Saint Sampson's Cathedral

Rumor has it that it was in St. Sampson's Church that Catherine II of Russia secretly married Grigory Potemkin in 1774.

It was on the feast day of that saint that Peter the Great defeated Charles XII of Sweden in the Battle of Poltava.

A Rastrelliesque chapel was constructed on the grounds, and Peter I's address to his soldiers at Poltava was inscribed on the wall.

Some of the city's first foreign architects, including Jean-Baptiste Alexandre Le Blond and Domenico Trezzini, were buried there.

[2] The tomb of Artemy Volynsky and Pyotr Yeropkin (both executed exactly 31 years after the Poltava victory) is by Alexander Opekushin (1885).