History Image Bank - Russia and Eastern Europe

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Shown here is the remaining outer shell of the cathedral at Konigsberg, the one-time capital of East Prussia. The cathedral, along with most of the city, was virtually destroyed by Allied bombers during World War II. Occupied by the Soviet Union after the war, the city was renamed Kaliningrad, and all of its prewar buildings except for the cathedral were razed to eradicate the memory of its German past.

With its famous multispiral towers, sixteenth-century Saint Basil's Cathedral, situated next to Red Square in Moscow, symbolizes Russia's tsarist and Christian Orthodox past.

Although the Kremlin was first begun in the fourteenth century, the present walls date from the next century. They surrounded the Tsar's palace, as well as these lovely Russian Orthodox churches with their distinctive gilded onion domes.

In 1712 Peter the Great moved his capital from Moscow to St. Petersburg to provide Russia with a port on the Baltic Sea. Here we see the Winter Palace, erected as the royal residence of the Tsars and obviously influenced by Louis XIV's own residence at Versailles.

In order to provide himself with an escape from the city, Peter the Great built a palace at nearby Petrodvoretz, where he used this room as his study. The globe of the world, which figures so prominently in the photo, seems to symbolize his desire to change Russia's feudal image and give it "a window looking on Europe."

During her reign, Catherine the Great built a palace of her own near St. Petersburg. Like the Winter Palace, it was also in the French classical style. Extremely lavish decor made this Summer Palace one of the most magnificent royal residences in Europe.

In 1905 the Black Sea port city of Odessa was the site of an abortive revolution, marked by a sailor's mutiny on the Russian battleship Potemkin. Seen here is the famous staircase leading from the dock to the city, on whose steps tsarist troops killed hundreds of demonstrators. The event has been forever memorialized in the classic film Potemkin, by the famous Russian director Sergei Eisenstein.

The Tauride Palace in St. Petersburg, shown here, is where the Russian Duma met to debate policy during and after the first stage of the Russian revolution in February 19

This is one of several Stalinist-style buildings that mark the skyline of Moscow today. They are humorously called "wedding cakes" by the local Muscovites.

Although separated from Russia proper by Latvia, Lithuania, and Belarus, the port of Kaliningrad is today part of Russia. The city is highly prized as a port because it does not freeze over, even during the hard winters. Here we see the busy port area.

The Battleship Aurora, where sailors revolted in support of the Bolshevik uprising in the autumn of 1917 is today a popular tourist attraction on the Neva River in St. Petersburg.

A somewhat poignant legacy of the collapse of the Soviet Union is this abandoned skating rink in Almaty, Kasakhstan. It was in this rink and on an adjacent ski jump in the mountains of Central Asia that the Soviet Union trained its best athletes to win international competitions for gold medals and glory during the Cold War. Here we sense the ghosts of former Soviet skaters, subsidized darlings of the empire, as they attempt the difficult triple jump.

A street vendor selling apples to strolling Russians in Odessa on a balmy day in February.

This brick castle at Marienburg (Malbork in Polish) was built in 1274 by the Teutonic Knights, and served as their base of operations in the task of converting the local population to Christianity. It stands today as an excellent example of German medieval architecture and the largest brick castle in Europe.

We can practically feel the physical presence of these three dedicated and awe-inspiring Grand Masters of the Teutonic Knights, as their statues stand today in the main courtyard at Marienburg.

In the mid-fourteenth century, Danzig (today the Polish city of Gdansk) became one of the most important port cities of the Hanseatic League on the Baltic Sea. The city exported lumber and wheat, as can be seen in this river view of the wooden grain elevator.

Almost totally destroyed during World War II, Gdansk is being carefully rebuilt to replicate the original architecture, as illustrated by these colorful burghers' houses on the city's famed "Long Street." In 1980 Gdansk was the site of widespread strikes by shipyard workers, which led to the formation of the Lech Walesa's Solidarity Movement.

Shown here is one of the main gates of the medieval city of Krakow, in southern Poland. Each gate represented a different guild, reflecting the commercial grandeur of this city, which in the early fourteenth century became the political and cultural center of Poland.

Poland's Jews were almost totally annihilated during World War II. Shown here are the walls of one of the oldest synagogues in Krakow.

This bird's-eye view of Prague, taken from the top of the ancient Town Hall, reveals the twisting lanes and red-tiled roofs of the medieval city.

This intricate mechanical clock on the Town Hall in Prague has been marking the hours since medieval times.

The city's oldest house, on "Gold Street" in the environs of Hradcany Castle, serves as an excellent conduit for the modern visitor back to life in medieval Prague.

This elegant villa, a reminder of the past glory of Riga, the capital of Latvia, today houses the French Embassy. Because of the emphasis placed by the French on the importance of historical sites, the most beautiful buildings in capitals throughout the world have often been purchased as French embassies.

The "Three Brothers," adjacent medieval houses in Riga's old district, date from the fifteenth century. The merchant family lived on the ground floor, while upper floors were used for storage.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union and its Eastern European satellites, musicians no longer receive a subsidy from the state, and some must play for pedestrians to earn a living. Here a quartet performs on a street corner in Riga.

Strikers in front of the parliament building in Tallinn. Since the dissolution of the Soviet empire, the Estonian people have felt much freer to express their concerns.

This wedding is taking place in Minsk, the capital of Belarus, on the site of a monument to commemorate the 27,000 Russian soldiers who lost their lives in the Afghanistan war. Reportedly half of those killed in the war were from Belarus. In this case, however, the groom is from Syria, which only accentuates the multinational composition of today's world.

The medieval town of Dubrovnik, located on the spectacular coast of Croatia, was once an independent maritime republic. In the sixteenth century it acted as an entrepôt for trade in the Mediterranean. In 1808 it was briefly captured by Napoleon. It became part of Yugoslavia in 1918 and remains a jewel of architectural delights, as glimpsed in this bird's-eye view of the city.