Abstract: The subject of this article is the development of sinology within the walls of the Communist University of the Toilers of the East (CUTE). The author pays particular attention to the scientific works on Chinese history and society, written by the faculty of CUTE during 1921-1939. The author notes that before 1927 China was only an example for proving the "universal truth" of Marxism, and only after 1927 the university started sinological studies in the full sense of the term. At the end of the article, the author examines the influence of the scientific heritage of CUTE on the historiography of the history of China. The research method of this study is the historical-descriptive one. The author describes the little-studied historical facts on the basis of declassified archival material. The scientific novelty of this article lies in the complex analysis of the sinological work of CUTE, conducted on the basis of a wide-ranging quantity of sources, including some archival material for the first time introduced to scientific use. Relying on the analysis of various scientific works by sinologists, the author comes to the conclusion that sinological activity not only had great influence on Soviet Eastern Studies but also became one of the most important sources for Marxist historiography in China itself.