According to legend, as soon as the Russian ships landed on the island, a royal bird - an eagle - appeared above it. Taking this as a blessing from God, the king went ashore, cut out two strips of turf with a spade, folded them into a cross and, as the work of an anonymous author of the 18th century tells. “On the conception and building of the reigning city of St. Petersburg,” “having made a cross out of wood and planted it in the turf, he deigned to say: “In the name of Jesus Christ, in this place there will be a church in the name of the supreme apostles Peter and Paul...” Thus, construction began fortresses St. Petersburg (that’s what it was called at first, and only later, when a new city grew up around it, the name St. Petersburg began to mean the city, and the fortress began to be called Peter and Paul fortress).

The Peter and Paul Fortress was built with great haste, fearing an attack by the Swedes. To speed things up, the king and his associates supervised the work themselves. It was built as an exemplary fortification structure of the bastion system, and, as contemporaries wrote, “His Majesty himself drew up the drawing of this fortress.” In plan, the fortress is an elongated hexagon with bastions, five of which are named after Peter's associates, and one - the Sovereign. Professional leadership was provided by the Swiss architect and engineer Domenico Trezzini, specially invited by Peter I.

The fortress was built by Russian soldiers, captured Swedes, peasants driven by order of the Tsar from all over Russia, and even convicts who served their sentences here. Working conditions were difficult, mortality from epidemics, hunger and cold was very high. Nevertheless, the work did not stop for a minute.

For its time, the Peter and Paul Fortress became a first-class example of military engineering art. During its construction, the latest achievements of Western European fortification were used. The height of its walls is 9 m, thickness is about 20 m, and it is surrounded on all sides by the river.

The main fortress fence followed the coastline, leaving not even a piece of land for an enemy landing. The bastion pushed forward increased the battle area. Not a single enemy ship could approach the fortress within firing distance, and its guns controlled the Neva fairway. A canal dug inside the fortress provided its defenders with an unlimited supply of drinking water. From the land, the fortress was protected by a crown structure formed by earthen embankments and a ditch. At first the fortress walls were also made of earth, but already in 1706 they began to be rebuilt in stone. Later, during the reign of Catherine, the walls facing the Neva were lined with granite.

Dawn over the Peter and Paul Fortress

Description

The Peter and Paul Fortress in St. Petersburg is located at the mouth of the Neva River on Hare Island. It was founded by Emperor Peter I on May 27 (May 16, old style) 1703 at the very beginning of the Northern War (1700-1721). Initially, the first Russian outpost in the Baltic was called “St. Petersburg” and connected together a system of defensive structures (Nyenschanz, Noteburg, Kronslot), the main task of which was to block the Swedish fleet in the Gulf of Finland and at the mouth of the Neva River. But throughout its history, the fortress was never used for defensive purposes. It was destined to become the core of a new city - the rapidly developing capital of the Russian Empire - St. Petersburg.

The first fortress was built from earth, turf and wood according to the design of the French engineer Joseph Gaspard Lambert de Guerin. It is believed that the plan for fortifications was proposed by Tsar Peter Alekseevich himself. The fortress was built according to the latest in fortification art in accordance with the laws of the Western European bastion system. The outlines of Hare Island determined the shape of the fortress: an irregular hexagon with six protruding massive bastions named after the associates of Peter I (Gosudarev, Menshikov, Zotov, Naryshkin, Trubetskoy, Golovkin) and curtains connecting them (Petrovskaya, Nevskaya, Ekaterininskaya, Vasilyevskaya, Nikolskaya, Kronverkskaya) . In the eastern part of Hare Island, outside the fortress walls, an earthen ravelin was erected - an additional defensive structure, and on Berezovy Island, to the north of the fortress, Kronverk was built.

The work was carried out at an “accelerating pace” - the earthen fortress was completed by October 1, 1703. 52 guns were installed on the Trubetskoy and Naryshkin bastions, 58 on the Gosudarev. Raising and lowering the flag on the Sovereign Bastion meant the beginning and end of the working day.

Working conditions for workers were appalling. According to the testimony of Chamberlain Berchholz, the workers “died like flies from cold and hunger.” Another eyewitness recorded that the earth was carried in the tails of clothes or on the shoulders in small bags. Work on the construction of a new city was equated to hard labor; deserters from the army were exiled here (Peter’s decree of July 4, 1705), criminals, and special groups of workers from the provinces. Bases were created for the supply of food in Novgorod and Ladoga, but interruptions still occurred. To combat dysentery and scurvy, vodka infused with pine cones was used. Constant flooding also complicated the situation.

But the wood-earth fortress did not stand for long; just three years after its foundation, reconstruction began. The stone fortress is being built according to the design of the architect Domenico Trezzini. From 1706 to 1740, on the site of the earthworks, new curtains and bastions made of brick and stone were erected, which almost completely repeated the outlines of their wood-earth predecessors. Inside the fortress walls there were casemates for barracks and ammunition depots. In 1707, the Tsar ordered the construction of a front gate in the fortress. In 1708, work began on the construction of the Petrovsky Gate. They were designed by Domenico Trezzini, first wooden, then stone, they preserved the composition conceived by the architect. Peter's Gate is a striking example of Peter's Baroque.

In the 1731-1740s, during the reign of Anna Ioannovna, on the western and eastern ends of the island according to the project of B.-Kh. von Minich, additional external fortifications were erected - Ioannovsky (on the site of the first earthen ravelin) and Alekseevsky ravelins. They received their name in honor of the father and grandfather of Empress Anna Ioannovna. Between the fortress walls and ravelins, ditches with drawbridges were built (filled up at the end of the 19th century).

During the reign of Empress Catherine II, work on the improvement of the Peter and Paul Fortress continued. By her highest order, in 1779 - 1786, the walls of the fortress facing the Neva were lined with granite. At the same time, the Neva Gate of the fortress and the Commandant's pier (architect N. A. Lvov) were ceremoniously decorated.

The main dominant feature of the fortress's architectural ensemble is the Peter and Paul Cathedral. The first wooden church was founded in the center of the fortress on July 12 (June 29, old style) 1703, the day of the holy apostles Peter and Paul. In its place, in 1712-1733, according to the design of D. Trezzini, the stone Peter and Paul Cathedral was built. Based on the name of the cathedral, the fortress also began to be called Peter and Paul Fortress.

During the 18th-19th centuries, buildings for various purposes were built on the territory of the fortress - the Commandant's and Engineer's houses, the guardhouse, the Boat House, the Artillery Workshop, the Mint, the prison of the Trubetskoy Bastion, the Treasury, the House of Stock Capital, the Weights and Measures Depot, the Major's Parade and the Outbuilding. -adjutant house, Grand Ducal tomb, Church house and others.
The Peter and Paul Fortress in Tsarist Russia had another purpose - a prison; it was also called the “Russian Bastille”. Since the beginning of the 18th century, it became a place of detention for especially important state criminals. Prisoners were housed in casemates of bastions and curtains and in specially constructed prison buildings.

The Peter and Paul Fortress was first opened to visitors under Emperor Alexander I at the beginning of the 20th century. The first excursions began to be held in the Peter and Paul Cathedral around the imperial necropolis in the 1900s.

After 1917, no construction was carried out on the territory of Hare Island. In 1924, the Peter and Paul Cathedral and the Trubetskoy Bastion prison were transferred to the Museum of the Revolution. In 1954, the complex of buildings of the Peter and Paul Fortress became part of the State Museum of the History of Leningrad (St. Petersburg).

Today, the Peter and Paul Fortress is part of the State Museum of the History of St. Petersburg; the museum’s funds are located here, permanent exhibitions are open, and temporary exhibitions are held.

Notable exhibits

• Carved gilded iconostasis and altar canopy

  A gift to the temple from Peter I and Catherine I. The iconostasis was created in Moscow according to the drawings of D. Trezzini by a group of master carvers under the leadership of I. P. Zarudny. Peter and Paul Cathedral and the Grand Ducal Tomb

1. Peter and Paul Fortress - the heart of St. Petersburg, the point where the history of the city began on May 16, 1703. This is how it looks from the spit of Vasilyevsky Island.

2. The fortress is located on the island of Lust-holm, which means Cheerful Island in Swedish.

3. The Finnish name of the island is Janissaari, which means Hare. In honor of this, among the water of the channel separating the island from the land, a figurine of a hare is installed on a wooden pile, attacked by tourists with the help of coins.

4. The first thing a visitor sees when entering the island via one of the two bridges, Ioannovsky, is the so-called “Small Beach”, where townspeople sunbathe on the grass. Swimming in this place is not recommended.

5. From the rear, the fortress is covered by a crown fortification, now occupied by a military museum.

6. You can also get to the island through the Kronverksky Bridge, and inside the fortress through the Nikolsky Gate.

7. The Petrovsky Gate, to which the Ioannovsky Bridge leads, looks much more magnificent.

8. The gate is decorated with wooden carvings and bas-reliefs.

10. The gate still serves as inspiration for artists, including those who are just learning.

11. To the right and left of the gate rise the brick walls of the Peter's Curtain, abutting the Sovereign's Bastion.

12. Inside the Sovereign's Bastion, the first to be built, there is a long corridor - posterna, open to visitors.

13. It would make a wonderful photo gallery.

14. There are narrow and long ventilation vents in the thickness of the corridor walls.

15. The turn ends with an extensive casemate with access to the courtyard. Somewhere here, for some time after the death of Peter I, the famous boat - “Grandfather of the Russian Navy” - was kept.

16. General view of the bastion. In the center there is a stone ramp - a ramp for rolling guns onto the top of the shaft.

17. At the top of the bastion there is a memorial sign in honor of the city’s “zooleth anniversary”.

18. On the arrow of the bastion there is a granite turret for the guard. The part of the bastion facing the Neva was lined with granite under Catherine II.

19. From the bastion there is an excellent view of the historical center of the city; this route is called the “Neva Panorama”.

20. Novo-Mikhailovsky Palace of Grand Duke Mikhail, son of Nicholas I. And in 1928-1931 Mikhail Tukhachevsky lived in it.

21. Domes of the Resurrection Cathedral.

22. The Naryshkin Bastion and the Flag Tower on it are visible ahead.

23. Between the Sovereign and Naryshkin bastions there is the Neva Curtain, also clad in granite.

24. The Nevskaya Pier is located here, to which the gate of the same name leads. Now there are crowds of tourists and pleasure boats, but two hundred years ago this is where convicts began their journey to the Shlisselburg Fortress.

25. Inside the gate there are boards that marked the water level during severe floods. The flood of 1777 is known for the fact that during it, Princess Tarakanova allegedly died in the Alekseevsky ravelin, posing as the daughter of Empress Elizabeth and Alexei Razumovsky, which he depicted on his picture artist Flavitsky. The flood of 1824, the worst in the city's history, marked the death of Alexander I, and Pushkin described it in The Bronze Horseman.

26. Let us finally enter the territory of the fortress. On the right hand of the Neva Gate stands the Engineering House, which has come down to us virtually unchanged since the mid-18th century.

27. The boiler room is hidden behind the Main Treasury. This is a cozy but little-visited corner of the fortress; there are almost never tourists here.

50. Nearby is the house of the Chief Commandant of the fortress.

51. In this house in 1843, the famous commander Mikhail Skobelev, grandson of the commandant of the fortress, Ivan Nikitich Skobelev, was born.

28. A significant part of the fortress is occupied by the Mint, the largest in the world.

29. Rubles marked with the letters “SPMD” are minted here and now.

30. In front of the Mint lies the Cathedral Square covered with paving stones. On it stands the Boat House, built in 1761 to store the boat of Peter I.

31. Now inside there are cash registers, souvenir shops, and also a copy of that same boat.

32.

33. On the roof of the house there is a sculpture of a girl with an oar, an allegory of Navigation.

34. And since 1819, this terracotta sculpture created by sculptor D.I. Jensen has stood on the house. Now it can be seen in the Museum of the History of the Peter and Paul Fortress, located in the Neva Curtain.

35. The same museum houses original wooden bas-reliefs from the Petrovsky Gate.

36.

37. The museum displays many ancient maps and engravings depicting the fortress.

43. Samples of antique glass.

44. Icon-offering to the deceased Tsar Alexander III.

40. It is impossible to do in such a museum without models of the fortress.

41. The models clearly show the canal running to the right of the Peter and Paul Cathedral. Its purpose is to supply the defenders of the fortress with drinking water in the event of a siege.

42. Now the canal is filled up, but its collectors under the walls of the fortress have been preserved.

45. There are many other, smaller scale models in the museum.

46. ​​Here is a fragment of the curtain of the original earthen fortress.

47. Small bridge.

48. Bridge over a moat at one of the four botardos of the fortress.

47. Ferry crossing.

50. An interesting detail: the floor in the hall where a film about the construction of the fortress is shown on the screen is covered with tiles made from wooden blocks.

51. And just under the windows of the museum the Neva splashes, people swim and sunbathe there.

The Peter and Paul Fortress is the first building of St. Petersburg. This is exactly how the city was founded in 1703 by Peter I. Since the territory passed to the Russian Empire during the war with Sweden, the fortress was built to protect against the Swedes. The fortress was founded on Hare Island, so the fortress’s cannons were supposed to defend the city from invasion along two large branches of the river. The maritime borders of St. Petersburg were supposed to be protected by the Kronstadt fortress, founded in 1704.

Well, already in 1705, the first industrial structure was opened, the Admiralty Shipyard on Admiralty Island, which in 1706 was a fortress to protect the territory as part of the Northern War with the Swedes. Now the Peter and Paul Fortress is a cultural heritage site of St. Petersburg. And even though it is now a museum, we should not forget that this is a real fort that was ready to repel any attack.

How to get to the Peter and Paul Fortress

The Peter and Paul Fortress is located on Hare Island, which is open to the public daily from 6.00 to 21.00. The fortress itself is open to the public from 9.00 to 20.00. There are two bridges leading to Hare Island: Ioannovsky Bridge and Kronverksky Bridge.

You can enter the territory of the island, as well as the fortress itself, via any of the bridges. Not far from the Peter and Paul Fortress there is Gorkovskaya metro station, from it to the Peter and Paul Fortress is no more than 5-10 minutes on foot.

You can also get here on foot: from Admiralty Island through Trinity Bridge. Or by Palace Bridge first to the spit of Vasilyevsky Island, and from there across the Birzhevoy Bridge along the Mytninskaya Embankment to the Kronverksky Bridge, but this route is the longest. Directions and opening hours of ticket offices and exhibitions can be found on the Peter and Paul Fortress website.

Ioannovsky Bridge and Ioannovsky Ravelin

We got to the Peter and Paul Fortress in the easiest way - by metro. The ground vestibule of Gorkovskaya station is located in Aleksandrovsky Park, and when you go outside, it’s easy to lose your orientation and understand where to go. In this case, if your natural sense of direction is silent, then it is better to ask someone for directions or try to follow the main stream of people.

So after 5 minutes we find ourselves at the Ioannovsky Bridge, the road to the historical heart of St. Petersburg, the Peter and Paul Fortress. The bridge is the oldest bridge in St. Petersburg, although nothing remains of that same bridge. Ioannovsky Bridge, originally called Krasny, as the main and only bridge to the fortress, had a lifting central section.

The Ioannovsky Bridge ends with the Ioannovsky Gate, on which the year 1740 is indicated. This is the year the construction work was completed, during which the Peter and Paul Fortress became completely stone, before which it was wooden. The fortress is further strengthened on the east and west by defensive structures called ravelins. The very same Ioannovsky Gate is built into the eastern ravelin or Ioannovsky. Therefore, having passed through them, thus bypassing the ravelin, we find ourselves in an open space directly in front of the main walls of the fortress.

Gate of the Peter and Paul Fortress

There are four gates leading to the Peter and Paul Fortress, according to the number of cardinal directions and their location.

• Neva Gate. This is the southern river entrance to the fortress. It was possible to get into the fortress through the Neva Gate only by mooring to the pier. Hence the name of the gate.
• Vasilyevsky Gate from the west, this gate serves as the entrance to the fortress through the Vasilievsky curtain, which faces Vasilievsky Island, hence the name.
• Nikolsky Gate serves as the entrance to the Peter and Paul Fortress from the north. They were not in the original plan of 1703 and they appeared in the Nikolskaya curtain only during the reconstruction of the wooden fortress into a stone one a quarter of a century after its foundation.
• Petrovsky Gate, the eastern entrance to the fortress, the most beautiful gate of the fortress

It is through the Petrovsky Gate that we enter the fortress. The wooden gate was built in 1708 and rebuilt 10 years later in stone. Peter's Gate is a monument to Peter's Borroque, designed by the architect Domenico Trezzini. In the niches on either side of the gate are statues representing “Prudence” and “Courage”.

A lead double-headed eagle is installed above the arch. And above it is a wooden bas-relief “The Overthrow of Simon the Magus by the Apostle Peter,” in which Simon is identified with the Swedish King Charles XII, and the Apostle Peter with Peter I, respectively. Thus, the whole picture is a symbol of Russia’s victory in the Northern War with Sweden.

Grand Ducal Tomb and Monument to Peter I

Behind the Petrovsky Gate, the central alley to the Cathedral Square of the fortress begins, paved with paving stones.

The central alley will lead us straight to Cathedral Square and its main Peter and Paul Cathedral. But first there are several attractions awaiting us.

To the right of the alley, in the territory of its own garden, is the Grand Ducal Tomb. The role of the tomb in the Peter and Paul Fortress went to the Peter and Paul Cathedral; the tomb itself appeared here much later in 1908. The tomb was intended for grand dukes and princesses, as well as for princes of imperial blood. Some of the burials in the tomb were moved from the Peter and Paul Cathedral.

The entrance to the Grand Ducal Tomb is accessible from Cathedral Square.

Opposite the tomb, on the other side of the alley, the founder of the fortress, Peter I, sits on a forged throne, behind him is the building of the chief officer's guardhouse. Sculpture of Peter I, work by Mikhail Mikhailovich Shemyakin, Russian and American artist. When creating the sculpture, the artist took inspiration from the famous “Wax Person”, a wax double of the emperor, exhibited in the State Hermitage.

“The Wax Person” is entirely the work of Carlo Rastrelli, who, during the life of Peter I, took a wax cast from the emperor’s face and used it to make a bust and an exact copy of Peter. But “Shemyakin’s Peter” owes only his face to Rastrelli’s mask, while the body, devoid of proportions, will be left to the artist’s conscience.

Cathedral Square and Peter and Paul Cathedral

The alley leads us to Cathedral Square, which also served as a parade ground for the fortress garrison.

Several main buildings of the fortress are located on Cathedral Square. First of all, these are the Peter and Paul Cathedral, the Mint and the Boat House. The current Gosznak Mint and the largest Mint in the World.

The boat house was built specifically to store the boat of Peter I, where it was kept until 1931; a copy is now on display here.

The construction of the Peter and Paul Fortress began with this cathedral. The building was founded in 1703 on the day of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul. The height of the Peter and Paul Cathedral with its spire was 122.5 meters. Until 2013, it was the tallest building in St. Petersburg. According to the plan of Peter I, the Peter and Paul Cathedral was to become the first building of the new Russia, which is why it does not look like traditional Orthodox churches, but with its height, the spire almost pierces the sky.

Trubetskoy Bastion Prison

Although you can walk around the territory of the Peter and Paul Fortress absolutely free, exhibitions and museums in the fortress still cost money. Therefore, you will have to pay to visit the next attraction, but it will be worth it.

What is a fortress without “dungeons”? No, of course it did not exist in the original plans; guardhouses were usually used for punishment. The prison in the Trubetskoy Bastion appeared in 1872; for the sake of its construction, the internal walls of the bastion were dismantled. So, in place of the tower, a pentagonal two-story prison building with a courtyard appeared, in the center of which there were baths.

The prison was planned for 73 solitary cells, where the main goal was the complete isolation of the prisoner both from the outside world and from other prisoners. Over the years, populist revolutionaries served their sentences here, including Lenin’s elder brother Alexander Ilyich Ulyanov, the Socialist Revolutionaries, members of the deputation who opposed the executions of 1905, including Maxim Gorky, as well as members of the St. Petersburg Council of Workers’ Deputies, including Leon Trotsky .

Later, the situation changed radically twice, first during the February Revolution, and later as a result of the October Revolution of 1917. Thus, the population of the prison cells changed first to ministers and police chiefs, and later to the provisional government, cadets and members of the Cadet Party. The fundamental difference between the Bolshevik prison and the “tsarist” prison was the abolition of solitary confinement.

A particularly sad page in the history of the Trubetskoy Bastion prison was the years of the Red Terror, when prisoners, including 4 Grand Dukes, were massacred on the territory of the fortress. In 2010, mass graves of victims of the Red Terror were discovered on the territory of the Fortress.

Naryshkin Bastion and Neva Curtain

A special pleasure in visiting the Peter and Paul Fortress is the opportunity to look at the city from the walls of the fortress. There is such an opportunity, all you need to do is climb the Naryshkin Bastion, having previously purchased a ticket at the ticket office located here. Since the fortress was built in the shape of a six-pointed star, there are exactly six bastions in the fortress. In one of them we just visited a prison, it was the Trubetskoy bastion, the others are the Menishikov, Golovkin and Zotov bastions. There are two more, Naryshkin and Gosudarev, between which lies the camp called the Nevskaya Curtain we will have to examine. From here, from the Naryshkin bastion, a cannon fires its salvo every day at noon, announcing the middle of the day.

From the Naryshkin Bastion there are beautiful views of not only the Neva, but also the fortress itself. The route from the Naryshkin Bastion along the Neva Curtain to the Sovereign Bastion is called the Nevsky Panorama, which is how it is positioned at the box office and on advertising posters in the fortress.

The Neva curtain is a shaft connecting the Naryshkin and Sovereign bastions. The shaft faces the Neva, hence its name. It is in the Neva Curtain that the Neva Gate, also called the Gate of Death, was installed.

Along the wooden flooring, accompanied by an audio guide broadcasting from horns installed on the curtain, we move towards the Sovereign Bastion.

The Sovereign's Bastion was founded first; now a monument has been erected on the bastion in honor of the “300th anniversary of the founding of St. Petersburg.”

And from the bastion itself there is a beautiful view of the Neva and the Trinity Bridge. By the way, you can enter the bastion and walk along its turn, feeling like you are in a real dungeon.

Postern of the Sovereign Bastion of the Peter and Paul Fortress

Poterna is an underground corridor communicating between the internal structures of the fort and its external fortifications. Thus, through the trench of the Sovereign's bastion one could get into the inner courtyard of the fortress, bypassing the Petrovsky Gate.

The entrance to the postern is from the outside of the Sovereign's Bastion, from the Ioannovsky Ravelin. There is an entrance fee and the gallery itself is not very large, ending with a small art exhibition.

This is where the sights we visited ended. Of course, we have not examined all the objects of the fortress and visited not all exhibitions and museum displays, but what we have covered is quite enough for a 4-5 hour acquaintance with the Peter and Paul Fortress. And it's definitely worth going here. After all, the Peter and Paul Fortress is the first building of the Northern capital, and a military one at that. It turns out that the Peter and Paul Fortress contains the charm of Kronstadt and the proximity of St. Petersburg attractions.

Bird's eye view of the Peter and Paul Fortress.

The Peter and Paul Fortress is a unique monument of history and architecture of St. Petersburg. The main building of its architectural ensemble, the Peter and Paul Cathedral, is one of the symbols of the city.

The walls of the fortress were supposed to become a serious obstacle to external enemies - they were erected according to the latest state-of-the-art fortification of the early 18th century. But life decreed differently. The fortress acquired a cruel reputation as a prison for state criminals, where the authorities dealt with the internal enemy...

Peter and Paul Fortress: historical background

Construction of fortifications.

This is where the city on the Neva began. The founding date of St. Petersburg is considered to be May 27, 1703, when on the day of the Holy Trinity on Hare Island the first stone was laid in the foundation of the Peter and Paul Fortress. According to the original plan, there was no talk of a city, much less a capital; it was necessary to protect the lands conquered from the Swedes.

Peter I was personally involved in the development of the plan for the citadel, as well as the choice of location for its construction, together with the engineer, Russian general of French origin J. G. Lambert.

Soldiers, captured Swedes, and serfs worked from dawn to dusk under the supervision of the king’s associates. The general leadership was carried out by a close friend of the emperor, A.D. Menshikov. Peter I settled nearby in a summer house and inspected the construction, circling the island by boat in the morning.

The fortress repeated the hexagonal shape of the island; at the tops of the corners there were bastions named after the curators, each of whom was responsible for “their” object: Menshikov, Trubetskoy, Golovkin, Naryshkin, Zotov, Gosudarev. The construction of the Sovereign Bastion was supervised by Tsarevich Alexei.

On October 1, 1703, the fortress was consecrated. By this time, the construction of earthen and wooden fortifications of a small wooden church in the name of the apostles Peter and Paul had been completed, guns were installed and a flag was raised on the Sovereign Bastion.

In 1706, the first architect of St. Petersburg, the Italian Domenico Trezzini, began the construction of stone structures using new principles for the construction of fortifications. The walls of the bastions, 12 meters high, reach 20 meters in thickness - they are formed by outer and inner layers of five-meter brickwork, between which crushed brick mixed with earth is poured.

The bastions are interconnected by curtains, in which casemates were equipped to accommodate soldiers and store weapons. The Ekaterininskaya curtain is solid, and the Nevskaya, Petrovskaya, Vasilyevskaya, Kronverkskaya and Nikolskaya curtains are equipped with gates of the same name. The elegant Petrovsky Gate was the main entrance. On the bastions they installed guns, fifty on each. For a sortie, in case of a siege, underground passages (sorties) and secret passages in the walls (patterns) were provided, which were laid with a single layer of brick and were known only to trusted officers.

Later, on the site of the wooden church, the Peter and Paul Cathedral was erected (1712-1732), which acquired the status of a cathedral and became the tomb of the House of Romanov. The foundation contains the holy relics of St. Andrew the First-Called. Behind the eastern wall of the cathedral is the Commandant's Cemetery. 18 commandants found peace here from 1720 to 1914.

The defensive system is closed by a crown-shaped earthen rampart - a crownwork.

Triangular fortifications from the sea (ravelins) were built in the 1730s during the reign of Anna Ioannovna, named after her father and grandfather, the western one - Ioannovsky (in memory of Ivan Alekseevich, the elder brother and formal co-ruler of Peter I), and the eastern one - Alekseevsky (in memory of the father of Peter I).

The date of completion of the construction of the Peter and Paul Fortress is depicted on the Ioannovsky Gate - 1740.

Russian Bastille

After the final victory over the Swedes, the Peter and Paul Fortress lost its defensive function and soon found itself in the center of the city, which grew around it. In the fortress itself, the coastline of which was partially lined with granite, construction was carried out for various purposes; in the 18th–19th centuries, the Mint, the Artillery Workshop, the Commandant's and Engineer's Houses, the guardhouse, the Boat House appeared here...

I. G. Fokkerodt, who served for many years as secretary of the Prussian embassy in Russia, described the fortress in his notes: “... This fortress is quite strong and, due to its location, is impregnable, but they believe that... it cannot be of much use. Nowadays it serves as nothing more than a Bastille, where state prisoners are kept...”

And indeed, the bastions soon became a place of imprisonment for state criminals, and since the 19th century - the main political prison in Russia, where people were sent without trial by imperial order...

In the fortress, tortured by interrogations and tuberculosis, Princess Tarakanova, posing as the daughter of Elizabeth I and Razumovsky, will also die. Alexander Radishchev, the author of the book “Journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow,” which greatly angered Empress Catherine II, will await his verdict here.

The leaders of the Decembrist uprising were hanged on the rampart of the crown. The memorial obelisk preserves their profiles and the words of the great Russian poet:

“Comrade, believe: she will rise

Star of captivating happiness,

Russia will wake up from its sleep,

And on the ruins of autocracy

They will write our names!

Here Fyodor Dostoevsky was sentenced to death along with other Petrashevites, but the execution was replaced by hard labor at the last moment. The events are reflected in the work “Notes from the House of the Dead.”

In the cell of the Alekseevsky ravelin, Nikolai Chernyshevsky, protesting against the illegal conduct of the investigation, went on a hunger strike, which lasted 9 days, and wrote the famous novel “What to do.”

Until 1917, one and a half thousand political prisoners passed through the cells of the Trubetskoy Bastion prison built in 1872.

The fortress garrison supported the Bolsheviks - it was its cannon that gave the signal to the cruiser Aurora in October 1917, and during the years of the “Red Terror” (1917-1921) mass executions were carried out here.

Peter and Paul Fortress at night - view from the Neva.

In 1925, the Leningrad Soviet decided to destroy the fortress, which by that time had become a museum, and build a stadium in its place. The decision was soon reversed, and the Gas Dynamics Laboratory was located in Ioannovsky Ravelin, which was the first rocket engine design bureau in the country and was located within its walls until 1933. Forty years later, a museum of cosmonautics and rocketry was opened in its place, which today bears the name of V.P. Glushko, the head of the development of systems that launch the Vostok, Voskhod and Soyuz spacecraft into orbit.

Attractions and exposition

The Peter and Paul Fortress is part of. The excursion begins with an introduction to the history of the Nevsky region and an exhibition dedicated to the stages of construction of the fortress. Among the exhibits located in the Commandant's House are Russian and Swedish maps, models of fortifications, and a collection of tools found during excavations. Separate rooms are dedicated to the life of the population from 1703 to 1918.

Peter and Paul Cathedral

The sightseeing continues with the most beautiful building of the fortress - the Peter and Paul Cathedral. For 300 years until the construction of the Prince Alexander Nevsky residential complex in the historical Rybatskoye district in 2012, it remained the tallest building in the city. The height of the temple with a 40-meter spire, decorated with a weather vane in the form of a golden figure of an angel with a cross, is 122.5 meters.

Peter and Paul Cathedral.

The carved iconostasis inside the cathedral with the figures of the apostles in front of it amazes with its splendor and resembles a triumphal arch. This is not a coincidental similarity, but the idea of ​​Peter I to make the temple a monument in honor of the victories of Russian weapons and a place to store the keys to the captured cities, as well as the banners of the defeated Swedish and Turkish troops. The iconostasis was made in the Armory Chamber of the Moscow Kremlin, delivered disassembled and assembled on site. All elements are made of wood and covered with gold: the frame is made of larch, linden is used for sculpture and decorative details.

The practice of reading sermons in Orthodox churches was first introduced in the times of Peter the Great, as evidenced by the pulpit installed in front of the altar. During the service, the emperor himself occupied the royal place at the right column, richly decorated with crimson velvet and symbols of power.

The slender elongated silhouette of the building, unusual for Orthodox churches, and its interior decoration attract visitors to the same extent as the tomb of the emperors, which was supplemented by the Grand Ducal Tomb built at the beginning of the 19th century, as well as the wonderfully restored Royal Apartments with miraculously surviving relics.

The premises located in the passage gallery to the tomb were intended for the imperial family to relax when visiting the cathedral and consisted of a reception room, a living room, a smoking room and a ladies' room. The exhibition is presented in two rooms, partially restored from the archives of the author of the project, architect L. N. Benois. Here you can see marble fireplaces, paintings with portraits of royalty and panoramic views of St. Petersburg. Of particular value are rare items: vestments of clergy, lectern cover, transcendental cross.

The exhibition “Three Centuries Above the City” will introduce tourists who climb the bell tower to the panorama of the fortress that opens from here and the mechanism of a rare carillon purchased in Holland for the tower’s chimes.

Peter and Paul Cathedral.

A street leads from the Cathedral to a small square, where tourists can expect to see an unusual sculpture of Peter I by Mikhail Shemyakin. The king is depicted sitting on a throne, and the proportions of the body are increased by one and a half times, and the natural size head seems small, which gives the figure a grotesque appearance. The face is based on an authentic wax mask made by B. K. Rastrelli. The author called the work “My Mystical Peter” and argued that the distortion of proportions corresponds to the canons of Orthodox icon painting.

Trubetskoy Bastion Prison

One of the most popular objects in the fortress is the Trubetskoy Bastion prison. The exhibition, dedicated to the history of the Trubetskoy Bastion prison, introduces visitors to the conditions of detention of prisoners, the peculiarities of the regime, and the fate of the prisoners. Alexander Ulyanov, Maxim Gorky, Leon Trotsky passed through its cells... The interiors have been restored, and models of guards and prisoners create an eerie prison atmosphere of different historical periods, from 1870 to 1917. Its last prisoners were participants in the Kronstadt uprising.

Only the exhibition “Streets of Time” in the Naryshkinsky Bastion and the Museum of Cosmonautics, located in Ioannovsky Ravelin, compete with it.

Naryshkin Bastion

Anyone can take a fascinating journey into the past of St. Petersburg by visiting the exhibition in the Naryshkinsky Bastion. The three-century-long exhibition “Street of Time” will first lead through the lands of Ingermanland on the Neva banks, then past the customs of Peter the Great and the chancellery from the buildings it will lead to the imperial capital of the 18th – 20th centuries. Looking through the windows of the “houses”, you can see how the appearance of the interiors and the townspeople themselves changed. Go to a sewing workshop and see the fashion of the 19th century, “visit” the dentist’s office, or plunge into the atmosphere of a communal apartment of the 20th century.

Space Museum

The museum, opened in the halls of the right facade of Ioannovsky Ravelin, is dedicated to the history of space exploration and the role of designers of St. Petersburg-Leningrad in the development of Russian cosmonautics and rocket technology. The unique developments of the employees of the Gas Dynamics Laboratory, which was located here in the 30s of the last century, are presented in the exhibition:

• smokeless powder rockets, which were used in the Katyusha;
• liquid rocket engines are the forerunners of spaceship engines;
• One of the most interesting exhibits was in space and returned to Earth in 1974 - this is the Soyuz-16 descent module.
• In front of the entrance to the museum stands the descent module of the Comet satellite, which also made a space voyage, but already in the 90s.

Porcelain exhibition

The exhibitions of porcelain and furniture collections dating back to the 18th–20th centuries located in the Petrovskaya Curtain are noteworthy.

The exhibition of products from European and Russian glass and porcelain factories brings together the best examples of decorative and applied art from Russia, England, Denmark, France, and Germany. Among the mass-produced items, the collection of propaganda porcelain is interesting. Particular attention of visitors is paid to memorial items that belonged to A. A. Akhmatova, O. F. Berggolts, D. S. Likhachev, as well as a collection of memorable gifts to Stalin, transferred from the Museum of the Revolution, and a collection of gifts to the city for anniversaries.

Furniture exhibition

The dialectic of furniture art is reflected in the exhibition located in the Nikolskaya curtain. The earliest examples include: a chair from the Peter the Great era, French chests of drawers, Russian caskets and a chest from the 18th century. Richly inlaid with mother-of-pearl, tortoiseshell, bone, metal, and made from rare species of red, black, and rose wood, the furniture samples demonstrate different styles and allow you to imagine what the interiors of the Northern capital looked like over three centuries.

Exhibition of medieval weapons

A completely different type of art is represented by the exhibition located in Karetnik, a former stable that in the old days bore the pompous name “Services of the Commandant’s Department.” The exhibition of medieval instruments of torture takes us back centuries and has no direct relation either to the commandant services or to the fortress as a whole. The history goes back to the times of the Inquisition, when Pope Innocent IV in 1252 legalized the status of their use during inquests. They were carried out by secular authorities, as well as the execution of death sentences. Among a number of instruments of punishment, the chastity belt, which the organizers of the exhibition included in the same theme, looks very unexpected.

Exhibition “Historical Mosaic”

In the workshop, the exhibition “Historical Mosaic” presents the history of the Russian state in person. The rulers of Russia Ivan the Terrible and Catherine II, statesmen, famous prisoners of the fortress, revolutionaries, writers and other people make up its historical canvas. The inimitable atmosphere of an impressive immersion into the past, with all the twists and turns and unexpected turns, is created by 60 wax figures. Created by the masters of St. Petersburg, the characters look realistic, conveying not only external resemblance, but also character, mood, and emotions. Natural hair was used, hand-made eye prostheses were used, skin tones were corrected with theatrical makeup.

Other attractions

One of the oldest enterprises in the city, the Mint, transferred here from Moscow by decree of Peter I in 1724, continues to operate on the territory of the Peter and Paul Fortress.

Mint.

Continuing the tradition of producing medal works, it is currently a leading manufacturer of award signs, orders and medals, as well as commemorative coins made of precious metals.

In the 60s of the 19th century, the Arsenal building, made in the style of medieval architecture, was built on the crownwork. Currently there is a museum here, the exhibition of which is located indoors and in the courtyard.

The interesting sculpture “The Bunny Saved from the Flood” is located near the Ioannovsky Bridge. There is a sign: if a thrown coin hits the base of the monument, big-eared Arseny will make his wish come true. The hare inherited the name from the Swedish name for the island of Yenisari.

No visitor will pass by the small building with a portico and a statue of "Navigation" on the roof, located to the left of the bell tower, because this is where the ticket office and gift shop are located. Many do not suspect that this is the Boat House, built specifically for the “Grandfather of the Russian Navy” - the boat of Peter I.

In addition to excursions, events, and operating museums in the Peter and Paul Fortress, today the traditions laid down from the day of its foundation have been revived:

• Every day from the Naryshkinsky bastion exactly at noon the shot of the “messenger” cannon is heard. According to the decree of Catherine II, the cannons of Peter and Paul Fortress, in addition to the midday shot, were supposed to signal an impending flood. On this occasion, Yuri Tynyanov wrote: “The guns of the Peter and Paul Fortress are the gun newspaper of St. Petersburg. They have long sighed every noon and every flood. This habit is so strong that when a flood begins, officials rush to change the clocks.”
• again the St. Andrew's flag flies over the Naryshkinsky bastion - an oblique cross on a red background with a white border. The tradition dates back to the era of Peter the Great. According to documents of those times: “This flag is placed at this fortress... for a seaside city.”

View of the Peter and Paul Fortress on the Neva side.

In addition, memorial services for deceased emperors have been held in the Peter and Paul Cathedral since 1990, and festive services have been held since 1999. Next to the crypt of Peter I in the Catherine's chapel, the remains of the last Emperor Nicholas II, his family and companions who shared their sad fate were buried in 1998. The latest burials include the reburial of the ashes of Empress Maria Feodorovna, transferred from Denmark in 2006.

Once upon a time, a brass band played on the territory of the fortress on weekends and holidays. Various entertainment events are held on the beach of the fortress today. In 2005, a grand piano was installed in the flag tower; famous pianists give concerts here.

During the warm season, on Saturdays in the Naryshkinsky Bastion you can observe the changing of the guard of honor, which is symbolic in nature. The parade ground and the removal of the flags of the Russian Federation and St. Petersburg are the most striking moments of the ceremony.

The day off, the same for all museums of Petropavlovka, is Wednesday. Entrance to the fortress territory is free and open from 9:30 to 20:00.

Panorama of the Peter and Paul Fortress

By pressing and holding down the left button, move the mouse in different directions: you can look around without moving. When you click on the black square in the upper right corner of the panorama window, you will be taken to full-screen viewing mode.

1. Panorama.

2. Panorama.

Peter and Paul Fortress: where it is and how to get there

The Peter and Paul Fortress is located in the central part of the Northern capital opposite the Winter Palace, at the address:

St. Petersburg, Hare Island, Peter and Paul Fortress, 3.

• from the nearest metro station "Gorkovskaya" walk along Alexander Park and Kronverkskaya embankment;
• trams 6 and 40 run from Sportivnaya station;
• from Petrogradskaya - bus 46, minibuses 46, 76, 183 and 223.