Rostral Columns

The Rostral Columns stand on the Strelka (Spit) of Vasilyevsky Island in Saint Petersburg, forming part of the architectural ensemble that frames the entrance to the port from the Neva. The columns were erected between 1805 and 1810 to a design by the French architect Jean-François Thomas de Thomon, working alongside the renowned stonemason Samson Sukhanov; the grand opening took place in 1815. Their name comes from the rostra — decorative ship's-bow reliefs adorning the shafts — a reference to the ancient Roman custom of decorating trophy columns with the prows of captured enemy vessels, a device symbolizing the maritime might of the state.

Each column stands 32 metres tall and is held upright by its own weight alone, without any additional fastenings. A spiral staircase inside leads to an upper viewing platform crowned with a large bowl-shaped beacon. Until 1896 hemp oil was burned in these bowls, and the pillar of flame served as a guide for ships in darkness and fog — in effect, the columns functioned as lighthouses for the capital's seaport until 1885. Electricity was connected to the lamps in 1896, and gas in 1957; today the flames atop the columns are lit only on especially festive occasions. The southern column points the way into the Bolshaya Neva, the northern one into the Malaya Neva.

At the base of the columns stand two male and two female allegorical figures, created by the Flemish sculptor Joseph Camberlain and the Frenchman Jacques Thibault; the male figure by the northern column is Camberlain's work, the rest are Thibault's. The statues were originally meant to be cast in bronze, but owing to the difficulty of working the material, Pudost limestone was chosen instead — quarried in the village of Pudost near Gatchina, a stone that is soft when freshly dug but hardens quickly in the air into a durable material. Thomas de Thomon himself described the figures as deities of the sea and of commerce, though a later, widely repeated version holds that they symbolize Russia's great rivers — the Volga, the Dnieper, the Neva and the Volkhov.

The columns were restored in 1925. The structure is a federally protected object of cultural heritage of the peoples of Russia.