St Sampson's Cathedral is one of the oldest churches in St. Petersburg. Rumor has it that it was in St. Sampson's Cathedral that Catherine II of Russia secretly married Grigory Potemkin in 1774.
The original wooden church was built in 1710 to honor Sampson the Hospitable. It was on the feast day of that saint that Peter the Great defeated Charles XII of Sweden in the Battle of Poltava. The existing church was built under Empress Anna to a design by Pietro Antonio Trezzini. It was consecrated in 1740. The tent-like belltower was built at a later date. The original church had only one dome; the four subsidiary domes were added in 1761.
The church was considerably renovated as part of the battle's bicentennial celebrations. A Rastrelliesque chapel was constructed on the grounds, and Peter I's address to his soldiers at Poltava was inscribed on the wall. It was at that time that the church was elevated to cathedral status. The parish was disbanded by the Soviets in the 1930s, and the building was converted into a warehouse. It was restored in the late 1970s and reopened in 2000 as a museum attached to St. Isaac's Cathedral.
The grave yard which surrounds the church has been filled for centuries. Some of the city's first foreign architects, including Jean-Baptiste Alexandre Le Blond and Domenico Trezzini, were buried there. The tomb of Artemy Volynsky and Pyotr Yeropkin (both executed exactly 31 years after the Poltava victory) is made by Alexander Opekushin (1885). The statue of Peter the Great in front of the cathedral was designed by Mark Antokolsky. It was removed by the Soviets and restored in 2003 as part of the city's tercentenary celebrations.
On 5th February 2017 the cathedral was transferred from the state to the Russian Orthodox Church at a ceremony in the cathedral.
Rosenborg Palace was built in the period 1606-34 as Christian IV’s summerhouse just outside the ramparts of Copenhagen. Christian IV was very fond of the palace and often stayed at the castle when he resided in Copenhagen, and it was here that he died in 1648. After his death, the palace passed to his son King Frederik III, who together with his queen, Sophie Amalie, carried out several types of modernisation.
The last king who used the place as a residence was Frederik IV, and around 1720, Rosenborg was abandoned in favor of Frederiksborg Palace.Through the 1700s, considerable art treasures were collected at Rosenborg Castle, among other things items from the estates of deceased royalty and from Christiansborg after the fire there in 1794.
Soon the idea of a museum arose, and that was realised in 1833, which is The Royal Danish Collection’s official year of establishment.