I have much to try to capture about my three days in St. Petersburg. It was a whirlwind, of course. I'll try to break it into components in a series of posts. First among the many highlights was the simplest . . . the original log cabin built by Peter the Great and three sailors for his initial official residence in the new capital. As my guide during my visit to St. Petersburg, Galina, put it, "Can you imagine?"
And, there it is, 300+ years later, protected by a masonry overcoat building from the brutal elements at the mouth of the Neva. We paid to go inside, to find the cabin nested within . . . a bit like a variant on Matryoshka dolls. On the door frame to the cabin's entrance is a marker showing Peter's relative height; at 6'8", he had to stoop to enter and probably came close to scraping his noggin on each of the three rooms' ceilings.
One walks around the exterior of the cabin, looking into each of the rooms through the windows. It would take about 90 seconds to make the circuit if one didn't stop. Peter's study is still intact, with his pipe resting on the desk and the chair that he built pushed back, as if waiting for him to return to take a seat and continue defining his plans for a city to rise from the swamps that surrounded him. His bedroom is literally the size of a small walk-in closet. He either slept on the floor or on a long chair that he'd built. "Can you imagine?" The table in the dining room is still set with cutlery and dishes used by Peter. And, wham, you're done with the tour!
A last interesting tidbit about Peter's cabin. He had it painted to look as though it were constructed of white brick. And, on the front, north-facing side of the house, faded squares of white paint are still visible. "Can you imagine?"
Peter was a great visionary and manager. He imagined a city where no sane person would ever consider one possible, and it became St. Petersburg, Venice of the North, and Peter's (as well as Russia's) capital, until the Revolution of October 1917. From the iconic log cabin, a city filled with architectural and cultural treasures blossomed. One of the most impressive is the Winter Palace . . . which Peter established on the site of and to replace his log cabin palace. Peter's successors (particularly Catherine the Great) oversaw the Winter Palace's evolution and extension.
And now, here I am standing on the site of Peter's cabin (it was moved across the river once the replacement palace was initiated).
Behind me are the main gates to the palace, which were stormed by the Red guards when they booted the provisional government in the now infamous fall of 1917. And, with that, came the end of the palace's role as residence of the Tsars. Today, it is one of the four interconnected buildings that make up the Hermitage Museum. I'll try to say more about this incredible collection of some 3 million pieces, but to bring this particular post to a close I want to note a couple of the items in the collection, specifically related to Peter the Great . . . the two are part of an odd pair, as you will see.
When Peter was 50, he commissioned a sculptor (whose name, of course, I don't recall) to form a cast of his head. The sculptor encased the czar's head in plaster, inserting two straws into his nostrils so that he might breathe during the 30 minutes it took for the casting to set. The result was a perfect representation of the great man's noggin.
But, Peter, like all of history's great egomaniacs, believed that future generations would really appreciate knowing just how he looked. So, supposedly, when he had his hair cut and his mustache trimmed, he ordered that the detritus be retained so that it might be attached to one of the castings of his noggin. The result is below. Again, that's reportedly the actual hair and mustache of Peter the Great. "Can you imagine?"
While I didn't get photos, in the same museum case as the two busts of Peter, there were displays of tools used by Peter in exploring his varied interests. There were several carpentry tools, there was an astrolabe, and then there were some other things. Peter apparently was an amateur dentist, and his tools for extracting teeth, including the still-blood-stained bowl that his patients had to rest their chins upon, were there. He was fascinated by human anatomy, and so had his autopsy tools (including a pretty impressive looking saw). And, to top things off, there were Peter's obstetrics' tools . . . supposedly he delivered several of his own children.
What a guy!
"Can you imagine?"
No comments:
Post a Comment