One of the oldest museums in Russia is the Central Naval Museum in St. Petersburg which its name and location changed regularly through time. This museum which is the largest naval museum in the world with its subsidiaries all over Russia is one of the avant-garde museums in the world.
However that the name and the location of this museum changed a lot during its existence, it’s currently named the Central Naval Museum, and it locates at the west side of the St. Petersburg in Admiralty district, near the Moyka River and Yusupov Palace.
The Russian Central Naval Museum is the largest naval museum in the world. The museum collection included the building designs, and model ships at first, but the collection grew to contain new items over time which formed the largest naval museum in the world. We don't exactly know when the museum started to collect, but, many believe that the museum origin date back to when Peter the Great was in Ukraine, in 1709. He sent a letter to its first council and commanded him to move the Model Chapel which was a room full of building plans and model ships in Peter the Great's palace to the new proper location. The Model Chapel relocated to the central admiralty building where Baltic Fleet’s ships were made. The collection inside that hall led to form one of the crucial and significant cultural and historical places in Russia history. At the 200th birthday of the museum, in 1908, its name changed into its first funder, Peter the Great.
Following the October revolution, the Naval Museum transferred to the state ownership. The museum's name changed to the Central Naval Museum, in 1924, and fifteen years later, it relocated to the Old Stock Exchange's building, in Vasilyevsky Island. The new museum started to work in 1941, but due to the Second World War, and invasion of the German Army, the collection in the museum moved to the Ulyanovsk city. After the war ended, the museum started to work again, in 1946. Following the event, the Soviet government decided to enlarge the museum and opened some new branch of the museum all over Russia. These branches were the Aurora cruise ship, the Lake Ladoga, and the Kronstadt Naval Cathedral. The Aurora ship was the first ship museum in the world. The government also opened the first submarine museum in the world inside the Narodovolets, in 1994.
The Central Naval Museum changed its location to the current address, in a two-story building at the west side of the St. Petersburg, Admiralty district near Yusupov Palace due to the decision of the city council to switch the Old Stock Exchange building into something new. The Central Naval Museum has over 700 thousand items in its collection after three centuries of work. These enormous collections represent the most important and crucial moments in Russia history and items such as the naval machinery, navigation equipment, model ships, weaponry, pieces of art, uniforms, medals, flags, documents, and negative pictures.
One of the most important parts of the museum’s collection is the gorgeous model ships collection which contains more than 2000 models. This collection represents the history of building ships in Russia and other parts of the world through time.
The weaponry collection contains the swords, cannons, old and modern guns, missile-launcher, and many more which describes the history of naval weaponry development through time.
There are also a few halls dedicated to the Russian naval artists which contain the paintings, pieces of fine art, sculptures, and work of many artists such as Aivazovsky, Lagorio, Premazzi, and many more.
Part of the museum is also devoted to special items in the museum such as uniforms, flags, medals, banners, and the souvenirs of sea battles.
The largest collection of the museum is the collection of images, documents, and negatives of the naval's archive.
In your tour to St. Petersburg, one of the favorite tourist’s attractions of the city is the Saint Petersburg's Central Naval Museum which attracts many people toward itself. Visiting this museum for the tourists who like to know more about sea exploration, battles, and history of maritime development would be quite exciting and enjoyable.
