Saint Petersburg
This article is about the city in Russia. For other uses, see St. Petersburg, Florida or Saint Petersburg (disambiguation). (,
Sankt-Peterburg) is a city located in
northwestern Russia on the delta of the river
Neva at the east end of the
Gulf of Finland on the
Baltic Sea. It is informally known as Питер (
Piter) and was formerly known as
Petrograd (, 1914–1924) and
Leningrad (, 1924–1991).
Founded by
Tsar Peter the Great in May,
1703 as a "window to Europe," it served as the capital of the
Russian Empire for more than two hundred years (the capital was moved to
Moscow after the
Russian Revolution of 1917). With about 4.7 million inhabitants (2002), today Saint Petersburg is
Russia's second-largest city, Europe's fourth largest city, a major European cultural center, and the most important Russian port on the Baltic. The city has total area 1439 square km, which makes it the biggest city in terms of area among cities with over a million inhabitants in Europe, after London. It is 2 times bigger than New York City and 13 times bigger than Paris.
Among cities of the world having populations of over one million people, Saint Petersburg is the northernmost. The city center is a
UNESCO World Heritage Site. For over 200 years Russia's political and cultural center, the city is impressive even today, and is sometimes called "the Northern Capital" (,
severnaya stolitsa). It is the administrative center of
Leningrad Oblast (itself a separate region) and of the
Northwestern Federal District.
The majestic appearance of St. Petersburg is achieved through a variety of architectural details including long, straight boulevards, vast spaces, gardens and parks, decorative wrought-iron fences, monuments and decorative sculptures. The Neva River itself, together with its many canals and their granite
embankments and
bridges gives the city a unique and striking ambience. These bodies of water led to St. Petersburg being given the name of "
Venice of the North".
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St Petersburg is known as the city of 300 bridges. |
St. Petersburg's position below the
Arctic Circle, on the same
latitude as nearby
Helsinki,
Stockholm,
Aberdeen and
Oslo (60°
N), causes twilight to last all night in May, June and July. This celebrated phenomenon is known as the "
white nights". The white nights are closely linked to another attraction — the nine drawbridges spanning the Neva. Tourists flock to see the
bridges drawn and lowered again at night to allow shipping to pass up and down the river. Bridges open from May to late October according to a special schedule between approximately 2 a.m. and 4:30 a.m.
The historical center of St. Petersburg, sometimes called the outdoor museum of
Neoclassicism, was the first Russian patrimony inscribed on the
UNESCO list of
World Heritage Sites.
The Palaces
St. Petersburg has been known as the city of
palaces. One of the earliest of these is the
Summer Palace, a modest house built for
Peter I in the
Summer Garden (1710–1714). Much more imposing are the
baroque residences of his associates, such as the
Kikin Hall and the
Menshikov Palace on the Neva Embankment, constructed from designs by
Domenico Trezzini over the years 1710 to 1716. A residence adjacent to the Menshikov palace was redesigned for
Peter II and now houses the
State University.
Probably the most illustrious of imperial palaces is the baroque
Winter Palace (1754–1762), a huge building with dazzlingly luxurious interiors, now housing the
Hermitage Museum. The same architect,
Bartolomeo Rastrelli, was also responsible for three residences in the vicinity of the
Nevsky Prospekt: the
Stroganov palace (1752–1754, now a wax museum), the
Vorontsov palace (1749–1757, now a military school), and the
Anichkov Palace (1741–1750, many times rebuilt, now a palace for children). Other baroque palaces include the
Sheremetev house on the
Fontanka embankment (also called the Fountain House), and the
Beloselsky-Belozersky Palace (1846–1848) on the Nevsky Prospekt, formerly a residence of the
Grand Duke Sergey Aleksandrovich.
Of
Neoclassical palaces, the foremost is St Michael's (or Engineers')
Castle, constructed for
Emperor Paul in 1797–1801 to replace the earlier Summer Palace. The
Tauride Palace of
Prince Potemkin (1783–1789), situated nearby, used to be a seat of the
first Russian parliament. Just to the left from the Hermitage buildings is the
Marble Palace, commissioned by
Count Orlov and built in 1768–1785 from various sorts of
marble to a Neoclassical design by
Antonio Rinaldi. The Michael Palace (1819–1825), famed for its opulent interiors and named after its first lodger, Grand Duke Mikhail Pavlovich, now houses the
Russian Museum. Also built in the Neoclassical style are the
Yusupov palace (the 1790s), where
Rasputin was killed; the
Razumovsky palace (1762–1766); the
Shuvalov palace (1830–1838); and the
Yelagin Palace (1818–1822), a sumptuous summer
dacha of the imperial family, situated on the
Yelagin Island.
The last important residences were built for
Nicholas I's children: the
Mariinsky Palace (1839–1844), located just opposite St Isaac's Cathedral and housing a
city council, the
Nicholas Palace (1853–61), and the
New Michael Palace (1857-1861).
The churches
Most of the church buildings belong to the Russian government, since their seizure in 1917. The largest
church in the city is
St Isaac's Cathedral (1818–1858), one of the biggest
domed buildings in the world, constructed for 40 years under supervision of its architect,
Auguste de Montferrand. Another magnificent church in the
Empire style is the
Kazan Cathedral (1801–1811), situated on the Nevsky Prospekt and modelled after
St Peter's, Vatican. No tourist can miss the
Church of the Savior on Blood (1883–1907), a gorgeous monument in the
old Russian style which marks the spot of
Alexander II's assassination. The
Peter and Paul Cathedral (1712–1732), a long-time
symbol of the city, contains the
sepulchres of
Peter the Great and other
Russian emperors. Apart from these four principal cathedrals, which operate today primarily as
museums, there are numerous other churches.
Of baroque structures, the grandest is the white-and-blue
Smolny Convent (1748–1764), a striking design by
Bartolomeo Rastrelli, but never completed. It is followed by the
Naval Cathedral of St Nicholas (1753–1762), a lofty structure dedicated to the
Russian Navy, the outside being covered with
plaques to sailors lost at sea. The church of Sts Simeon and Anna (1731–1734), St Sampson Cathedral (1728–1740), St Pantaleon church (1735–1739), and
St Andrew Cathedral (1764–1780) are all worth mentioning.
The Neoclassical churches are too numerous to count. Many of them are intended to dominate vast
squares, like St. Vladimir's Cathedral (1769–1789), not to be confused with
the church of Our Lady of Vladimir (1761–1783). The
Transfiguration Cathedral (1827–29) and the
Trinity Cathedral (1828–1835) were both designed by
Vasily Stasov. Smaller churches include the Konyushennaya (1816–1823), also by Stasov, the "Easter Cake" church (1785–1787), noted for its droll appearance, St Catherine church on the
Vasilievsky Island (1768–1771), and numerous non-Orthodox churches on the Nevsky Prospekt.
The
Alexander Nevsky Monastery, intended to house the relics of St
Alexander Nevsky, contains two cathedrals and several smaller churches in various styles. It is also remarkable for the
Tikhvin Cemetery, where many notable Russians are buried.
The city has two small churches in the early
Gothic Revival style, those of St John the Baptist (1776–1781) and the Chesmenskaya (1777–1780), both designed by
Yury Velten. The late 19th-century and early 20th-century temples are all constructed from
Russian Revival or
Byzantine Revival designs.
The cathedral mosque (1909–1920), reputedly the largest in Europe, is built after the model of
Timurid temples in
Samarkand.
St Petersburg Buddhist temple was the first in Europe. Construction was funded by subscriptions of the
Dalai Lama and Russian and Mongolian Buddhists; the structure was inaugurated in the presence of
Itigilov in 1914 and served as a valuable resource to transient
Buryats and
Kalmyks during World War I. It functioned until 1935 when the lamas passed into gulags. The temple and its grounds were used for secular purposes until
1991, when the
datsan was eventually reopened for worship.
Public buildings
The
Peter and Paul Fortress, formerly a political
prison, occupies a dominant position in the center of the city. A
boardwalk was built along a portion of the fortress wall, giving visitors a clear view of the city across the river to the south. On the other bank of the Neva, the spit of the Vasilievsky island is graced by the
former Bourse building (1805–1810), reminiscent of a classic
Greek temple, with two great
Rostral Columns, decorated with ships' prows, standing in front of it.
Undoubtedly the most famous of St. Petersburg's museums is the
Hermitage, one of the world's largest and richest collections of
Western European art. Its vast holdings were originally exhibited in the
Greek Revival building (1838–1852) by
Leo von Klenze, now called the New Hermitage. But the first Russian museum was established by Peter the Great in the
Kunstkammer, erected in 1718–1734 on the opposite bank of the Neva River and formerly a home to the
Russian Academy of Sciences. Other popular tourist destinations include the
Stieglitz Museum of Applied Arts (1885–1895), the
Ethnography Museum (1900–1911), the
Suvorov Museum of Military History (1901–1904), and the Political History Museum (1904–06).
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The city is adorned with numerous monuments from the imperial period of Russian history. |
The imperial government institutions were housed in the
General Staff building on the
Palace Square (1820–1827), with a huge triumphal arch in the centre, the
Senate and
Synod buildings on the
Senate Square (1827–1843), the Imperial Cabinet (1803–1805) and the
City Duma (1784-87) on the Nevsky Prospekt, the Assignation Bank (1783–1790), the Customs Office (1829–1832), and the splendid
Admiralty (1806–1823), one of the city's most conspicuous landmarks. Most of these buildings were designed either by
Giacomo Quarenghi, or by
Carlo Rossi.
The former imperial capital is rich in educational institutions.
Saint Petersburg State University occupies several buildings on the Vasilievsky Island, including the spacious baroque edifice of Twelve Collegia (1722–1744). The
Academy of Arts (1764–1788), an exceedingly handsome structure, overlooks a
quayside adorned with genuine
Egyptian
griffins and
sphinxes. The
Smolny Institute (1806–1808), originally the first school for Russian women, was picked up by
Lenin as his headquarters during the
Russian Revolution of 1917. The Catherine Institute (1804–1807), also designed by Quarenghi, has been affiliated with the
Russian National Library. Another Neoclassical building by Quarenghi, a roomy Horse Guards Riding School (1804–1807), was recently designated the Central
Exhibition Hall.
Some of the city shops and
storehouses are landmarks in their own right. For example, the monumental
New Holland Arch (1779–1787) and adjacent walls of the
New Holland isle are occupied by commercial enterprises.
The Merchant Court on the
Nevsky Prospekt (1761–1785), also designed by
Jean-Baptiste Vallin de la Mothe, houses the largest extant 18th-century supermarket in the world, as well as several coffee bars and a
metro station. Nearby are the Circular Market, erected in 1785–1790, and
the Passage, one of the great covered
arcades of the mid-19th century. Other
department stores, built in the majestic
Art Nouveau style, line the Nevsky Prospekt and include the Eliseev emporium and the House of Books.
St Petersburg is a home to many
theatres. The oldest is the
Hermitage Theatre, a private palatial theatre of
Catherine the Great, still preserving the complex stage machinery of the 18th-century. The Alexandrine Theatre, built in 1828–1832 by Carlo Rossi, was named after the wife of
Nicholas I. Much more famous outside Russia is the
Mariinsky Theatre (formerly known as the Kirov Theatre of Opera and Ballet), which has been styled the capital of the world
ballet. Also worthy of note is the
Ciniselli Circus, one of the oldest circus buildings in the world. The
city conservatory, the first in Russia, was opened in 1862 and bears the name of
Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov; its alumni include
Tchaikovsky,
Prokofiev, and
Shostakovich.
Public monuments
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The Bronze Horseman comes to life and races the streets of St. Petersburg in more than one work of Russian fiction. St Isaac's Cathedral looms in the background. |
Probably the most familiar symbol of St Petersburg is the
equestrian statue of
Peter the Great, installed in 1782 on the
Senate Square. Considered the greatest masterpiece of the French-born
Etienne Maurice Falconet, the statue figures prominently in the Russian literature under the name of the
Bronze Horseman.
The
Palace Square is dominated by the unique
Alexander Column (1830–1834), the tallest of its kind in the world and so nicely set that no attachment to the base is needed. A striking monument to
Generalissimo Suvorov, represented as a youthful god of war, was erected in 1801 on the
Field of Mars, formerly used for military parades and popular festivities.
Saint Isaac's Square is graced by the
Monument to Nicholas I (1856–1859), which was spared by
Bolshevik authorities from destruction as the first
equestrian statue in the world with merely two support points (the rear feet of the horse).
The public
monuments of St Petersburg also include
Mikeshin's circular statue of
Catherine II on the
Nevsky Avenue, fine horse statues on the
Anichkov Bridge, a
Rodin-like equestrian statue of
Alexander III by
Paolo Troubetzkoy, and the Tercentenary monument presented by
France in 2003 and installed on the
Sennaya Square.
Some of the most important events in the city's history are represented by particular monuments. The
Russian victory over
Napoleon, for example, was commemorated by the
Narva Triumphal Gate (1827–1834), and the victory in the
Russo-Turkish War, 1828-1829 " by the
Moscow Triumphal Gates (1834–1838). Following this tradition, the
Piskarevskoye Cemetery was opened in 1960 as a monument to the victims of the
900-Day Siege.
Suburbs
St Petersburg is surrounded by imperial residences, some of which are inscribed in the
World Heritage list. These include:
Peterhof, with the Grand Peterhof Palace and glorious fountain cascades;
Tsarskoe Selo, with the baroque
Catherine Palace and the neoclassical
Alexander Palace; and
Pavlovsk, which contains a domed palace of
Emperor Paul (1782–1786) and one of the largest English-style parks in Europe.
Much of Peterhof and Tsarskoe Selo had to be restored after being dynamited by the retreating Germans in 1944. Other imperial residences have yet to be revived to their former glory.
Gatchina, lying 45 km southwest of St Petersburg, retains a royal
castle with 600 rooms surrounded by a park.
Oranienbaum, founded by
Prince Menshikov, features his spacious baroque residence and the sumptuously decorated Chinese palace.
Strelna has a hunting lodge of
Peter the Great and the reconstructed
Constantine Palace, used for official summits of the Russian president with foreign leaders.
Other notable suburbs are
Shlisselburg, with a
medieval fortress, and
Kronstadt, with its 19th-century fortifications and naval monuments.
 |
Inspired by example of Venice and Amsterdam, Peter the Great envisaged boats and coracles as principal means of transport in his city of canals. No permanent bridges across the Neva were allowed until 1850. |
Tsar
Peter the Great founded the city on
May 27 (
May 16,
Old Style), 1703 after reconquering the
Ingrian land from
Sweden. He named it after his patron saint, the apostle
Saint Peter. The original name of
SanktPiterburh was actually an imitation of the pronunciation of
Dutch Sint Petersburg; Peter had lived and studied in the Netherlands for quite some time. The Swedish fortress of
Nyenskans and the city
Nyen had formerly occupied the site, in the
marshlands where the river
Neva drains into the
Gulf of Finland.
Since construction began during a time of war, the new city's first building was a fortification. Known today as the
Peter and Paul Fortress, it originally also bore the name of
SanktPiterburh. It was laid down on
Zaiachiy (Hare's) Island, just off the right bank of the Neva, a couple of miles inland from the Gulf. The marshland was drained and the city spread outward from the fortress under the supervision of
German engineers whom Peter had invited to Russia. Peter forbade the construction of stone buildings in all of Russia outside of St Petersburg, so that all stonemasons would come to help build the new city.
Serfs provided most of the labor for the project. According to one estimate, 30,000 died [
1].
"The most artificial city in the world", as
Dostoevsky put it, was intended to become the new
capital of Russia. By virtue of its position on an arm of the
Baltic Sea, it was called by
Pushkin a "window on Europe". It was also a base for Peter's navy, protected by the island fortress of
Kronstadt, built soon after the city. Indeed, the first person to build a house in Saint Petersburg was
Cornelis Cruys, commander of the
Baltic Fleet. Inspired by example of
Venice and
Amsterdam, Peter the Great envisaged boats and coracles as principal means of transport in his city of canals. No permanent bridges across the Neva were allowed until 1850.
In the course of the 18th and 19th centuries, Russia's elite built lavishly in the city, leaving many palaces that survive to this day. But the city also suffered from regular flooding. The worst such flood occurred in
November 7 1824, when the water level rose 4.21 meters above normal. The playwright
Alexander Griboyedov wrote,
"The embankments of the various canals had disappeared and all the canals had united into one. Hundred-year-old trees in the Summer Garden were ripped from the ground and lying in rows, roots upward." When the waters receded 569 dead bodies were found, with thousands more injured or made ill, and more than 300 buildings had been washed away. The 1824 inundation is the setting for
Alexander Pushkin's famous poem,
The Bronze Horseman (1834). Other disastrous floods took place in
1777 and
1924.
Alexander II's
emancipation of the serfs (1861) caused the influx of large numbers of poor into the city. Tenements were erected on the outskirts, and nascent
industry sprang up. By the end of the century, St Petersburg had grown up into one of the largest industrial hubs in Europe.
With the growth of industry, radical movements were also astir.
Socialist organizations were responsible for the assassinations of many royal officials, including that of
Alexander II in 1881. The
Revolution of 1905 began here and spread rapidly into the provinces. During
World War I, the name
Sankt Peterburg was seen to be too German and, on the initiative of Tsar
Nicholas II, the city was renamed
Petrograd on
August 31 (
August 18,
Old Style), 1914.
1917 saw the beginnings of the Russian Revolution. The first step (the
February Revolution) was the removal of the Tsarist government and the establishment of two centers of political power, the
Provisional government and the
Petrograd Soviet. The Provisional government was overthrown in the
October Revolution, and the
Russian Civil War broke out. The city's proximity to anti-revolutionary armies, and generally unstable political climate, forced
Bolshevik leader
Vladimir Lenin to flee to Russia's historic former capital at
Moscow on
March 5 1918. The move may have been intended as temporary (it was certainly portrayed as such), but Moscow has remained the capital ever since. On
January 24 1924, three days after Lenin's death, Petrograd was renamed
Leningrad in his honor. The central committee's reason for renaming the city again was that Lenin had led the October revolution. Deeper reasons existed at the level of political symbolism: Saint Petersburg had stood as the head of the Tsarist empire. After Moscow it was the largest city and the change gave great prestige to Lenin. The renaming to Leningrad emphatically symbolised the upheaval that had occurred to the social and political system.
The government's removal to
Moscow caused a reversal of the mass immigration of the latter 19th century. The benefits of capital status had left the city. Petrograd's population in 1920 was a third of what it had been in 1915 (see table below).
During
World War II, Leningrad was surrounded and besieged by the German
Wehrmacht in the
Siege of Leningrad from
September 8 1941, until
January 27 1944, a total of twenty-nine months. A "
Road of Life" was established over
Lake Ladoga (frozen for a large part of the year), but it was open to airstrikes; only one out of three supply trucks that embarked on the journey reached its destination. Another route was opened on
January 18,
1943 after the
Red Army had succeeded in securing a narrow break-through of the
Wehrmacht encirclement of the city. Some 800,000 of the city's 3,000,000 inhabitants are estimated to have perished. For the heroic tenacity of the city's population, Leningrad became the first Soviet city to be awarded the title
Hero City.
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The downtown preserves numerous profit houses built in the Art Nouveau style. |
According to some historians,
Soviet ruler
Joseph Stalin delayed the breaking of the siege and stymied the evacuation of the city with the intention of letting its
intelligentsia perish at the hands of the Germans. Many of those Leningraders who were evacuated to distant corners of the Soviet Union never returned to their home city.
The war damaged the city and killed off many of those old Petersburgers who had not fled after the revolution and did not perish in the mass purges before the war. Nonetheless, Leningrad and many of its suburbs were rebuilt over the following decades to the old drawings. Though changes in the social fabric were more permanent, the city remained an intellectual and arts centre.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, a bare majority (54%) of the population agreed to restore
"the original name, Saint Petersburg," on
September 6,
1991 (see above). As well as the city, 39 streets, six bridges, three
Saint Petersburg Metro stations and six parks were renamed. Nevertheless, some, especially older people, still use the old names and, for example, use the old addresses on letters. The name releases positive associations particularly in connection with the siege - so that on holidays even authorities call places connected with World War 2 "Hero city Leningrad". Among young people the name
Leningrad seems to be a vague protest against the new society. One of the most successful bands in Russia, a
Ska punk band from Saint Petersburg, called themselves
Leningrad (not to be confused with
Leningrad Cowboys from Finland).
After a popular vote the name of the
Oblast (administrative province) of which the city is the capital remained
Leningrad Oblast.
 |
St Petersburg's docks in the morning smog. |
According to results of the government website, St. Petersburg has 4,560,000 inhabitants. That amounts to roughly 3% of the population of Russia as a whole. It is the second largest city in Russia, after
Moscow.
About 15% of the population lives in
kommunalkas.
People are permitted to move to St. Petersburg only if they can show they have a room and a job or if they are married to an inhabitant of St. Petersburg. Probably many people don't have this registration and are living there in an illegal or semi-legal status (and they are not included in the census). The
International Labour Organization (ILO) estimates there are up to 16,000 children living on the street (as of 2000).
Officially the city is inhabited by 89.1% Russians. 2.1%
Jews, 1.9%
Ukrainians, 1.9%
Belarusians, as well as substantial numbers of
Tatars,
Uzbeks,
Vepsians,
Finns, and peoples from
Caucasus (with many illegal immigrants).
As for religions most are
Russian Orthodox; many others are
atheist.
Population development
The following charts show the numbers of inhabitants. Until 1944 these were mostly estimates, but the figures for 1959 to 2002 come from
census returns, and the figure for 2005 is an estimate.
| year | inhabitants | | 1725 | 75,000 | | 1750 | 150,000 | | 1800 | 300,000 | | 1846 | 336,000 | | 1852 | 485,000 | | 1858 | 520,100 | | 1864 | 539,100 | | 1867 | 667,000 | | 1873 | 842,900 | | 1881 | 876,600 | | 1886 | 928,600 | | 1891 | 1,035,400 | | 1897 | 1,264,900 | | 1901 | 1,439,400 | |
| | year | inhabitants | | 1908 | 1,678,000 | | 1910 | 1,962,000 | | 1915 | 2,318,600 | | 1920 | 722,000 | | 1926 | 1,616,100 | | 1936 | 2,739,800 | | 1939 | 3,191,300 | | 1944 | 2,559,000 | | January 15, 1959 | 2,888,000 | | January 15, 1970 | 3,512,974 | | January 17, 1979 | 4,072,528 | | January 12, 1989 | 4,460,424 | | October 9, 2002 | 4,159,635 | | January 1, 2005 | 4,596,000 |
|
Demographics
National composition of St. Petersburg (
1989 Soviet Census)
*
Russians: 89.1%
*
Ukrainians: 3%
*
Jewish: 2.1%
*
Belarusians: 1.9%
*
Tatars: 0.9%
*Others: 3%
|
One of St. Petersburg's many canals. |
The city is a major center of machine building, including power equipment,
machinery,
shipyards,
instrument manufacture, ferrous and nonferrous
metallurgy (production of
aluminium alloys),
chemicals,
printing, and one of the major
ports of the Baltic Sea.
The
Saint Petersburg Mint (
Monetny Dvor) is apart from
Goznak in
Moscow the only place in Russia that mints
Russian coins,
medals and
badges.
Ford Motor Company began producing the
Ford Focus automobile here in 2002.
Toyota is building its plant in one of the suburbs and the Russian government is close to securing a deal with General Motors and Nissan for a factory to be built near the city.
In 2006 Saint-Petersburg's budget reached volume of more than $6 billion and planned to reach $8 billion by 2008.
The city is a major
transport hub. It is the center of the local
road and
railway system, and has a
seaport (in the
Gulf of Finland of the
Baltic Sea) and
river ports (in the
Neva delta). It is the terminus of the
Volga-Baltic Waterway which links the Baltic with the
Black Sea. The
St Petersburg Dam (currently under construction) will complete a ring road around the city.
The city has six major railway stations serving various directions:
Baltiysky Rail Terminal,
Vitebsky Rail Terminal,
Ladozhsky Rail Terminal,
Moskovsky Rail Terminal ,
Varshavsky Rail Terminal (terminal - museum), and
Finlyandsky Rail Terminal.
Saint Petersburg has regular railway connections to
Helsinki,
Finland via
Vyborg (on the Russian side) and
Kouvola and
Lahti (on the Finnish side). Three beautiful, old-fashioned trains - the
Sibelius, the
Repin and the
Tolstoi - operate exclusively on this route.
The city is served by
Pulkovo Airport, which carries both domestic and international flights. Saint Petersburg has an extensive
public transport system, including the
tramway network that is considered the world's largest by track length. The
Saint Petersburg Metro (subway/underground) system began operation in 1955 and now includes four lines.
:
The city has numerous islands on which many historically important parts of the city are located.
Vasilyevsky island is the largest of them and forms the whole
Vasileostrovsky Administrative District. Petrogradsky, Petrovsky, Aptekarsky,
Krestovsky,
Yelagin, and
Kamenny islands form
Petrogradsky Administrative District.
Music in St. Petersburg
St. Petersburg has always been known for its high-quality cultural life. Among the city's more than forty theaters is the world-famous Kirov Theater (known now by its pre-revolution name of
Mariinsky Theater), home to the
Kirov Ballet company and first-class ballet and opera. The
St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra is one of the best in Russia.
The Russian composer
Dmitri Shostakovich, who was born in St. Petersburg, dedicated his
Seventh Symphony to the city, calling it the "Leningrad Symphony." He wrote the symphony during the German siege of the city in 1941.
St. Petersburg has also been home to the newest movements in modern music. For example, in 1972 mathematics student
Boris Grebenshchikov founded the band
Aquarium, an underground rock group that grew to huge popularity in the 70s and 80s. St. Petersburg was similarly home to
Kino, headed by the legendary
Viktor Tsoi. Since then the "Piter's rock" music style was formed.
Today's St. Petersburg boasts many pioneering musicians, from Leningrad's
Sergei Shnurov to the group
Tequilajazzz.
St. Petersburg in the movies
(see also Cinema of Russia and Soviet Union)The end of the cultural predominance of St. Petersburg coincided with
Moscow's being chosen as the new capital and the dawn of film industry in Russia. Few films achieved international acclaim and international productions from Western countries couldn't film there.
Lenfilm was the Soviet film studio based in St. Petersburg; however, films that became known internationally were often based on famous literary works, such as a few versions of
Anna Karenina (a Russian and a
French film, each of 1911; the first Western
Anna Karenina has been shot in Petersburg after the end of communism) or of
Fyodor Dostoevsky's
The Idiot (the first one, Russian, in 1910).
Several films deal with the complex history of the city many of which have
propagandistic purposes. Outstanding is the film
Noi Vivi (
Italy, 1942;
see Noi Vivi at IMDB), based on the novel
We the Living by
Ayn Rand, a film that comments on
Italian politics by way of featuring the
October Revolution.
Anastasia has been shot several times, and especially famous is the 1956 version casting
Ingrid Bergman;
Warner Brothers also set a 1997 musical in the city.
Giuseppe Tornatore planned a film about the
Siege of Leningrad in
2005. The
Russian Ark, shot in the
Winter Palace (now the Russian State
Heritage Museum), let the audience meet various real and fictional personages from 300 years of
Russian history up till the present.
Der Untergang was also filmed in Petersburg because of similarities of the historical city centre and the center of
Berlin of 1945.
St. Petersburg also is seen in
Interdevochka (also Интердевочка or Intergirl) by
Pyotr Todorovsky in 1989 featuring impressive shots of the city. The cult comedy
Irony of Fate (Cyrillic: Ирония судьбы, или С лёгким паром!) even if mostly shot at
Cheremushki,
Moscow) plays in St. Petersburg and pokes fun at Soviet city planning.
Fiction movies include
GoldenEye (1995) or the
action movie Midnight in St. Petersburg (
UK, 1996).
Onegin (1999 featuring
Liv Tyler) is based on the
Pushkin poem and showcases many tourist attractions.
The Stroll (2003) by Aleksei Uchitel featured many attractions of the city with Irina Pegova playing the role of a mysterious, well endowed and enchanting Russian beauty.
Two Brothers and A Bride (2002), originally titled
A Foreign Affair and starring David Arquette, is a comedy about brothers seeking a mail order bride in St. Petersburg and end up finding much more. The
International Film Festival in Saint Petersburg has been held annually since its inauguration in 1993 during the White Nights.
St. Petersburg in literature
It was said that St. Petersburg was the head of the
Russian Empire, whereas Moscow was its heart. "The most purposeful city in the world" (as Dostoyevsky referred to it) frequently appeared to
Russian writers as a menacing and unhuman mechanism. The grotesque and often nightmarish image of the city is featured in Pushkin's last poems, the Petersburg stories of
Gogol, the novels of
Dostoyevsky, the verse of
Alexander Blok and
Osip Mandelshtam, and in the symbolist novel
Petersburg (by
Andrey Bely).
Notable people
:
Numerous Russian and international aristocrats, politicians, artists, and scientists were born and/or have lived in Saint Petersburg. These include many of
the Russian emperors, the novelists
Fyodor Dostoyevsky,
Ayn Rand, and
Vladimir Nabokov, the composers
Modest Mussorgsky,
Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky,
Igor Stravinsky and
Dmitri Shostakovich, the painters
James McNeill Whistler and
Kazimir Malevich, the scientists
Leonhard Euler,
Mikhail Lomonosov,
Heinrich Schliemann and
Alfred Nobel, the ballet dancers
Vaslav Nijinsky,
Anna Pavlova,
George Balanchine and
Rudolf Nureyev, and the politicians
John Quincy Adams,
Ignaz Aurelius Fessler,
Gustaf Emil Mannerheim, and
Vladimir Putin.
Saint Petersburg has long been a center of education in Russia.
*
Saint Petersburg State University (founded 1724)
*
Saint Petersburg State Institute of Technology (1828)
*
Saint Petersburg Electrical Engineering University (1886)
*
Saint Petersburg Polytechnical University (1899)
*
Saint Petersburg State University of Information Technologies, Mechanics and Optics (1900)
*
Saint Petersburg State University of Engineering and Economics (1906)
*
Smolny College (1999)
*
Turku,
Finland (the first one, since 1953)*
Hamburg,
Germany (since 1953)*
Dresden,
Germany (since 1961)*
Birmingham,
United Kingdom (since 1962)*
Zagreb,
Croatia (since 1968)*
Osaka,
Japan (since 1979)*
Melbourne,
Australia (since 1989)*
Lansing, Michigan,
USA (since 1992)*
Isfahan,
Iran (since 1999)*
Los Angeles,
USA*
Belgrade,
Serbia*
Mumbai,
India *
Milan,
Italy*
Debrecen,
Hungary*
Košice,
Slovakia (since 1995)*
Istanbul,
Turkey *
Rotterdam,
Netherlands*
Warsaw,
Poland (since 1997)*
Gdańsk,
Poland (since 1997)*In addition, Saint Petersburg has a "twin city" relationship with:
*
St. Petersburg, Florida*
WikiSatellite view of Saint Petersburg at WikiMapia*
Official website of St. Petersburg* several hundred photo albums by Peter Sobolev
*
Many pages about St.Petersburg's architecture and history with hundreds of images*
Saint Petersburg in 1900 - a photographic travelogue
*
Encyclopaedia of Saint Petersburg*
The famous museum, the Hermitage*
non-governmental Organizations in St.Petersburg*
St. Petersburg in Architecture, from University of Michigan*
Satellite photo, via Google Maps*
Petersburg Pictures (in English) - Online album, created by young European photographers living in St. Petersburg, both tourist as art pictures.
