History of Saint Petersburg
Founded by Tsar Peter the Great on 27 May 1703. It became capital of the Russian Empire for more than two hundred years (1712–1728, 1732–1918). St. Petersburg ceased being the capital in 1918 after the Russian Revolution of 1917.
Demographics of Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg has always been populated mostly by Russians, albeit with several sizeable ethnic minorities, such as Germans, Ukrainians, Finns, and people from Eastern Europe, among others. In 1800 an estimated 200 to 300 thousand lived in the city. After the emancipation of serfs in 1861, former serfs started arriving to the capital as workers, boosting population from half a million to 1439.6 thousand recorded in the census of 1900.