Aleksey Kraikovski

The Maritime Metropolis – Technologies, Governance and New City-Dwellers in SaintPetersburg (18th c.)

CERCEC - Main Seminar « Mondes russe, caucasien, centre-asiatique et centre-européen : sources et méthodes. Mobilité et reconfigurations des sociétés à l’Est de l’Europe”

Referents : Alain Blum, Masha Cerovic, Catherine Gousseff

I will focus on the development of St. Petersburg as the maritime metropolis of the Baltics. This issue is usually considered through the perspective of the Navy and commercial shipping. However, I argue, the problem requires far more complex view. I will approach it through the lens of the human/environmental relations. What does it mean to live in the maritime metropolis? How did the government “construct” the space and the dwellers of this new city, what instruments of governance were used? How did the city interact with the sea, including both the inanimate nature (water, sand, winds) and the marine biota? I will pay the special attention to the governmental projects of transformation of the Gulf of Finland in order to make it the Mare Nostrum of the Russian Empire.

• 21.06.21, 17-00, online