File:Petrograd, past and present (1916) (14582935507).jpg

Identifier: petrogradpastpre00stev (find matches)
Title: Petrograd, past and present
Year: 1916 (1910s)
Authors: Steveni, W. Barnes
Subjects: Saint Petersburg (Russia) -- History
Publisher: Philadelphia : Lippincott
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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considerable commerce. Evenbefore the conquest the Roos and Gothland vikingsfrom Varjag (Sweden) used to come down the Nevaand enter Lake Ladoga, from thence finding their wayto Novgorod—the old name of which was Holmgard.Li course of time the connection of the Varangianson the eastern shores of the Baltic with their kindredin the west was broken off, and Novgorod became apowerful independent state, with territories extendingfrom Lake Ilman to the White Sea and eastward to theUral Mountains. The southern shore of the FinnishGulf was also a part of the great possessions of thisfree republic, and the very spot on which Petrogradnow stands was a portion of ancient Russia, inhabitedby heathen Finns and a few Swedish and later onHanseatic merchants. Even in the tenth century theshippers of Novgorod, who were mostly Norsemen,carried on, with the aid of the Gothlanders, and subse-quently with the help of the Hanseatic traders, a livelyintercourse with the rest of Europe. In fact it was 34
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THE FOUNDING OF PETROGRAD 35 by the Volga-Ilman-Ladogo-Neva route that the waresof Central Asia were brought to England, long beforethe Conquest. Peter, although a descendant of thoseMuscovite rulers who had destroyed the prosperity ofthat great republic, was such an admirer of AlexanderNevsky, the heroic Grand Duke of Novgorod, thathe transferred his bones with ceremony to Petrograd,and erected a splendid monastery on the spot wherethey finally rested. The remains of the quondamenemy of Muscovy now rest beneath a shrine of silverabout two tons in weight, at the monastery at theend of the Nevsky Prospekt, named after him. Petrograd did not pass into the hands of theRussians without many a sanguinary struggle on thebanks of the swift Neva. In one of these crusadesagainst the heretics, by order of the Pope, the Swedes,under their famous General Berger Jarl, were surprisedby Alexander Nevsky and defeated with great loss.This battle, which took place on the banks of the RiverIshora, a tri

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