Historama, January 28

From the death of Peter the Great to the great discovery of Antarctica – Historama takes a look at January 28 in Russia’s history.

Historic birth

January 28, 1841 saw the birth of a man, without whom such a section as Historama would be impossible.

Prominent Russian historian Vasily Klyuchevsky, who wrote one of the most popular courses of Russian history, was born on this day.

He was one of the first to study the migration and economic processes that formed contemporary Russia and thought it was more important than merely sticking to its political history.

Education to a higher level

Klyuchevsky was, among others, a member of the St Petersburg Academy of Sciences, which was established on this day in 1724 under the order of Tsar Peter the Great.

It was on the very same day that Russia got its first higher education facility – St Petersburg State University.

First Emperor’s death

Peter the Great – the first Russian Tsar to be titled an emperor – died exactly one year later, in 1725, and his death threw the country into turmoil.

A couple years beforehand, he had changed the rules of succession so as to choose the new Emperor himself. However, he failed to do so before his death.

This led to decades of intrigues, coups and fights for the crown, which is known as "the era of palace revolutions" and which ended in 1796 with Emperor Nicholas I establishing himself on the throne.

Icy continent

It was on 28 January, 1820 that there appeared another continent on the world map. The Russian expedition, led by explorers Fabian Bellingshausen and Mikhail Lazarev, saw the icy shores of Antarctica.

It happened six months after they sailed off from the port of Kronstadt near St Petersburg.

The ships managed to sail around much of the continent, and 28 more islands were discovered on the way.