Эрмитаж, "Иорданская лестница", на английском языке

Прекрасно иллюстрированное подарочное издание в твердом переплете с золотым тиснением и трехсторонним золотым обрезом.
The priceless collections of the Hermitage, one of the world's most famous museums, are preserved in a beautiful complex of palaces, which is striking for the harmony of its architectural rhythms and its commensurate proportions. Talented architects created, in the course of a century and-a half, a group-of palaces for the principal imperial residence - the Winter-Palace, the buildings of the Small, Large and New Hermitages and the Hermitage Theatre. These buildings serve to this day as a precious setting for the treasures of world art. The place itself where the Hermitage palaces are located in St. Petersburg is associated with the most important events in the city's early history. It was here, on the left bank of the Neva, opposite the main fortress, that in November 1705, a little more than two years after the foundation of the northern capital, Peter the Great laid the foundations of the Admiralty, which - was to become the major shipyard of new Russia. Soon the first wooden houses ... of naval officers and shipwrights, Peter's closest associates, began to grow around the Admiralty, primarily upstream the Neva, alongside its low bank. In 1705, on .the site of the present-day Palace Embankment with its imposing stone edifices, palaces-for the Admiralty commanders, Russian Vice-Admiral Fiodor Apraxin and Kornelis Kruis, a Norwegian by origin, were built. A little later, in 1768, Peter himself took a decision to move to the left bank of the Neva, closer to the Admiralty, where his first, wooden Winter Palace was under construction. From this time onwards, a rapid transformation of the Neva bank of Admiralty Island, largely due to the Russian monarch's dwelling there, began.
Издание на английском языке.