Polotsk. The house of Peter I.

The house of Peter the Great is the oldest civil building in the city of Polotsk. The official date of construction is 1692, but at the beginning of the XXI century, during archaeological work, researchers found out that the beginning of construction can be attributed even to the middle of the XVII century.

Originally it was a wooden building on a high stone plinth. The house had an extensive basement and even a garbage chute. During the Russian-Polish war (1654-1667), the building was severely damaged and by the end of the XVII century it was completely rebuilt from brick. Judging by the archaeological finds of tiles with the coat of arms of "Ostoy" found on the territory adjacent to the building, the House of Peter I could belong to the Grebnitsky family, known in the Polotsk region.

Another large-scale renovation of the building took place in 1780 in connection with a visit to Polotsk by Empress Catherine II. The house was restored and presented to the Empress as the residence of the Russian tsar and emperor.

As at the time of construction, and throughout the XIX — early XX century, the existing house functioned as a residential building, and the surnames of most of its owners are known. In 1818, the building belonged to the Sinebutov family, after the death of the owner Ivan Sinebut, his widow sold the building to Colonel Ludwig Ivanovich Shteras, after some time Vasil Andreevich Sobolevsky became the new owner of the house, who soon sold his property to titular adviser Andrei Vasilyevich Kamenkov. In the second half of the 19th century, the house belonged to the Wittenberg family, and the last known owner of the House of Peter I from 1871 to 1917 was the famous Polotsk banker Beniamin Lazarevich Barkan.

The placement of the house indicates its estate development. There are features of classicism in the architecture of the building. This style is characterized by simplicity, rigor, laconism of forms, and the absence of numerous details.

Before the Great Patriotic War, the building was used as housing. During the war, the building was significantly damaged, but in 1949 the House of Peter the Great was restored. In the post—war years, first the city library was located in it, later the children's library. In 1952, in memory of Peter's stay in Polotsk, a memorial plaque was installed on the house. In 1964, the children's library was named after Leo Tolstoy, and a monument to the famous writer was erected in front of the main facade of the building. In 1997, the library was moved to another area of the city, and the museum of the National Polotsk Historical and Cultural Museum-Reserve - the stationary exhibition "A Walk along Nizhne—Pokrovskaya" is located in the House of Peter the Great.