Latest / The Romanov Dynasty: Rise, Power, and Bloody End — Fexingo History / The Romanovs and the Bronze Horseman: Peter the Great's Monumental Legacy
Transcript
- Lucas: So we've talked a lot about the Romanovs as people — their dramas, their politics, their wars. But I want to step back and look at something they left behind that's almost living: monuments. And there's one in particular that's become almost synonymous with Russia itself. Luna: You mean the Bronze Horseman? Lucas: Exactly. The statue of Peter the Great on Senate Square in Saint Petersburg. Officially it's called the Monument to Peter the Great, but everyone knows it as the Bronze Horseman, thanks to Pushkin's poem. And the story of how it got there is… well, it's a Romanov story through and through. Lucas: It was Catherine the Great who commissioned it, just a few years after she seized the throne in 1762. She was German by birth, had no legitimate claim to the throne, and she needed to tie herself visually to Peter the Great — to present herself as his true successor, the one who would complete his vision. So she decided to erect a grand equestrian statue of Peter in the capital he built. Luna: So it was political from the start. Lucas: Completely. And she went big. She wanted a statue that would rival the Marcus Aurelius in Rome or the Louis XIV in Paris. She brought in a French sculptor, Étienne Maurice Falconet, who was recommended by Diderot. Falconet was a controversial choice — he wasn't a court flatterer, and he had strong ideas. Lucas: Falconet spent twelve years on it, from 1766 to 1778. And he fought constantly with the Russian court. They wanted Peter in Roman armor, sitting on a horse in a classical pose. Falconet insisted on something more naturalistic — Peter in a simple tunic, on a rearing horse, with his hand outstretched. And the horse is trampling a serpent, which represents the enemies of Peter's reforms. Luna: That serpent was added later, right? By another sculptor? Lucas: Yes, by Fyodor Gordeyev. But the real drama was the pedestal. Catherine wanted it to be a single rock, a symbol of the obstacles Peter overcame. So Falconet proposed using a massive boulder that was found near the Gulf of Finland, in Lakhta, about six miles from Saint Petersburg. It weighed something like 1,500 tons. They called it the Thunder Stone — Grom-Kamen in Russian — because local legend said it had been split by lightning. Luna: How on earth did they move it? Lucas: That's the engineering marvel. They built a kind of sled that ran on bronze rails, and they used capstans and pulleys, with hundreds of men and horses. It took them nine months, over land and then by barge across the Neva. The stone was carved into shape as it moved, to reduce weight. When it finally arrived at Senate Square in 1770, the whole city turned out to watch. Lucas: But then came the casting. Falconet had never cast a bronze statue this big before. He had a falling out with the foundry master, a Frenchman named Benoît-Ernest Molchanov — actually his name was Benoit, but he russified it. Anyway, Falconet left Russia in 1778 before the statue was even unveiled, because he was so fed up with the court. Luna: So he never saw it finished? Lucas: No. The casting was completed by a Russian master, Yemelyan Khailov, who saved the work when the mold cracked. And on August 7, 1782 — the hundredth anniversary of Peter's ascension to the throne — the statue was unveiled in a grand ceremony. Catherine herself was there, of course, surrounded by the court. Lucas: And it became an instant icon. But its meaning kept shifting. Under Catherine, it was a symbol of enlightened absolutism. Under Nicholas I, it became a symbol of autocratic power. And then in 1833, Pushkin wrote his poem 'The Bronze Horseman,' which completely transformed how people saw it. Luna: The poem about the flood, right? Where the statue comes to life? Lucas: Exactly. The poem tells the story of a poor clerk named Yevgeny, who loses his fiancée in a flood. He goes mad and blames Peter for building the city on such a vulnerable spot. Then he confronts the statue, and the Bronze Horseman comes to life and chases him through the streets. It's a terrifying scene — the statue as an embodiment of the state's crushing power over the individual. Lucas: Pushkin's poem was so powerful that the statue became known as the Bronze Horseman — Medny Vsadnik in Russian — and the name stuck. And from then on, the debate about Peter's legacy was tied to that image. Was Peter a great reformer who dragged Russia into modernity, or a tyrant who crushed people in the process? The statue seems to ask that question every time you look at it. Luna: It's almost like the statue has a life of its own in Russian culture. Lucas: Absolutely. During the Siege of Leningrad in World War Two, the statue was sandbagged and protected, but it stayed in place as a symbol of resistance. The city's defenders saw it as a guardian. And after the Soviet Union fell, it became a rallying point again — not just for imperial nostalgia, but for arguments about Russia's identity. Lucas: There's also a fascinating detail: the statue was originally placed facing the Neva, toward the water. But when the city grew, it seemed to be facing the Senate and the Admiralty. Some historians say it was meant to face the west — toward Europe — as Peter's window to the West. Others say it faces the city, as if Peter is watching over his creation. Luna: I've always wondered about the snakes under the horse's hooves. Lucas: The serpent represents the forces opposed to Peter's reforms — the old boyars, the church conservatives, the Swedes, the Ottomans. But also, structurally, it's a third point of contact that stabilizes the statue. Without it, the horse would be rearing with only two legs on the ground, and that's not structurally sound in bronze. Lucas: By the way, if you've been enjoying these conversations about the Romanovs and their world, you might be interested to know that this is an ad-free show, and it stays that way because of listeners who chip in a couple of dollars a month. It genuinely makes a difference — it covers hosting costs and lets us keep digging into these stories. If you've gotten something out of these episodes, you can support the show at buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. Luna: Yeah, it's a small thing that really helps keep the history flowing. Lucas: Anyway, back to the Bronze Horseman. One of the most remarkable things about it is that it survived the Soviet era. The Bolsheviks tore down statues of tsars everywhere — they even demolished the Alexander III monument in Moscow. But they kept the Bronze Horseman. Why? Because Pushkin's poem had made it a symbol of the common man's struggle against tyranny. The Soviets reinterpreted it as a critique of autocracy. Luna: So the same statue meant different things to different regimes. Lucas: Exactly. And that's what makes it such a powerful historical artifact. It's not just a statue of a man on a horse — it's a palimpsest of Russian history. Every era has written its own meaning onto it. Catherine used it to legitimize her rule. Pushkin used it to question power. The Soviets used it to condemn tsarism. And today, it's a tourist attraction, but also a site where people still argue about Peter's legacy. Lucas: There's one more detail I love. The statue's pedestal, the Thunder Stone, has an inscription on it. On one side, in Latin, it says 'PETRO PRIMO CATHARINA SECUNDA' — 'To Peter the First from Catherine the Second.' On the other side, in Russian, it says 'To Peter the Great from Catherine the Second, 1782.' Catherine was very deliberate about using both languages — Latin for the European audience, Russian for the domestic one. Luna: That's such a Catherine move — playing to both worlds. Lucas: Right. And it worked. The statue became one of the most recognizable symbols of Russia. But it also became a locus of anxiety. In the 19th century, there was a legend that as long as the Bronze Horseman stands, Saint Petersburg will stand. During the Soviet era, that legend was suppressed, but it persisted underground. Lucas: There's also a lesser-known story about the statue during World War Two. When the Nazis surrounded Leningrad, the city authorities decided not to evacuate the statue. They covered it with sandbags and wooden scaffolding. The horse's legs were protected with iron bands. And the statue survived — it was one of the few monuments left untouched. People saw it as a sign that the city would survive too. Luna: It's like the statue became a character in the city's story. Lucas: It really did. And I think that's because it was never just a piece of art. It was a statement of power, a feat of engineering, a lightning rod for political debate, and a source of myth. All in one. And it all started with Catherine the Great's need to legitimize her throne. Luna: I'm going to look at it differently next time I see a photo of it. Lucas: That's the thing about history — once you know the story behind a thing, it's never just a thing again. And the Bronze Horseman has one of the richest stories of any monument I can think of.