The Collins Russian Pocket Dictionary. 
° Abakan ° Arkhangelsk ° Astrakhan ° Irkutsk ° Kaliningrad
° Korsakov ° Kushka ° Moscow ° Novosibirsk ° Riga
° Sakhalin Islands ° Samara ° St. Petersburg
° Vladivostok ° Vyborg
The 1787 Map of Russia below renders the sprawling extent of the Russian Empire from the Black Sea to the northwestern parts of the American Continent (Alaska) in extraordinary detail. There are extensive explorer’s annotations along the Arctic shores of Russia.
(Click on map image to see additional views and details.)
Church and State Gazette, December 5, 1845
London, United Kingdom
The Baltic provinces of Russia present to the observer much that is interesting and peculiar in political as well as ecclesiastical matters. The connection of serf and master, which formerly existed between the Estonian and Livonian populations and the German nobles, was indeed dissolved in 1817; but, as the emancipation of the peasantry neither gave them a share in the possession of the soil, nor the right of changing their residence at their pleasure, they still remain in a state of great dependence on the owners of the estates, at whose command they are for the tillage of his grounds, while they depend entirely for their subsistence on the produce of the land he may allot to them. Though the bitterness or this state of dependence is frequently mitigated by the kind consideration with which the proprietors treat their peasants, it is, nevertheless, felt by the latter as a heavy burthen. They very often look with distrust upon their masters, and particularly m times of scarcity, when the most open-handed generosity of the proprietor is not sufficient entirely to save them from starvation.
Arkhangelsk
In 1581, Russia lost its access to the Baltic Sea when it lost the towns of Yam, Narva, and Koporye during the Livonian War. The Russian Tsar then turned his attention to the White Sea further north. In 1583, Tsar Ivan IV (Ivan the Terrible) ordered the construction of "a city for launching ships," and the Port of Arkhangelsk was born. Within a year, the Port of Arkhangelsk imported fine goods like English cloth, Barbant silk, sugar, spices, hand soap, writing paper, lace, pearls, European china, and weapons. The port also imported a lot of wine, but the most important import was money. The Russian treasury was empty of gold and silver, so the Russians melted down imported silver and gold coins from other countries and minted the Tsar's coins for circulation. The Port of Arkhangelsk exported goods from Russia as well, including bread, flax, tallow, canvas, hemp, wax, skins, and furs. In 1693, Tsar Peter I (Peter the Great) visited the Port of Arkhangelsk with a huge group of followers. He was inspired at the sight of Russia's first seaport. To welcome him, the Port of Arkhangelsk had built a 12-cannon yacht called the St. Peter. The Tsar escorted a convoy of Dutch merchant ships into the White Sea from the Port of Arkhangelsk, fulfilling a boyhood dream. The Tsar visited the city's trading center and talked with Russian and foreign merchants, coming to believe that a Russian fleet was necessary if Russia was to be an economic power. Within a year, Peter the Great had started building the first Russian ship on the Port of Arkhangelsk's island of Solombala. In 1694, the St. Pavel was launched from the Port of Arkhangelsk with a cargo of official Russian goods, beginning Russia's participation in sea-going trade.
October 8, 1896, Iowa Postal Card
Fayette, Iowa
DIAMONDS OF A PRINCE.
Russian Aristocrat Who Has the
Largest
Collection of Gems in the World.
Prince F. F . Yousupoff, of Russia, has the finest collection of diamonds in the world. He is known to all the diamond dealers of Europe, and has the first refusal of every extraordinary stone that comes into their possession. At the estate of Arkhangelsk, near Moscow, where Prince Yousupoff spends the summer, there is a handsome wrought steel showcase in which, behind thick plates of glass, are grouped diamonds according to size and water. Here, declares the St. Petcrsburgnya Gazeta, are brilliants of the purest kind and others of yellowish hue; there are some finely cut, others almost in the rough. Another collection, which is kept at Mikhaylovsk, is valued at about 2,500,000 rubles. But of far greater value is the St. Petersburg collection, which is kept in the Yousupoff palace there. In a fireproof chamber of this place lies, among others, the famous brilliant known as the Polyarnaya Zvezda (Pole Star), and there is a diadem of great value which belonged to Queen Caroline of Naples, wife of Murat. Here also is a pearl of enormous size and great beauty, known as the Peregrin, for which 200,000 rubles was paid at the end of the last century.
The Yousupoff passion for collecting
precious stones was developed by the
Princess T. Y. Yousupoff's great-grandmother,
born Engelhardt, who was a
niece of Potemkin-Tavrichesky. She
was fond of diamonds and pearls, and
bought shovelfuls of the latter. She
purchased for 4,000,000 rubles the entire collection of diamonds which belonged
at one time to King Rudolph II.,
a famous collector of precious stones,
and to Philip II of Spain, another ardent
lover of diamonds. All these came into
the possession of the Princess T. V.
Yousupoff, in addition to an enormous
collection of Siberian stones, onyx and
sardonyx, engraved with arms and devices.
Notwithstanding the many divisions of the Yousupoff properties, the greatest portion of this collection of diamonds belonging to the dead princess has become the property of the present representative of this ancient Russian house, Prince F. F. Yousupoff.—N. Y. Press.
The origins of the Peregrina Pearl (above) are clouded, but the basic story is the same. It was found in Panama in 1513 by a slave and brought to Spain and gave to Crown Prince Phillip II. He rewarded the slave with freedom. He gave the pearl as a gift to Queen Mary I of England (Mary Tudor -- Bloody Mary -- daughter of the first of Henry VIII's six wives) as an engagement present in 1554. Mary Tudor ascended the throne in 1553. After her death, the pearl was returned to Spain until 1808 when Napoleon Bonaparte capture Spain. When the French forces were defeated at the Battle of Victoria, the pearl made its way to London. In 1969, actor Richard Burton purchased the Peregrina for actress Elizabeth Taylor.
Sakhalin Islands
Sakhalin (Karafuto in Japanese) is a very long (c.a. 1000 km) narrow (200 km in its largest extent) island located between Japan and Russian Maritime Territory. It is separated from the Asian continent by a narrow strait. In 1808, the Board of Directors of the Russian-American Company received permission from the Russian Government to found its own settlements on Sakhalin. In 1821, Emperor Alexander I grants new-privileges to the Russian-American Company and the southern cape of Urup is declared the extreme possession of the Russian Empire on the Kuril Islands. During 1849, the Russian transport "Baikal" under command of G.I. Nevelskoy explored the mouth of the Amur River and its estuary. The southern entrance to the Amur estuary — the straits between Sakhalin and the mainland — is found by the Russian mariners and in 1850, G.I. Nevelskoy raised the Russian [lag not far from the mouth of the Amur River and proclaims the Amur valley and Sakhalin a possession of Russia. The Russian-Japanese Treaty is signed in February 1855 in Shimoda stated that the boundaries between Russia and Japan passes between the islands of Etorofu and Uruppu and Sakhalin remained unpartitioned between Russia and Japan.
The Sakhalin Region, in its present form, was officially defined and integrated as a part of the Russian Federation on January 2, 1947. The region lies off the eastern coastline of mainland Russia, and includes the island of Sakhalin, the islands of Tyulenyi, Moneron, and the Kuril Islands. It is bordered by the waters of the Sea of Okhotsk, the Sea of Japan, and the Pacific Ocean.
However, along with the Kuril Islands, Sakhalin is one of the territories disputed between Japan and Russia. Japanese explorer Mamiya Rinzo proved that Sakhalin should be an island and not a peninsula. He circumnavigated the island to make a precise map and then crossed the strait to reach the Chinese trading post of Deleng at Amur River.
May 4, 1878, North China Herald
Shanghai, China (NewspaperArchive.com)
The Japan Gazette publishes the subjoined story, for which it does not vouch, but which has been repeated too often to be excluded from its pages:—" The rumour runs that the Government of Russia applied to the Government of Japan for permission to use the coast of Kiushiu; for what purpose has not been divulged, but presumably as a naval station. This request was peremptorily refused by the Ministry of this country. Should the report, have any foundation, the designs of Russia will be more apparent than were supposed, but that the Russian Government should have preferred a request which there was so little chance of Japan acceding to, is, primd facie, incredible. Great Britain would not have considered Japan responsible for her actions had the Russian demand been granted; and, instead of a remonstrance, the occupation of the Kiushiu seaboard to the instant inclusion of the Russians would have been the consequence. It is matter of congratulation to the people that the remarkable exchange of Sakhalin for the Kurile Islands, is not a forgotten transaction. What return Russia would have offered to make to Japan for the cession of Kiushiu is unknown; but present Russian promises should be estimated by the Japanese in the ratio of their past performance ; and before deciding upon any proposition they should await the settlement of the Kulja question with the Chinese."—
St. Petersburg
Peter the Great was born on June, 29, 1672 on St. Peter's day. As a child Peter fell in love with the sea. He learned to sail at age 12, and learned to build ships in Amsterdam. He desired a shipping port for his landlocked nation, and wanted to name it after his patron saint. At first Peter hoped to build such city at the Azov Sea during his military campaign of 1697, and thus acquire an outlet to Europe through the Black Sea. But the Russian army was defeated. Six years later, in spring of 1703, the long-awaited victory in a decisive battle against the Swedes in the Baltic Sea occurred. So Peter decided to build a city along the conquered shores of the Gulf of Finland, which would let Russia "stand firmly on the sea."
Tens of thousands of workers were brought in to dig canals and waterways along 101 islands of the Neva delta. The desolate windswept landscape subject to frequent fogs and floods, impassable marshes and the wide, tidal river Neva (neva was an old Finnish word for swamp) greeted them. Peter ordered work to commence on building the fortress that eventually became a rallying point from which order and progress set out to overcome and reclaim the wildness. The city was one of the first in the world built according to preconceived plans - drawn up by the most famous Russian and European architects as well as Peter himself. He introduced Western culture, commerce and technology, and was determined to pull his backwater but beloved country out of its long isolation. The first buildings of the city included an admiralty and a shipyard.
On 16 May, 1703 a salute was fired to celebrate the founding of Saint Petersburg, Russia's "window to the West." Peter immediately brought in 1,000 aristocratic families, 500 families of the best merchants and traders, and 2,000 artisans and craftsmen. Nine years after its inception in 1712, Peter the Great made St. Petersburg the capital of the Russian Empire; it remained so for over 200 years. Both Westerns and Russians flocked into the new capital; by 1725, the year of Peter's death, Petersburg had over 75,000 nationalities.
The first Russian settlers in America were fur traders who crossed the Bering Strait into Alaska in the mid- eighteenth century. Vitus Bering, a Danish sea captain, discovered the strait in 1741 while exploring eastward under the command of the Czar. Fur traders began to cross the strait to secure land for fur trading. The Russian Orthodox Church founded its first mission in Alaska in 1794. These people converted many Eskimos to their religions, and started small communities in Alaska. The migration stopped, however, in 1867, when Russia sold Alaska to the United States.
The Edinburgh Advertiser, November 14, 1826
Edinburgh, United Kingdom
St. Petersburg, Oct 23.--Trade is still very active here, notwithstanding the advanced season: from the 11th to the 18th of this month inclusive, 53 ships have entered the port of Cronstadt, of which 234 in ballast; and notwithstanding this, the orders are still so considerable, that there is reason to fear they may not all be executed before the navigation closes. In the month of August, 161 vessels arrived in the port of Riga; sailed 138. The value of goods imported in the same period was full 1,213,848 rubles, that of the exports 3,700,926.--This Journal contains no news from the army.
In 1870, a period of "Russification" began; the Russian government implemented a policy to try to stamp out different ethnic groups within the country. Basic rights were taken away from many people, including the Jews. Jews were forced to move to the Pale settlement, a small region of western Russia and eastern Poland. The conditions and jobs available in the Pale were poor. Following the assassination of Alexander II in 1881, violent pogroms in the area caused many deaths. These conditions led to a huge influx of Russian Jewish immigrants. From 1880 to 1914, there was a new wave of Russian immigrants coming to America, which included poor peasants, such as the Molokans (who arrived after 1905), and persecuted Jews.
October 9, 1903, The Ogden Standard
Ogden City, Utah, USA
SAD CONDITION OF JEWS IN RUSSIA
Driven Within the Pale of Jewish Settlement, They Are Becoming More Destitute and Wretched.
New York, Oct. 8—Fresh from a visit to the great centers of Jewish population in Russia, Michael Davitt has written his estimate of the conditions and future of those people in a volume entitled "Within the Pale," which will be issued tomorrow from the presses of A. S. Barnes and company. "The Jew, as he is ruled and oppressed by Russian officials, is a far greater danger to Russian autocracy than anti-Semitism is to the Israelites of the Pale," declares Mr. Davitt, in the preface to his work. ''The danger," he continues, "was candidly avowed by all the representative Russians from whom I solicited light and information."
Mr. Davitt sees further catastrophe
ahead because unnatural economic
and social conditions within the pale
of settlement," he writes, "are so objective
that the warning they give of a
coming catastrophe cannot be ignored.
It would be like leaving an epidemic
of smallpox to cure itself by neglect.
This condition of things is fully explained
and expressed by the term unnatural.
It is analogous to a situation
which would result from a federal law
compelling every European-born artisan and laborer within the whole United
States to reside inside of Pennsylvania
and to be forbidden to seek employment
outside the cities and towns of that
state. The murderous competition for
employment, the deadly rivalry for existence,
the bad blood between opposing
races, the poverty and social wretchedness
which such a condition of things
would create—apart from the operation
of coercive laws—can readily be imagined
by the American reader. But this
is no overdrawn picture of the economic anarchy prevailing within the Russian pale of Jewish settlement.
"The towns are crowded with artisans and traders and, as these are out of all proportion to the producers and consumers of an agricultural Country, they necessarily become more destitute and wretched as their numbers increase. They are too poor to emigrate. They are prohibited from migrating. They are not permitted to engage in several occupations."
Mr. Davitt asserts that the Czar can accomplish much for the Jews in his domain by destroying the legend of the blood atonement. "M. De Plehve and the Czar," he avers, "can accomplish one good and blessed work, if so minded, without altering a single anti-Semitic Russian law. The emperor can destroy in Russia the atrocious legend about me annual killing of Christian children by Jews as an alleged part of the blood atonement in Hebrew Paschal rites. In this humane and Christina task he is entitled to the cooperation of the Emperor of Austria, the King of Roumania, and the heads of the other Balkan states, where this story of ritual murder is constantly circulated, and not infrequently as a part of political propaganda. There ought to be a truly Christian crusade waged against this infamous product of ancient sectarian hale."
Mr. Davit calls attention to the striking economic growth of Russia, in the following sentences:
"What Russia is accused of coveting in Manchuria or devising in Persia and not what she is strenuously and rapidly achieving in the sphere of her vast domestic activities, exercises the critical attention of West European and American journalism. And yet the wide and sure and extraordinary progress that is being made in the economic development of a great empire, as self contained in its measureless natural resources as the United States, and with an assured domestic market for most of her manufactured products in a population of fully 140,000,000—growing at a rate of upwards of 2,000,000 annually out of a natural increase—ought to be a subject of infinitely greater concern to the public thought of commercial rivals like Great Britain—as it undoubtedly is in the keener sense of German competition—than what Russian policy may or may not mean in its diplomatic trend in the Far East.
Returning to the subject of the Jew, and discussing the amelioration of his condition, Mr. Davitt: says:
"'I have come from a journey through the Jewish pale, and a convinced believer in the remedy of Zionism. I failed to see any other that can offer an equal hope of success. It is a necessity of the actual situation and faces the growing perils of the Russian Jew with a contagious plan of repatriation. Hope for partial or ultimate emancipation in Russia there is none. Other countries cannot be expected to relieve Russia of the unhappy victims of oppression and poverty. Where, then, are they to go?"
