Narva Triumphal Gate

The Narva Triumphal Gate is an architectural monument in the Empire style, erected in honor of the heroes of the Patriotic War of 1812. The monumental arch stands on Stachek Square next to the "Narvskaya" metro station. Its height exceeds 30 meters, its width is 28 meters, and the span reaches 15 meters in height and more than 8 meters in width.

The first Narva Gate was made of wood: it was built in just one month to a design by Giacomo Quarenghi in time for the arrival of Russian troops returning from Europe in 1814, and was erected by the Obvodny Canal, on the boundary of the city at that time. The arch was adorned with a chariot drawn by six horses, driven by the goddess of Victory, and sculptures of Roman warriors. The guards marched ceremonially beneath this gate four times during 1814. However, the wood and alabaster quickly deteriorated, and at the insistence of Governor-General Mikhail Miloradovich, Emperor Nicholas I ordered a permanent stone gate to be built on a new site, by the Tarakanovka River.

Construction to a design by architect Vasily Stasov, who preserved Quarenghi's concept, began on August 26, 1827 — the anniversary of the Battle of Borodino — and was completed in 1834. The structure was built of brick masonry faced with copper sheets. The sculptural group — the chariot, the six horses, and the goddess of Victory — was created by Pyotr Klodt and Stepan Pimenov, while the Roman warriors were replaced with figures of ancient Russian knights by Pimenov and Vasily Demut-Malinovsky. The gate bears inscriptions with the dates of construction, the names of the battles, and the names of the military units that distinguished themselves.

The copper cladding soon began to corrode, and in 1877–1880 it was partly replaced with iron, which only accelerated the deterioration. In 1917, during the February Revolution, the gate was set on fire by a crowd, which destroyed the city duma's archive and damaged the bronze decorations. During the Siege, soldiers passed beneath the arch on their way to the front, and in 1944 the troops that lifted the siege of the city marched under it; the monument itself sustained more than two thousand shell holes. The 1949–1951 restoration recreated the lost details of the copper sculptures and restored the gate's historic appearance; it was later restored again in 1978–1980 and 2002–2003.

Today a museum of military glory, a branch of the State Museum of Urban Sculpture, operates in the three-story interior space of the arch, holding relics of the War of 1812. In 1999 a monument to Marshal Leonid Govorov, who liberated Leningrad from the Siege, was installed within the span of the gate, symbolically linking two eras of Russian military victories.