literary anthology "lado", published in 1911, opens with a poem "slavic eagle" (славянский орел) by dmitriy vergun, in which the three heads are explained as representing the union of three races which contributed to the genesis of russia, the "western" head representing the varangians, the "eastern head" the mongols and the central head the slavs.