Monument to Peter I
Sculpture by E.M. Falconet
The first monument in our city was erected in Senatskaya Square, a monument to Peter I, the founder of Saint-Petersburg. This monument, that was commemorated by Pushkin in his poem The Bronze Horseman, is one of the best samples of the world monumental sculpture and one of Petersburg symbols.
The French sculptor E.-M.Falconet was invited to make the sketches for the monument. He especially came to Russia specially for that purpose. It took him three years (1768 - 70) to make the model of the equestrian statue. The head of Peter I was performed by Falconet's pupil - M.-A. Collot. The pedestal was performed after the architect Yu.Velten's design.
The huge granite boulder (called Thunder-stone) that serves as the pedestal, was discovered in 1768 on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, in the vicinity of the Lakhta village. It took nine months to deliver the enormous monolith weighting 1,600 tons to the construction site. Four hundred people, using special devices, were first moving it by land, and further by water, on a barge built especially for this purpose. Catherine II herself came to inspect the stone and the transportation device several times. In October 1770 the rock was put into its place; however, only 12 years later was the monument opened.
The casting that began in 1775 and might have ended in a catastrophe. Molten copper began to pour out of a crack that appeared in the mold. The caster Ye.Khailov who was in charge of the works repaired the damage with a risk to his life and completed the casting. Sculptor F.Gordeyev moulded the snake trampled by the horse. The opening ceremony took place on August 7, 1782. On each side of the pedestal there is an inscription done in Russian and in Latin reading: «To Peter the First— Catherine the Second».
«The monument will be simple,- he wrote.- I shall limit myself to the statue of this hero, and I am treating him neither as a great marshal, nor as a victor, though he was both. More important is his creative personality, that of the benefactor of the whole country, and it is this personality that is to be shown to the people. My tsar is not holding any warder; he is stretching his benefactory arm over the country that he is trying to 'break in'. He is going up to the top of the rock that serves as a pedestal—this is the symbol of the hardships that he had to overcome... He overcame them by the persistence of genius... In other words, this is a monument to Russia and its Transformer".
Address: Dekabristov Square
