ABSTRACT
In 1910 Prince Peter Kropotkin concluded an article on ‘St. Petersburg’ for the eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica as follows:
It has often been said that St. Petersburg is the head of Russia and Moscow its heart. The first part at least of this saying is true. In the development of thought and in naturalizing in Russia the results of west European culture and philosophy St. Petersburg has played a prominent part. It has helped greatly to familiarize the public with the teachings of west European science and thinking and to give to Russian literature its liberality of mind and freedom from the trammels of tradition. St. Petersburg has no traditions, no history beyond that of palace conspiracies and there is nothing in its past to attract the writer or the thinker. 1 (My italic.)
