Polish Saint-Petersburg. Diversity connects - by students from Russia

City Duma

Dvortsoviy Bridge drawn during White Nights

The bridge of Peter the Great

Stanisław August Poniatowski

Mathilde Kschessinska as The Dying Swan

Polish Saint-Petersburg
First Poles came to St.Petersburg as soon as the city was founded. Many people with Polish surnames were around Peter I. Stanisław August Poniatowski lived in the city in 1755 – 1758. He adored the future Empress Catherine II and 40 years later returned to St.Petersburg as the last king of the Rzeczpospolita (The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth).
After the division of Poland, when its Central and Eastern parts became parts of the Russian Empire many more Polish people came to live in St.Petersburg.
Adam Jerzy Czartoryski made a successful career in St.Peterburg. He was a friend of the Emperor Alexander I and became one of his advisors, a minister of foreign affairs and a senator.
The Poles played an important part in the development of cultural relations between two countries. The first step was a visit of Adam Mickiewicz to Saint-Petersburg. In this perion he created his masterpieces: ‘Sonets’, ‘Crimean Sonets’ and ‘Konrad Wallenrod’ 1828, dedicated to Nicolas I.
In 1828-1830 the music salon of a famous Polish pianist and composer Maria Szymanowska was very popular.
In 1870 Stanisław Moniuszko visited the capital, where his operas were very popular, including the famous ‘Halka’.
Matylda Krzesińska was the prima of the Emperor’s Mariinsky Theatre.
Polish arcitects and ingeneers took part in the construction of the main bridges of the city: Troitskiy Bridge, Dvortsoviy Bridge, the Bridge of Peter the Great and the Bridge og the Liutenant Schmidt. Marian Lialevich is the author of the project of the City Hall (Duma).
In 1914 there lived about 70 000 Poles in Saint-Petersburg.
The main Catholic cathedral of St.Petersburg is the Cathedral of St.Catherine. It was often visited by Adam Mickiewicz. In 1798 the last Polish king Stanisław Poniatowski, who spent his last years in Russia, was buried there (his remains were brought to Poland in 1938).