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Russia Engages the World, 1453-1825
1453 Through the Reign of Ivan the Terrible (1533-1584) The Time of Troubles to the First Romanovs (1598-1682) Peter the Great and His Legacy (1682-1762) The Age of Catherine the Great (1762-1801) The Reign of Emperor Alexander I (1801-1825)

                                     

Explore this Section:

Peter the Great and His Legacy (1682–1762): A Summary of Russian History
Russia Symbol Introduction
Russia Symbol The Early Years
Russia Symbol The Drive Toward Westernization
Russia Symbol The Drive Toward Empire
Russia Symbol The Historical Assessment
Russia Symbol Immediate Successors
Russia Symbol The Reign of "the Daughter"
Peter the Great and His Legacy (1682–1762): A Summary of World History
Europe
Eurasia


Russia's Globalization:
A Key

Events marked Russia Symbol are specific to Muscovy/Russia's internal development.
Those marked World Symbol are important world historical or cultural events.
Engagement Symbol indicates specific points of sociocultural or military engagement between Muscovy/Russia and foreign powers or individuals.




















 

 

  Sweden’s Empire

 
   Photographic Services & Permissions
 

Erik Jönsson Dahlbergh (1625–1703)
Suecia antiqua et hodierna [Ancient and Modern Sweden]
[Stockholm: E. J. Dahlbergh, at the expense of the King, 1667–1716]
NYPL, Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, Art and Architecture Collection

This collection of coats-of-arms was meant to convey the territorial extent and majesty of the Swedish empire. This plate is from a large collection of views of cities and towns, plans of fortresses, insignia, and various antiquities that appeared at the height of Sweden’s imperial greatness. Such images, intended for foreign consumption, offer visual testimony to Sweden’s hegemony in northeastern Europe – much as the later 18th-century materials presented elsewhere in this exhibition underscored Russia’s imperial glory.

Erik Jönsson Dahlbergh was a fortifications expert, cartographer, engineer, architect, and accomplished draftsman as well as a military and governmental administrator. At the age of seventy-one, he was appointed governor-general of Sweden’s most affluent province, Livland, at present the newly independent Baltic lands of (northern) Latvia and (southern) Estonia.