Russian President Vladimir Putin presented the Pushkin Medal to Alexander von Bismarck, a descendant of Otto von Bismarck in the Kremlin.
Von Bismarck, a former local CDU politician and entrepreneur from the Dublin branch of the Bismarck family, founded the Bismarck Dialogue, a private German-Russian forum that maintains personal contacts amid strained official relations.
He started it after the German side shut down the Petersburg Dialogue.
Media in Russia noted that he spoke German and Putin, who is fluent, did not need an interpreter.
Von Bismarck said he was proud that Russia recognized his efforts for friendship between the two peoples, emphasized the need for personal ties on an equal footing, and recalled Otto von Bismarck's sentence that when Germany and Russia are friends, Europe prospers.
He added that he would go home and tell the Germans, "It is important to remain friends, not enemies."