Get in
By plane
Kaliningrad Hrabrovo Airport is located 16 kilometers away from Kaliningrad. There are buses to/from the domestic terminal to the bus station (YOUzhny vokZAL), but there is no public transportation at the international terminal. Taxi service is also available, normal price is about 200 roubles. Airlines and destinations include:
By train
Train number 345 departs Berlin daily at around 21.00, arriving in Kaliningrad around 16.00 the next day. Train 344 operates the return trip, leaving Kaliningrad around 18.30 and arriving in Berlin around 07.00 the next day. Timetables of trains to/from Germany at DB.
Several trains from Moscow pass through Belarus and Lithuania. Also daily train to/from Saint Petersburg via Lithuania. Timetables at Timetables of trains to/from Poland at Poezda.net.
Timetables of trains to/from Poland at PKP - Polish Rail.
By car
Road system is highly developed in Kaliningrad region (thank to Germans, who lived there before), however, they are not always very good (major Russian problem), and sometimes it s hard to get around because of absence of the signs with destinations (especially in the city). Driving rules are generally the same like in most European countries, but not everyone follow these rules, especially when it is rush hour in the city. Be aware of the road police, because they like to stop foreigners and expect some bribes.
There are two ways to get to Kaliningrad by car - from Poland and from Lithuania, but you should expect delays on the borders (sometimes it can take couple hours)! You must have Russian insurance to cross the border, green card is not valid yet (expect it to be valid in 2007-2008). The cost of insurance is about $40-50 for 2 weeks.
By bus
Eurolines.ee Bus from Tallinn via Riga.
Bus to/from Gdansk (Zloty 28) - leaves Gdansk at 07:00 and 15:30. See http://www.itisnet.com/english/e-ce/e-poland/e-gdnsk/e-t-gdn.htm
By boat
During summer there is boat service between Kaliningrad, and Frombork, Krynica Morska and Elblarg, Poland - more info at Zegluga Gdanska
Get around
City has bus, trolleybus, and tram networks. The public transportation system is very good and quite cheap.
See
Do
Don't forget to visit Kourshian Lagoon National park (Kurshskaya kosa), a sand split between the Baltic sea and the Kourshian Bay.
Buy
Amber is the local specialty.
Eat
There is a fabulous Cafe/Restaurant named Twelwe Chairs (Dvenadtsat' Stuljev).
A VERY chic bohemian style Café with a very decent food menu.
Sleep
Because of Kaliningrad's Soviet past, most of the major city hotels are quite outdated. Look into smaller private B&B's or hire a corporate and leisure apartment. It's a nice alternative to Kaliningrad Hotel.
Kaliningrad (Калинингра́д; Lithuanian: Karaliaučius; German , Polish: Królewiec; briefly Russified as Кёнигсберг Kyonigsberg), is a seaport and the administrative center of Kaliningrad Oblast, the Russian exclave between Poland and Lithuania on the Baltic Sea. As of the 2002 Census, its population was 430,003, which is up from 401,280 recorded in the 1989 Census).
Under its original German name of Königsberg, it was the capital of the German province of East Prussia, the earlier Duchy of Prussia, and before that of the Monastic State of the Teutonic Knights.
Geography
Kaliningrad is located at the mouth of the navigable Pregolya River, which empties into the Vistula Lagoon, an inlet of the Baltic Sea.
Sea vessels can access Gdańsk Bay and the Baltic Sea by way of the Vistula Lagoon and the Strait of Baltiysk.
Until circa 1900 ships drawing more than 2 m of water could not pass the bar and come into town, so that larger vessels had to anchor at Pillau (now Baltiysk), where merchandise was moved onto smaller vessels. In 1901 a ship canal between Königsberg and Pillau was completed at a cost of 13 million mark, which enabled vessels of a 6.5 m draught to moor alongside the town. (See also Ports of the Baltic Sea.)
Khrabrovo Airport is located 24 km north of Kaliningrad, and has a few scheduled/charter services to several destinations throughout Europe. There is the smaller Kaliningrad Devau Airport for general aviation. Kaliningrad is also home to Kaliningrad Chkalovsk naval air base.
History
Teutonic Order
Around 300 BC an Old Prussian settlement called Tvanksta (also Tvangste, Tvangeste) was founded near the site of modern Kaliningrad. This settlement was conquered and destroyed during the conquest of Prussia by the Teutonic Order. In its place Königsberg ("King's Mountain") was founded in 1254 by the Order, named in honour of one of their Northern Crusaders, King Ottakar II of Bohemia, who paid for the erection of the first fortress there. Over a long period, the Teutonic Knights, assisted by various knights from Western Europe, conquered the indigenous Baltic Old Prussians. This marked the beginning of the extermination of pagan Baltic culture and German colonisation of the area. The small remaining population of Old Prussians eventually became Germanised. However, the Old Prussian language did not become extinct until the 18th century.
Königsberg was originally the capital of Sambia, or Samland, one of the four dioceses into which Prussia had been divided in 1243 by the papal legate William of Modena. Saint Adalbert of Prague became the main patron saint of Königsberg Cathedral, one of the main landmarks of the city.
Königsberg eventually became a member of the Hanseatic League and an important port for the southeastern Baltic region, trading goods with Prussia, Poland, and Lithuania.
As a result of its defeat in the Thirteen Years' War at the hands of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Monastic State of the Teutonic Knights was reduced by the dictated Peace of Toruń in 1466 to the area of the later Duchy of Prussia, held by the Teutonic Order under the feudal overlordship of the Polish crown. The Order saw the actions of Poland as a betrayal of their original mission and pledges, the Polish Duke of Masovia, Konrad, having first called in the crusaders to eliminate the Pagan Prussians who were constantly raiding his territory, causing death and destruction, and who, as the Polish historian Vincent Kadlubek states, had resisted all Polish attempts to subdue and convert them. Konrad promised the Teutonic Knights the heathen Prussian lands they conquered (although they were not his to promise).
Duchy of Prussia
With the secularisation of the Order's territories in 1525, Grandmaster Albert of Prussia of the Hohenzollern dynasty became the Duke of Prussia after paying feudal homage to King Sigismund I of Poland. The capital of the fief was Königsberg (Królewiec). It became one of the biggest cities and ports of the Prussian region, having considerable autonomy, a separate parliament and currency, and with German as its dominant language.
Anna, daughter of Duke Albert Frederick, married Elector John Sigismund of Brandenburg, who was granted the right of succession to Prussia on Albert Frederick's death in 1618. From this time the Duchy of Prussia and Königsberg were ruled by the Electors of Brandenburg, the rulers of Brandenburg-Prussia.
Brandenburg-Prussia and German Empire
In the Treaty of Oliva in 1660 the Hohenzollern dynasty negotiated the release of the Duchy of Prussia from Polish sovereignty for the duration of their line, upon the expiration of which the duchy would revert back to Poland. By the act of coronation in Königsberg in 1701, Prince-elector Frederick III of Brandenburg became King Frederick I of Prussia, King in Prussia, independent in Prussia (though not in his other domains) from both Poland and the Holy Roman Empire. After the Partitions of Poland, Königsberg became the capital of the newly-created province of East Prussia within the Kingdom of Prussia.
Königsberg became a centre of education when the Albertina University was founded by Albert of Prussia in 1544. The university was situated opposite the north and east side of the Königsberg Cathedral. In 1560 Albert's sovereign, Polish king Sigismund II of Poland equalled the university in law with the University of Kraków. In 1900 it contained the Municipal Library. In 1862 a new university in the Renaissance style, was completed. The facade was adorned by an equestrian figure in relief of Albert of Prussia, the founder. Below it were niches containing statues of Martin Luther and Philipp Melanchthon. Inside was a handsome staircase, borne by marble columns. The Senate Hall contained a portrait of Emperor Frederick III and a bust of Immanuel Kant by Friedrich Hagemann. The adjacent hall ("Aula") was adorned with frescoes painted in 1870. The university library was situated in Dritte Fliess Straße and contained over 230,000 volumes. There were 900 students in 1900.
Königsberg as well was the place where the first printed books in Lithuanian language were published and it for long remained the center of the publishing in Lithuanian because here there were educated Lithuanians (from Lithuania Minor, which was as well part of East Prussia; in Lithuania Minor sermons after the Protestant reformation were held in Lithuanian, and thus Lithuanian prayer books were needed). Protestantism and policies of Prussia promoted education and this helped as well. The first non-religious Lithuanian books were published later as well.
It was the birthplace (1690) of the mathematician Christian Goldbach, the writer E.T.A. Hoffmann, and the home of the philosopher Immanuel Kant. In 1736, the mathematician Leonhard Euler used the arrangement of bridges and islands at Königsberg as the basis for the Seven Bridges of Königsberg Problem which led to the mathematical branches of topology and graph theory. More latterly Königsberg was the birthplace in the 19th century of David Hilbert, the most influential mathematician of the first half of the 20th century and professor at the German intellectual centre of the University of Goettingen.
Also in the Dritte Fliess Straße was the Palaestra Albertina, established in 1898 for the encouragement of the higher forms of sport among the students and citizens. Nearby were the government offices, adorned with mural paintings by Knorr and Schmidt.
In the König Straße stood the Academy of Art with a good collection of over 400 pictures. About 50 works were by old Italian Masters; and some early Dutch paintings were also to be found there. (A summary list of some of the paintings can be found in Baedeker's Northern Germany, London, 1904.) At the Königs Tor (King's Gate) stood statues of Otakar I of Bohemia, Albert of Prussia and Frederick I of Prussia. Königsberg had a magnificent Exchange (completed in 1875) with fine views of the harbour from the staircase. In Bahnhof Strasse (Railway Street) were the offices of the famous Royal Amber Works – this district was celebrated as the "Amber Coast". There was also an Observatory fitted up by the astronomer Friedrich Bessel, a Botanical Garden and Zoological Museum. The "Physikalisch", near the Heumarkt, contained botanic and anthropological collections and prehistoric antiquities.
Of Königsberg's notable structures, the 1815 Encyclopaedia Britannica refers to "the magnificent palace in which is a hall 83.5 m long and 18 m broad without pillars to support it, and a handsome library. The gothic tower of the castle is very high (100 m) and has 284 steps to the top, from where a great distance can be seen". This extensive building, enclosed in a large quadrangle and situated almost in the centre of the city, was formerly a seat of the Teutonic Order. It was altered and enlarged in the 16th - 18th centuries. The west wing contained the Schloßkirche, where Frederick I of Prussia was crowned in 1701, and Wilhelm I, later the first Emperor or Kaiser of Germany, as King of Prussia, in 1861. The arms emblazoned upon the walls and columns were those of the Knights of the Order of the Black Eagle. Above the church was the spacious Moscowiter-Saal, one of the largest halls in Germany. Until the latter part of World War II the apartments of the Royal Family and the Prussia Museum (north wing) were open to the public daily. An extensive collection of provincial archives was also housed there.
By 1800 the city was approximately five miles in circumference and had 60,000 inhabitants (including a military garrison of 7,000). After the abolition of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, Königsberg remained the capital of East Prussia, which was outside the formal borders of the German Confederation of 1815-1866. it was incorporated into the German Empire in 1871.
Königsberg flourished as the capital of East Prussia. An extensive local railway network was established linking the city to Breslau, Thorn, Insterburg, Eydtkuhnen, Tilsit, and Pillau. In 1860 the railroad connecting Berlin with St. Petersburg was completed and made Königsberg an even more important commercial centre. Extensive electric tramways were in operation by 1900; and regular steamers plied to Memel, Tapiau and Labiau, Cranz, Tilsit, and Danzig. Two large theatres were built during this time: the Stadt (City) Theatre and the Appollo. By 1900 the city's population had grown to 188,000, with a 9,000-strong military garrison.
Weimar Republic
After World War I, the creation of the Polish Corridor cut off the East Prussian land connection from the rest of Weimar Germany. The Ostmesse (East European Fair) at the Königsberg Tiergarten was organized every year since 1920, it was intended as a compensation for the geographical distance that handicapped the economic development of East Prussia and its capital Königsberg. In 1922 the first permanent airport and commercial terminal solely for commercial aviation was built at Königsberg-Devau. In 1929, Königsberg amalgamated with some surrounding suburbs.
Third Reich
In 1932 Prussia's legal (Social Democratic) government under Otto Braun was ousted by the Reich Government, and Gauleiter Erich Koch replaced the elected local government during Nazi rule from 1933 to 1945.
In 1935, the Wehrmacht designated Königsberg as the Headquarters for Wehrkreis I, (under the command of General der Artillerie Albert Wodrig) which originally took in all of East Prussia. Wehrkreis I was extended in March of 1939 to include the Memel area. In October of 1939, it was extended again to include the Ciechanów and Suwałki areas. In 1942, the Wehrkreis was again expanded to include the Białystok district. Army units that called Königsberg home included the I Infantry Corps, which was part of the pre-Nazi era Standing Army; the 61st Infanterie Division, which was formed upon mobilization from Reservists from East Prussia. It took part in the invasion of Belgium, and Russia.
Winston Churchill referred to Königsberg as "a modernised heavily defended fortress".
=Bombing by British=
In 1944 Königsberg suffered heavy damage from British air attacks and burned for several days. Occasionally bombed by the Soviet Air Forces, No. 5 Group of the Royal Air Force first attacked the city on the night of 26/27 August 1944. The raid was in the extreme range for the 174 Avro Lancasters that flew 1500 km from their bases to bomb the city. Fortunately for the Königsbergers, this first raid was not successful, most bombs falling on the eastern side of the town. (Four of the attacking aircraft were lost.)
Three nights later on the 29/30 August, a further 189 Lancasters of No. 5 Group tried the target again dropping 480 t of bombs on the centre of the city. Bomber Command estimated that 20% of all the industry and 41% of all the housing in Königsberg was destroyed in the attack. A heavy German night fighter defense downed fifteen of the attacking bombers (7.9% of the force).
The historic city center, consisting of the quarters Altstadt, Löbenicht and Kneiphof was in fact completely destroyed, among it the cathedral, the castle, all churches of the old city, the old and the new universities and furthermore the old shipping quarter.
=Red Army's capture of Königsberg=
Many people fled Königsberg in advance of the Red Army's advance after October 1944, particularly after word spread of Soviet atrocities at Nemmersdorf and Gumbinnen. Soviet forces under General Chernyakhovsky reached the city on January 13, 1945 and had encircled the city by the end of the month, but a temporary German breakout allowed many of the remaining civilians to escape via train and naval evacuation from the nearby port of Pillau (now Baltiysk). The siege of Königsberg (or Battle of Königsberg), which had been declared a "fortress" (Festung) by the Germans and fanatically defended, raged all through February and March. The city was bombed and shelled continuously. The Red Army force for the final assault numbered 137,250 men, supported by almost 5,000 artillery pieces, 540 tanks, and 2,450 aircraft. Chernyakhovsky was succeeded by Marshal Aleksandr Vasilevsky.
On April 9 — one month before the end of the war in Europe — the German military commander, General Otto Lasch, surrendered the remnants of his forces, which had numbered 35,000. For this act, he was sentenced to death in absentia by Hitler, who declared him a "traitor." At the time of the surrender, military and civilian dead in the city were estimated at 42,000, with the Red Army claiming over 90,000 prisoners. (Lasch's subterranean command bunker has been preserved in Kaliningrad as a museum.)
About 50,000 survivors (out of Königsberg's prewar population of 316,000) remained in the ruins of the devastated city. These survivors, and a few others who returned immediately after the fighting ended, were held as virtual prisoners until 1949, during which time many died of disease and starvation. A significant number committed suicide. The remaining German residents were expelled in 1949-50.
Soviet Union
At the end of World War II in 1945, the city became part of the Soviet Union pending the final determination of territorial questions at the peace settlement (as part of the Russian SFSR) as agreed upon by the Allies at the Potsdam Conference:
VI. CITY OF KOENIGSBERG AND THE ADJACENT AREA
The Conference examined a proposal by the Soviet Government that pending the final determination of territorial questions at the peace settlement the section of the western frontier of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics which is adjacent to the Baltic Sea should pass from a point on the eastern shore of the Bay of Danzig to the east, north of Braunsberg and Goldap, to the meeting point of the frontiers of Lithuania, the Polish Republic and East Prussia.
The Conference has agreed in principle to the proposal of the Soviet Government concerning the ultimate transfer to the Soviet Union of the city of Koenigsberg and the area adjacent to it as described above, subject to expert examination of the actual frontier.
The President of the United States and the British Prime Minister have declared that they will support the proposal of the Conference at the forthcoming peace settlement.
It was renamed Kaliningrad in 1946 after the death of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR Mikhail Kalinin, one of the original Bolsheviks. The German population was expelled and the city was repopulated with Russian citizens. Life changed dramatically: the city had a new name (Kaliningrad), and German was replaced by Russian as the language of everyday life. As one of the westernmost territories of the USSR, the Kaliningrad Oblast became a strategically important area during the Cold War. The Soviet Baltic Fleet was headquartered in the city in the 1950s. Because of its strategic importance, Kaliningrad was closed to foreign visitors.
In 1957 an agreement was signed and later came into force which delimited the boundary between Poland and the Soviet Union. (Full text: , for other issues of the frontier delimitation see )
Russian Federation
Due to the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Kaliningrad Oblast became a Russian exclave, separated from the rest of Russia. Kaliningrad is the only Russian Baltic Sea port that is ice-free all year.
When Poland and Lithuania became members of the European Union in 2004, the region became completely surrounded by the EU. Special travel arrangements for the territory's inhabitants have been made.
Today, there is some debate about giving the city its old name back, as has happened in several Russian cities like St. Petersburg and Tver, which were known as Leningrad and Kalinin, respectively, during much of the Soviet time period. However, the continued use of "Kaliningrad", at least for the next few years, seems certain. "Kyonig" (shortened Russian form of "Königsberg") is often used in advertisements for tourism companies in this region.
Historical names
Sightseeing
Famous residents
Writers
Athletes
Cosmonauts
People of Science
Others
Sister cities
See also
External links
Footnotes
