Presidential Library tells about the 300-year history of the Russian Academy of Sciences at RUSSIA EXPO

On February 6, 2024, on the eve of Russian Science Day, which is celebrated annually in our country on February 8, Lyubov Zavyalova, methodologist of the Department for International Cooperation of the Presidential Library, spoke to visitors to RUSSIA EXPO at VDNKh in Moscow. As part of the educational program of the Knowledge Society, she spoke about the history of the Russian Academy of Sciences based on the Presidential Library's materials. 

The Senate decree on the establishment of the Academy of Sciences was published 300 years ago - on February 8 (January 28, old style) 1724. On the same day, the Day of Russian Science is celebrated annually, which was established by decree of the President of the Russian Federation dated June 7, 1999, “taking into account the outstanding role of domestic science in the development of the state and society, following historical traditions and in commemoration of the 275th anniversary of its founding in Russia Academy of Sciences".

The Presidential Library's portal features the collection Academy of Sciences and the Formation of Russian Science. It includes archival materials, modern official documents, literature indexes, anniversary publications, studies, works of members of the Academy of Sciences and periodicals. It also includes materials that tell about the beginning of the 300-year history of the institution.

Among them, for example, is the draft regulation “On the Academy of Sciences and the University under it” drawn up in 1724 by the first president of the Academy, the physician of Peter I, Lavrentiy Blumentrost. This document can be viewed from a digitized copy of the multi-volume publication Materials for the History of the Imperial Academy of Sciences (1885), presented in the collections of the Presidential Library. This project, approved by Peter, remained unpublished, and therefore was not an officially approved charter. However, it was he who determined the foundations on which the Academy of Sciences was created and functioned until 1747, when Empress Elizaveta Petrovna officially approved the Regulations of the Academy of Sciences and Arts in St. Petersburg. A digitized copy of a rare document from the 18th century is available in the collection Academy of Sciences and the Formation of Russian Science.

Even more interesting materials dedicated to Russian science and famous Russian scientists are available in the Presidential Library’s collections, which today exceed one million depository items. Full access to the library's resources is provided in the electronic reading room on Senate Square in St. Petersburg, in the Reserve Center in Moscow, the Branch of the Presidential Library inTyumen Region, as well as in remote access centers in Russia and abroad.