9781422285893

so that he could get closer to new systems of con- struction. He brought his findings back to Russia, swiftly instituting a series of changes that included outlawing traditional dress, updating the alphabet and calendar, and building technical schools. He even banned beards, long a favored feature of the nobility! His grandest undertaking was establish- ing a new Russian capital on the Gulf of Finland. St. Petersburg took nine years to complete and cost the country a great deal, both financially and in the number of lives lost during construction. Subsequent rulers of the Romanov dynasty, such as Catherine the Great, built upon Peter’s

Portrait of Catherine the Great, by Russian painter Fyodor Rokotov (1763), oil on canvas.

advances. Russia became a fully formed empire, expanding into central Europe and southward along the coast of the Black Sea. In the nineteenth century it acquired territories in Asia and built the famed Trans-Siberian railway to facilitate transport across its many regions. At its peak, the Russian Empire was among the largest in world history, spanning three continents. THE TWO PARTIES Bolshevik comes from the Russian word bol’shinstvo , which means “one of the majority.” Menshevik , alternatively, derives from

men’shinstvo , or “one of the minority.”

Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood, also called Cathedral of the Resurrection of Christ, marks the iconic St. Petersburg skyline.