Talk:Saint Petersburg

Article name

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the proposal was not moved. --BDD (talk) 22:51, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

Saint Petersburg → St. Petersburg – As English language sources use St. Petersburg, per WP:CommonName this article should be titled St. Petersburg. I have looked back through the archives, and this matter doesn't appear to have been previously discussed. (on behalf of SilkTork)) Enric Naval (talk) 21:49, 28 May 2013 (UTC) As English language sources use St. Petersburg, per WP:CommonName this article should be titled St. Petersburg. I have looked back through the archives, and this matter doesn't appear to have been previously discussed. As the article is high profile, and well edited, and has held the present title for some years, I am pausing before moving from Saint Petersburg to St. Petersburg.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  18:34, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I don't have any problem with this name change. --Enric Naval (talk) 09:08, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm of two minds about this, leaning towards leaving the article where it is, but I understand the reasoning. At any rate, whatever you do, don't just move the page. This is a high-profile article which at the very least deserves to go through a move request for wider input, in case there are less-than-obvious considerations that need to be taken into account.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); May 28, 2013; 13:40 (UTC)


 * I think this is an uncontroversial move - I am simply pausing here to see if there's something the article regulars know that I missed. This is the move request discussion, if you like. If you prefer to set up a more formal move request, please do so using this section as the starting point, otherwise I will action the move tomorrow.  SilkTork  ✔Tea time  14:36, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Well, I disagree this is an uncontroversial move, and even if your reasoning is correct (as it very well may be), it should go through a review more thorough than a couple of hasty comments. The article is about a major city, not some obscure concept where judgement of a couple editors is usually good enough. Since the move is your initiative, it is also your responsibility to format and submit the RM properly; please don't shift this burden to other people. Thank you for understanding.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); May 28, 2013; 15:26 (UTC)
 * I formatted a formal request. (aw, come on, loosen up, wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, and we can ignore the rules at any time for the good of the encyclopedia, remember?) --Enric Naval (talk) 21:49, 28 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Ah, but I didn't ask to follow the rules for the sake of feeding the bureaucracy :) A properly submitted RM leads to notifications automatically posted in all kinds of places, thus enabling a lot more people to comment other than the handful who happened to have the page on their watchlists and who paid attention on this particular day. And the article's high profile calls for a little bit more formality, don't you think? I would have happily helped to RM this myself, had I agreed with the proposal, but I have my reservations (and will document them here shortly after mulling them over); me submitting a request with which I don't quite agree would have simply looked weird :) Cheers,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); May 29, 2013; 01:07 (UTC)


 * Oppose. Um, I can't really take this nomination seriously... Of course, I'm Russian and I see the things from this side of the ocean, but I can't imagine a contraction as the primary reference to a city. This is Saint Petersburg, not St. Petersburg, Florida! I can't come up with any proper arguments for the full spelling, but I guess that's just because it is the default spelling? Personally, I've seen "Saint Petersburg" far more often than "St. Petersburg" - and I mean written in English, not in Russian. Maybe it is a U.S. tradition to contract it, but certainly not global (and we should take into account not only English-speaking countries). A brief glance through the references gives at least three that use full spelling:, incl. Encyclopædia Britannica, which contracts it in text but spells in full in the title. YLSS (talk) 15:12, 29 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Oppose. While I understand the reasoning behind the request, after reflecting on it for a while I can't agree with it. Let me explain. In Russian, the name of the city is "Санкт-Петербург", which unambiguously translates to "Saint Petersburg". "Saint Petersburg" is, in fact, the variant recognized as the conventional English name by the NGA, which I suspect is one of the reasons why our article is titled so. "St. Petersburg", on the other hand, is obviously just an abbreviation of the conventional name. Now, there is no doubt that the abbreviated name is being used in the real world a lot, but the question remains: is a commonly used abbreviation the same as the common name in English? I am not convinced that it is. To me, arguing about whether "St. Petersburg" is more common than "Saint Petersburg" is akin to arguing whether the article about the 100 meters sprint race should be under "100 meters" or "100 m". Surely the latter is extremely common as well! In the end, it boils down to benefits to both readers and editors, and in this case I just don't see any. Regardless of whether the full or abbreviated version is used as the title, the other variant remains (as it should) a redirect to it, rendering any navigational concerns moot. And a move of an article of this scale is bound to create inconveniences for editors, too (think of a gazillion bot edits this move will trigger, and think about how many other minor tweaks would have to be done manually across Wikipedia). All for a benefit that's nowhere to be seen. And if the article is moved, what are we going to be arguing about next? Whether "St. Petersburg" is more common than "St Petersburg"? This seems to be a move just for a move's sake (but please do enlighten me if there's some important benefit I'm just not seeing).—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); May 29, 2013; 15:25 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Unnecessary and let's also remember that this fails WP:ENGVAR, since "St. Petersburg" would be American English. Commonwealth English favours "St Petersburg". Better to leave as is. -- Necrothesp (talk) 13:34, 3 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Oppose. I don't think that titles should be abbreviated unless the title is very long.  There is no WP:COMMONNAME differentiation between "St. Petersburg" and "Saint Petersburg", both are equally recognisable.  --SmokeyJoe (talk) 13:30, 5 June 2013 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Article title
As a native English speaker and resident of St. Petersburg, I propose renaming the article's title to "St. Petersburg". "Saint Petersburg" is a widespread error resulting from a literal translation of the city's Russian name, "Sankt-Peterburg", by Russian-speaking translators. This error appears to have become widespread only after the advent of the Internet. You'll not find it anywhere in older English-language sources.Abercius (talk) 10:51, 21 June 2013 (UTC)
 * I do not know, Britannica uses Saint Petersburg. Any way to check paper maps?--Ymblanter (talk) 10:59, 21 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Encyclopaedia Britannica, Eleventh Edition (p. 38): "St Petersburg". Other formats available here. —Abercius (talk) 11:53, 21 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Current online version--Ymblanter (talk) 12:05, 21 June 2013 (UTC)
 * You did see that the move proposal immediately above this section failed just a couple weeks ago, right? Unless you can offer any new arguments, there is hardly any point in reopening it. Plus, a wide-sweeping statement that the "Saint Petersburg" spelling is a "widespread error" (as opposed to being the full form of "St. Petersburg") really needs to be supported by sources. So far you've offered none (EB 11th edition, is merely an example of alternative usage, and a badly outdated one at that). The NGA's website, on the other hand, gives only "Saint Petersburg" as the conventional English name, not the abbreviation, and those folks are extremely conservative with their "conventional name" assessments.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); June 21, 2013; 12:07 (UTC)
 * That's just the thing, that electronic and post-Internet reference works can't be regarded as definitive. Unfortunately, many errors have "gone viral" in our day and found their way into even such respected publications as the Britannica.  Older, printed reference works must be consulted to really settle the issue, but few of these can be found on the Internet.  But if you want online sources, here are a few:
 * The Oxford Dictionary (GB)
 * The Oxford Dictionary (US)
 * The Longman Dictionary
 * Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary
 * WordNet 3.0
 * Google Maps


 * The St. Petersburg Times
 * The State Hermitage Museum
 * The State Russian Museum
 * The Mariinsky Theatre
 * St. Petersburg International Economic Forum


 * By the way, since you've cited the current Britannica, you'll find that other entries in it use "St Petersburg" or "St. Petersburg".  Examples: here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here, just to mention a few.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Abercius (talk • contribs) 13:54, 21 June 2013 (UTC)
 * —Abercius (talk) 13:09, 21 June 2013 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately, that's not what I asked for. Not one of all those sources says that the "Saint Petersburg" spelling is a "widespread error" or is somehow incorrect. The only thing they illustrate is that some sources use "St(.) Petersburg", the abbreviated version of the full name (a fact that no one ever contended). For all we know, it's a part of the manual of style they follow, and a style choice is never an error, merely a decision. One could easily compile a similar list of sources which use "Saint Petersburg"; indeed, some are already available in the thread above this one. Additionally, that "electronic and post-Internet reference works can't be regarded as definitive" is strictly your opinion, and a rather unorthodox one, I would say. If you look at Wikipedia's definition of what a "reliable source" is, you won't see "electronic and post-Internet reference" in the list of exclusions; on the contrary, the very definition of "published" (further explained here) notes that whether a document is published in traditional printed format or online makes no difference.
 * Regarding Britannica's in-text examples, these remind me strongly of NPR's style guide, according to which the current President of the United States is referred to as "President Obama" on the first mention, but as "Mr. Obama" subsequently. Deciding what a title of a Wikipedia article should be based on such technicalities isn't a terribly smart idea, wouldn't you agree?—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); June 21, 2013; 13:51 (UTC)
 * Уважаемый Ezhiki, perhaps you might at least consider giving some heed to my opinion on this issue, the opinion of a native (unlike you) English speaker and professional translator, instead of just rejecting it outright? This page is evidence to that fact that I'm not alone: others have raised this problem before me and also consider "Saint Petersburg" an error.  Just maybe we could be right?


 * In any case, here's an additional argument you might find convincing:


 * From the Cambridge Guide to English Usage (1994):


 * When saints' names are written into those of institutions, the shortened form St(.) is always used... Geographical names which honor a saint are likewise written with St(.): St Gotthard Pass, St Kilda, St Moritz, St Petersburg. Abbreviated forms like these are used in the gazetteers of world atlases published by The Times and Oxford, among others, and they reflect common usage... Use of full stop/period: The shortened form St is normally left unstopped by British writers and editors, because (a) it's a contraction rather than an abbreviation, and (b) it contains a lower case letter.
 * (Source).
 * —Abercius (talk) 14:39, 21 June 2013 (UTC)
 * As one professional (albeit no longer practicing) translator to another I assure you I gave full weight to your arguments :) So did other people, to very similar arguments, in the thread immediately above. It should be rather obvious that neither "Saint Petersburg" nor "St. Petersburg" (nor "St Petersburg") are incorrect; at least no one was able to support such a claim with an authoritative source. What we have here is clearly a matter of style, and while in matters of style usage is one of the selection criteria, it is by no means the only one. Your Cambridge Guide example would have been a convincing argument only if the said guide had been adopted as Wikipedia's sole style guide (which it hadn't been). Style matters in Wikipedia are driven by applicable policies and guidelines, as well as community consensus, and here we have neither. If any of those ingredients change, then I am sure the article will be moved. Cheers,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); June 21, 2013; 15:00 (UTC)
 * Maybe you should see the article for St Asaph in North Wales: that follows the convention User:Abercius was referring to, and conforms with the said Cambridge Guide to English Usage. If that city can be there (along with all other cities with "St." in them), this should be among them too. -- 92.13.63.113 (talk) 14:54, 15 September 2013 (UTC)
 * The title of the St Asaph article is formatted to meet the British English usage conventions due to the strong national ties. The subject on St. Petersburg, Russia has no national ties to any variety of English, which is why the original choice of spelling has a greater weight, per WP:RETAIN. Since the current title is not incorrect, there is no point in changing it. Additionally, nothing is to be gained by switching to any of the two other equally valid spellings, but there is something to lose&mdash;instead of a current stable compromise title we'll get endless quarrels on whether it should be "St. Petersburg" or "St Petersburg". Lest you think I'm exaggerating, a quick scan through WT:AT and its archives will show you that some editors are happy to churn out kilobytes upon kilobytes of pointless discussions over even less significant issues...—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); September 15, 2013; 15:49 (UTC)
 * Regarding "endless quarrels on whether it should be 'St. Petersburg' or 'St Petersburg'", can you cite any evidence to support that claim?  The variant with the full stop is American, the other British.  Both are equally correct, and I for one would be happy with either as long as consistency is maintained.—Abercius (talk) 08:56, 26 October 2013 (UTC)
 * I don't purposefully keep track of every silly squabble Wikipedians somehow find time to engage in, but disputes about the choice between British and American spelling in articles which have to do with neither Britain nor America (and where WP:ENGVAR is happily ignored) are surprisingly common. Indeed, this very thread is already heading that way! If you ever feel like being astonished by the pettiness (and length!) of some disputes (many of which are not dissimilar to this hypothetical one), just take a look at WT:AT and its archives. Cheers,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); October 28, 2013; 16:06 (UTC)

Airport photo
For whom it may concern

Please, change the photo of Pulkovo airport. Now we have new terminal, long awaited, and don`t have those Russian types as portrayed (hope obtain some). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.134.38.217 (talk) 20:11, 4 December 2013 (UTC)

I added a new one. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.18.67.55 (talk) 22:41, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

My city is called Sankt Petersburg! Not Saint....
Please respect our Russian spelling and change. Thank you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.29.166.82 (talk) 09:45, 24 February 2014 (UTC)
 * WP:COMMONNAME Jaan Pärn (talk) 10:15, 24 February 2014 (UTC)

Тhe city is in fact called Санкт-Петербург - in Russian. In German, it is called Sankt-Petersburg; please note the added "s", which is absent from the Russian name. In English, cities named after saints start with "St." by convention, e.g. St. Louis or St. Paul in the U.S.. You wouldn't expect English Wikipedia to rename the article for "Moscow" to "Moskva" or the Russian Wikipedia to change the current "Сент-Луис" to "Ст. Луис". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 5.18.190.95 (talk) 09:34, 6 July 2016 (UTC)


 * I agree - this isn't a question of "respecting our Russian spelling", but simply of using the accepted name in the language you happen to be writing in. If we were to apply the "respect" principle, then we'd have to insist that Russian-speakers stop calling Rome "Рим" ("Rim") and Athens "Афины" ("Afiny" - Russian doesn't have a sound corresponding to "th", and replaces it with "f") and change them to something more "respectful" of Italian- or Greek-speakers. So please don't tell us English-speakers how to use our own language - just as we English-speakers shouldn't tell Russian-speakers how to use theirs.213.127.210.95 (talk) 16:43, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

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Shouldn't there be a hyphen?
Encyclopedant (talk) 07:49, 13 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Where?—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); February 13, 2015 ; 13:08 (UTC)

In the name of the city. There shouldn't be a hyphen, it spells in English exactly as it is over here. The confusion comes from Russian language where the name of the city spells with a hyphen: Санкт-Петербург ('Saint-Petersburg'). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 176.235.133.18 (talk) 16:25, 21 October 2020 (UTC)

Famous people?
As a wikinewbie just wondering how wikieditors decide who is included on the article page and who remains amongst the 800 people in:  Some city articles just have the wikilink under the notable people section ie. Baltimore    Coolabahapple (talk) 06:30, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Timeline of Saint Petersburg
What is missing from the recently created city timeline article? Please add relevant content. Contributions welcome. Thank you. -- M2545 (talk) 16:13, 19 May 2015 (UTC)

Peterburg
If it's Санкт-Петербург (Sankt-Peterburg) in Russian, why are we calling it St. PeterSburg? Sca (talk) 00:12, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Because it is St. Petersburg in English.--Ymblanter (talk) 06:01, 27 May 2015 (UTC)
 * It is probably because of its German form Sankt Petersburg, which needs s as an indicator of the genitive (posessive) case. Шурбур (talk) 11:41, 22 September 2017 (UTC)

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Gallery of paintings of Saint-Petersburg
Why it has been deleted? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Concord92 (talk • contribs) 03:30, 5 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Per WP:GALLERY.--Ymblanter (talk) 09:57, 5 May 2016 (UTC)

Nyenschantz
In 'Russia of the Russians' by Harold Whitmore Williams it only says on page 33 : "He [Peter the Great] was beaten at Narva, but in 1703 he beat the Swedes at Nyenschatz on the site of present day St. Petersburg, and again in the first sea fight won by Russians in modern times." The reference is not covering what is written.Taksen (talk) 08:23, 4 September 2016 (UTC)
 * But it does not make sense to say that this happened according to Williams. We need to either find a better source or to remove it. (I believe this is correct and a better source should be available, but this is debatable). --Ymblanter (talk) 18:35, 3 September 2016 (UTC)

may be it is written on another page, I will check.08:23, 4 September 2016 (UTC)

Greek name
We're told the "official Greek name is Αγία Πετρούπολη". This suggests there's an unofficial, and by implication more common, Greek name - but according to the Greek version of this article the name is either "Πετρούπολη" or "Πόλη του Αγίου Πέτρου", and no mention is made of the "official" name quoted here. In any case, few English-speaking readers will know what the Greek letters stand for, or why the Greek name might be important. Either this sentence should be deleted, or else explained.213.127.210.95 (talk) 16:29, 24 October 2016 (UTC)

Sankt
There was no established form of the toponym during Peter's life. The form Sant Pi(e)ter Burch looks like Dutch (sant is a variant for sint), others more like (Low) German, Swedish or even English. As for the argument that calvinists do not venerate saints, there are a lot of placenames in the Netherlands like Sint Pieter etc. Шурбур (talk) 13:29, 22 September 2017 (UTC)

Location
Is it just me or is the location of Saint Petersburg not on the map of Russia? The little pinpoint is missing. I checked on both Chrome and IE. Lord David, Duke of Glencoe (talk) 22:28, 23 January 2018 (UTC)
 * There's no pinpoint. The SVG map has Saint Petersburg's area highlighted red, as it is its own federal subject. AndreyKva (talk) 10:02, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * AndreyKva Thanks I see it now, it's just quite small. Lord David, Duke of Glencoe (talk) 19:51, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

Population density error
@Ymblanter: Can you sort out why the infobox is showing an error ("[convert: invalid number]") for the population density? The superficial reason is that a calculation is performed and the result is passed to convert but the calculation resulted in an error message which made convert display "invalid number". Even a month ago, the infobox had a strange mix of 2010 and 2017 items related to population. I suspect that pop_latest_date needs to be fixed, but what about the other 2017 mentions? Johnuniq (talk) 00:36, 13 June 2018 (UTC)
 * Sorry I realized I did not respond. I tried adding the auto parameter but failed, I was not sure what gives the error.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:12, 14 June 2018 (UTC)
 * But the last census was 2010. There were no censuses in 2012 or 2017.--Ymblanter (talk) 07:13, 14 June 2018 (UTC)

1991 name change key dates

 * 12 June: referendum on city's name
 * 25 June: Leningrad's city council votes to change the name  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Newyearbaby (talk • contribs) 14:05, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
 * 6 September: Russia's parliament approval of name change
 * 12 September: approval by Congress of People's Deputies of the Soviet Union?
 * 1 October: city name is officially changed

Newyearbaby (talk) 18:56, 7 September 2018 (UTC)

I'm having trouble adding in the population density of St. Petersburg to this article.
None of my edits for population and population density to the city template are not showing up. Can someone help me fix it. - KrishnaDasMath (talk) 03:09, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
 * There was no 2017 census. The last census was 2010.--Ymblanter (talk) 14:11, 9 September 2018 (UTC)
 * I know that. It is a population estimate. But the 2010 census data should be added to the article. And we stil need to add population density. - KrishnaDasMath (talk) 03:19, 24 September 2018 (UTC)

Mikhail Kutuzov, Dmitri Shostakovich, Alexander III, Kolya Vasin... Whaaa???

 * Mikhail Kutuzov
 * Alexander Blok
 * Dmitri Shostakovich
 * Peter II of Russia
 * Alexander III
 * Vladimir Putin
 * Dmitry Medvedev
 * Nicholas Roerich
 * Joseph Brodsky
 * Kolya Vasin
 * Mikhail Boyarsky

People, are you serious?? That guy might be known in collectors circles (or wherever he was known), but including him in this list looks like some kind of parody. The fact that, say, Pushkin was not considered famous enough to be included, makes that even funnier.

I'd propose removing that list completely - there are too many famous names. The full list would be too big (and at some point it would be hard to decide who deserves to be included). Any short list would look too short at best, or just laughable like this one. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dabern (talk • contribs) 11:10, 1 November 2018 (UTC)
 * I certainly agree.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:32, 1 November 2018 (UTC)

Nomination of Portal:Saint Petersburg for deletion (2nd nomination)
A discussion is taking place as to whether Portal:Saint Petersburg is suitable for inclusion in Wikipedia according to Wikipedia's policies and guidelines or whether it should be deleted.

The page will be discussed at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Saint Petersburg (2nd nomination) until a consensus is reached, and anyone is welcome to contribute to the discussion. The nomination will explain the policies and guidelines which are of concern. The discussion focuses on high-quality evidence and our policies and guidelines.

Users may edit the page during the discussion, including to improve the page to address concerns raised in the discussion. However, do not remove the deletion notice from the top of the page. North America1000 12:07, 25 May 2019 (UTC)

Not the northernmost metropolis
Helsinki (H-E-V) is (a) a metropolis; and (b) further north. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metropolis#Finland — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:7D0:8332:C680:DACB:8AFF:FEA7:FCDD (talk) 10:00, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

The citation used states that: " It is the northernmost city in the world with a population of over one million." not that its is the northern most metropolis in the world, which it is clearly not. If this information is to be included in the lead then it should represent the citation accurately. blindlynx (talk) 13:28, 19 September 2020 (UTC)

I've changed this section to read that it's the northernmost metropolis with more than 1 million people. Should be uncontroversial. JHMM13 (talk) 19:27, 29 January 2024 (UTC)

Northernmost
It can readily be seen, from looking at Helsinki, that that metropolitan area has a population of well over 1 million, and that it is (marginally) farther north than St Petersburg. What exactly are you getting at with this blatantly false claim? Bruce leverett (talk) 17:37, 29 October 2020 (UTC)
 * where is St. Petersburg's metropolitan area's population mentioned in the lead, open your eyes and read the lead. I mentioned that St. Petersburg is the "northernmost" metropolis with over 1 million residents within the city limits, the city has a total population of over 5.4 million residents. Did i mention Saint Petersburg's metropolitan area's population, which is over 6 million people, and around 5 times larger than Helsinki? I wrote "metropolis". Helsinki is a metropolis too, but has around 650k residents within the city limits. What are you trying to claim? I even changed the "northernmost metropolis" line, since Helsinki is INDEED the northernmost metropolis. But Saint Petersburg is the northernmost metropolis with over 1 million people. Helsinki does not have over 1 million residents within the city limits, we are not counting the metropolitan population here. It seems like you don't understand simple English. Danloud (talk) 17:43, 29 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Helsinki says it is the world's northernmost metro area with over one million people. This directly contradicts what we are saying in St Petersburg.  You don't see that as a problem?


 * Also, if we aren't counting the metropolitan population, why do we say "metropolis"? Bruce leverett (talk) 17:57, 29 October 2020 (UTC)
 * "A metropolis is a large city or conurbation which is a significant economic, political, and cultural center for a country or region, and an important hub for regional or international connections, commerce, and communications". - Metropolis
 * "A metropolitan area or metro is a region consisting of a densely populated urban core (which is the Metropolis) and its less-populated surrounding territories under the same administrative division." - Metropolitan area
 * Both are different things. Danloud (talk) 18:00, 29 October 2020 (UTC)
 * So, the Helsinki metro area is also a metropolis, since it's a conurbation, and fits the rest of the description as well. So it's the northernmost metropolis with a population of over 1 million.  Bruce leverett (talk) 18:08, 29 October 2020 (UTC)
 * Changed it to city. There you go. List of northernmost items -- Danloud (talk) 18:33, 29 October 2020 (UTC)

Construction serfs
The footnote citing the nuber of serf deaths is invalid. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:346:1180:4320:D8CF:F57B:F449:28F5 (talk) 18:03, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

File:Spb 06-2017 img01 Spit of Vasilievsky Island.jpg scheduled for POTD
Hello! This is to let editors know that the featured picture File:Spb 06-2017 img01 Spit of Vasilievsky Island.jpg, which is used in this article, has been selected as the English Wikipedia's picture of the day (POTD) for March 16, 2021. A preview of the POTD is displayed below and can be edited at Template:POTD/2021-03-16. For the greater benefit of readers, any potential improvements or maintenance that could benefit the quality of this article should be done before its scheduled appearance on the Main Page. If you have any concerns, please place a message at Wikipedia talk:Picture of the day. Thank you! Cwmhiraeth (talk) 11:11, 23 February 2021 (UTC)

Link to Moscow
I believe this article's first mention of Moscow in the overview, as well as the first mention in the history section, should be linked. Apparently people feel strongly it should not be linked (my edit was reverted, as was a previous edit to linkify them, I now see). But why? As a reader, I was looking for that link and found it very strange that the current capital of Russia was not linked in an article on the previous capital. The articles are clearly closely related and it's useful to a reader to have the context of reading both.

MOS:OVERLINK in particular states,


 * A good question to ask yourself is whether reading the article you're about to link to would help someone understand the article you are linking from. Unless a term is particularly relevant to the context in the article, the following are usually not linked: ... The names of [locations] with which most readers will be at least somewhat familiar

Emphasis added. Moscow may be a well-known location, but its article is especially relevant to, and helpful for understanding, the history of the previous Russian capital before Moscow. Graue (talk) 19:58, 30 June 2021 (UTC)


 * I agree that it is not unusual for a reader of Saint Petersburg to be also interested in Moscow. However, I don't think this is what Wikilinks are for.  We should be making better use of navboxes or, perhaps, series boxes.  Saint Petersburg in fact has the navbox "Capitals of Russia", but to even know that it's there, let alone use it, you have to first click the "show" button on the navbox "Articles Related to Saint Petersburg", and then click on the "show" button on the navbox "History".  Then you will see "Capitals of Russia", and click its "show" button, and it is very handy indeed, showing the historical sequence of capitals from the 9th century, including links to Moscow and others.


 * This looks like way too much pointing and clicking to me, but I am not sure of the best way to fix that. But I think that navboxes are for clicking around among related articles, while Wikilinks are for getting further information on terms with which one is unfamiliar.  Bruce leverett (talk) 02:09, 1 July 2021 (UTC)


 * It's a textbook case of WP:OVERLINKING. Double-clicking on Moscow, then right mouse button and so on is trivial. And no, it's just supplementary, it will NOT help understand Saint Petersburg better. Greetings from Biryulyovo Zapadnoye District! ;-) — Mike Novikoff 22:50, 6 July 2021 (UTC)

"Etymology" as a section title is not correctly applied, shouldn't the Etymology section be named "Toponymy"?
The section titled "Etymology" is not correctly named. The information it contains concerns the name of the city and how it changed through time, however, it is not an etymological analysis.

Etymology is the study of the origin of words and the way in which their meanings have changed throughout history. It is the study of the history of a word. The several "words" that have been names of the city are not subject to an etymological analysis, they are of course "historical" but not in an etymological way. The origin of its original name and the name that it currently holds lacks the "logical" etymology of a word that starts with its origin followed by its development as a "word" throughout history. The word "development" is most operative in this situation. The city name does not "develop", it just changes according to politics (for the lack of a better word). Etymology is a "linguistic discipline". The changing of the city name through time does reflect a "linguistic" progression.

Toponymy (there is a section with this title that contains appropriate toponymic information) is a taxonomic study of place-names, based on etymological, historical, and geographical information. A place-name is a word or words used to indicate, denote, or identify a geographic locality such as a town, river, or mountain.

The "Etymology" section should be renamed to "Toponymy" and the existing "Toponymy" should be included so that all information about the city name is in one location, in one section.

As an aside, if and when the two sections are joined as "Toponymy", it should be edited to make it more logical and readable.

Osomite hablemos  19:56, 1 August 2021 (UTC)


 * Good point, you're perfectly right. For most cities, we do have a section on etymology that actually deals with etymology, but of course not so much of an issue for St Petersburg (being a 'young' city with a picked name. Renaming to toponymy seems the best option. Jeppiz (talk) 20:15, 1 August 2021 (UTC)

Russia Link
Shouldn't there be a link to Russia at the start of the article? Pineappman (talk) 16:37, 12 December 2021 (UTC)
 * MOS:OVERLINK says that you don't need to link well-known countries. Links like this are to help people who don't know what Russia is, but everybody knows what Russia is.  This article has some navigation boxes at the bottom.  Most of them don't have links to Russia, but there is a Russia portal down there.  Bruce leverett (talk) 18:47, 12 December 2021 (UTC)

Toponymy and Toponymy
There are two sections called “Toponymy”. Should they be merged, one renamed, or all of the other sections renamed “Toponymy” too for consistency? boffy_b (talk) 14:27, 9 December 2022 (UTC)