The Czar Peter House (Dutch : Czaar Peterhuisje) is a historical building in Zaandam, the Netherlands. It is best known as the place where Tsar Peter I of Russia resided in 1697 during his Grand Embassy. The building was constructed in 1632. [1]
Peter had met the Zaandam blacksmith and craftsman Gerrit Kist when Kist had worked for the tsar in Moscow. Upon visiting the Zaanstreek, Peter insisted on staying with Kist in his home, despite Kist's protests that his house was a mere hovel, shared with the widow of one of his workers. The widow was paid to move out, and Peter spent a week as Kist's houseguest. [2] The tsar was traveling incognito under the name Peter Michaeloff [3] and while Kist did not reveal his guest's identity it did not take long for Peter to be recognized, making his observations difficult.
Peter wanted to learn more about the Dutch shipbuilding industry, and with this knowledge (and other knowledge acquired during the Grand Embassy) begin a period of modernization and growth in Russia. At this time, the Dutch Republic was one of the most developed countries in the world.
Although he remained at the house only a short time, he would return a number of times, the last in 1717. [2]
In 1895, a new stone cover was built over the house to protect it; this was done by the architect Salm, best known for designing the Artis Aquarium in Amsterdam. The cover was added to the list of national monuments in 2001, meaning that the Czar Peter House is actually on the list twice, once for the original building and once for the renovation. [4]
The house is part of the Zaans Museum and can be visited.
The House of Romanov was the reigning imperial house of Russia from 1613 to 1917. They achieved prominence after Anastasia Romanovna married Ivan the Terrible, the first crowned tsar of all Russia. Nicholas II, the last Emperor of Russia, and his immediate family were executed in 1918, but there are still living descendants of other members of the imperial house.
Peter I, was Tsar of all Russia from 1682, and the first Emperor of all Russia, known as Peter the Great, from 1721 until his death in 1725. He reigned jointly with his half-brother Ivan V until 1696. From this year, Peter was an absolute monarch, an autocrat who remained the ultimate authority and organized a well-ordered police state.
Zaanstad is a Dutch municipality in the province of North Holland, situated northwest of Amsterdam. Its main city is Zaandam. It is part of the conurbation and metropolitan area of Amsterdam. It had a population of 156,901 in 2021.
The Moscow Kremlin or simply the Kremlin is a fortified complex in Moscow, Russia. Located in the centre of the country's capital city, it is the best known of the kremlins and includes five palaces, four cathedrals, and the enclosing Kremlin Wall along with the Kremlin towers. Within the complex is the Grand Kremlin Palace, which served as the royal residence of the Emperor of Russia. It is now the official residence of the President of the Russian Federation. The Kremlin overlooks the Moskva River to the south, Saint Basil's Cathedral and Red Square to the east, and Alexander Garden to the west.
The Catherine Palace is a Rococo palace in Tsarskoye Selo (Pushkin), located 30 kilometres (19 mi) south of St. Petersburg, Russia. It was the summer residence of the Russian tsars. The palace is part of the World Heritage Site Saint Petersburg and Related Groups of Monuments.
The Grand Embassy was a Russian diplomatic mission to Western Europe from 9 March 1697 to 25 August 1698 led by Peter the Great.
Zaandam is a city in the province of North Holland, Netherlands. It is the main city of the municipality of Zaanstad and received city rights in 1811. It is located on the river Zaan, just north of Amsterdam.
Nicolaes Witsen was a Dutch statesman who was mayor of Amsterdam thirteen times, between 1682 and 1706. In 1693, he became administrator of the Dutch East India Company (VOC). In 1689, he was extraordinary-ambassador to the English court and became Fellow of the Royal Society. In his free time, he was cartographer, maritime writer, and an authority on shipbuilding. His books on the subject are important sources on Dutch shipbuilding in the 17th century. Furthermore, he was an expert on Russian affairs. He was the first to describe Siberia, the Far East and Central Asia in his study Noord en Oost Tartarye [North and East Tartary].
The Winter Palace is a palace in Saint Petersburg that served as the official residence of the House of Romanov, previous emperors, from 1732 to 1917. The palace and its precincts now house the Hermitage Museum. The floor area is 233,345 square metres. The total area of the Winter Palace is 14.2 hectares. Situated between Palace Embankment and Palace Square, adjacent to the site of Peter the Great's original Winter Palace, the present and fourth Winter Palace was built and altered almost continuously between the late 1730s and 1837, when it was severely damaged by fire and immediately rebuilt. The storming of the palace in 1917, as depicted in Soviet art and in Sergei Eisenstein's 1928 film October, became a symbol of the October Revolution.
Zar und Zimmermann is a comic opera in three acts, music by Albert Lortzing, libretto by the composer after Georg Christian Römer's Der Bürgermeister von Saardam, oder Die zwei Peter, itself based on the French play Le Bourgmestre de Saardam, ou Les deux Pierre by Mélésville, Jean-Toussaint Merle, and Eugène Centiran de Boirie. Ultimately, it goes back to the historical Grand Embassy of Peter the Great. Gaetano Donizetti had set the same story in his 1827 opera Il borgomastro di Saardam.
Netherlands–Russia relations is the relationships between the two countries, the Kingdom of the Netherlands and the Russian Federation. Russia has an embassy in The Hague, and the Netherlands has an embassy in Moscow, a consulate in Saint Petersburg, and an honorary consulate in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk.
Zaans Museum is a museum in Zaandam, Netherlands, located at the Zaanse Schans. It opened in 1998 to preserve and protect the heritage of the Zaan area. In 2009, the museum was extended with the addition of the Verkade Experience.
Royal Verkade is a Dutch manufacturing company, owned by a Turkish conglomerate. The company is headquartered in Zaandam and was one of the oldest existing family companies in the Netherlands. In November 2014, the company was acquired by Pladis, a global biscuit, chocolate and confectionery company owned by Yıldız Holding. It was founded in 1886 by Ericus Verkade to make mostly bread and rusk, and expanded to produce cookies, sweets, and, especially, chocolates.
Oostelijke Eilanden, also known as Oostelijke Eilanden en Kadijken, is a neighbourhood in the centre of Amsterdam, Netherlands, consisting of Kattenburg, Wittenburg and Oostenburg.
The Summer Palace of Peter the Great was built in Saint Petersburg between 1710 and 1714 in the northeast corner of the Summer Garden, located on an island formed by the Fontanka River, Moyka River, and the Swan Canal. Its northern perimeter runs along the left bank of the Neva River across from the Cabin of Peter the Great and Peter and Paul Fortress and was the first palace built in Saint Petersburg, the second largest city in Russia.
Nicholas II or Nikolai II was the last reigning Emperor of Russia, King of Congress Poland, and Grand Duke of Finland from 1 November 1894 until his abdication on 15 March 1917. He married Alix of Hesse in 1894 and had children Olga (1895), Tatiana (1897), Maria (1899), Anastasia (1901) - collectively known as the OTMA sisters - and the tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich (1904).
Tsar is a title historically used by Slavic monarchs. The term is derived from the Latin word caesar, which was intended to mean emperor in the European medieval sense of the term—a ruler with the same rank as a Roman emperor, holding it by the approval of another emperor or a supreme ecclesiastical official—but was usually considered by Western Europeans to be equivalent to "king".
Houses on the Achterzaan is an 1871 painting by French artist Claude Monet. Done in oil on canvas, the work depicts riverside garden houses on the west shore of the Achterzaan river in Zaandam, the Netherlands. He painted it from the dam in the Zaan, facing northwest. The painting is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
A memorial to the Russian Tsar Peter the Great was erected in London in 2000 to commemorate the tercentenary of the Grand Embassy of Peter the Great. It stands at on Glaisher Street, in a corner of Deptford within the Royal Borough of Greenwich, beside the confluence of the River Thames and Deptford Creek.