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Golovnev A. The Petrine Russia: Northern Dimension

Andrei Golovnev
Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography of the Russian Academy of Sciences
Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation
ORCID: 0000-0002-5716-655X
E-mail: Andrei_golovnev@bk.ru

 

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ABSTRACT. It is generally accepted that Peter I turned away from old Russian traditions in favor of European innovations. In fact, he returned to them, turning away from the Horde-Moscow “terrestriality” and reviving the old Baltic-Pontic mainstream in a renewed imperial guise. The main engine of this return and revival was the maritime business. In the preface to the Naval Charter, Peter sets out the motives and circumstances that prompted him to master navigation and shipbuilding, to turn Russia into a maritime power. From the beginning of his reign, Peter, like the Varangian princes, deployed his geopolitics between the Baltic and Black Seas, restoring the axis/path from the Varangians to the Greeks on the map of Russia. As if returning to the origins, Peter was building an “empire of the fleet” with key ports in the north and south, only this time the place of Ladoga was taken by Petersburg, and Kyiv by Voronezh. The choice of the North in Peter’s geopolitics was predefined by the realities of maritime affairs. The outcome of the battle for imperial power was predetermined not at Poltava, but on the Neva and in the Baltic. Once again, the North played a decisive role in the “nation-building” of Russia, which was greatly facilitated by the Northern War and the northern capital. The main trophy of the Northern War was the imperial status, which moved from Stockholm to St. Petersburg.

 

KEYWORDS: Peter I, Russia, North, Saint Petersburg, northerness

 

DOI 10.31250/2618-8619-2022-1(15)-28-43
УДК 94(47).05

 

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