1703 - St Petersburg is founded when Peter the Great builds the Peter and Paul Fortress. A year later the Admiralty shipyard is built. Work on Letny Sad (the Summer Gardens) begins.
1710 - Alexander Nevsky Lavra is founded.
1712 - St Petersburg becomes Russia's capital.
1714 - The Kunstkamera, Russia's first museum, is founded and the first stone buildings are built.
1715 - Russia's first Naval Academy is founded.
1718 - Peter the Great executes his son Czarevich Alexei, in the Peter and Paul Fortress, which now becomes a prison for enemies of the government.
1721 - Peace is made with Sweden, ending the long Northern War. Peter takes the title emperor.
1724 - The Academy of Sciences is founded. The remains of St Alexander Nevsky are moved from Vladimir to the Alexander Nevsky Lavra.
1725 - Peter the Great dies, and his second wife, Catherine I, ascends the throne. The population of St Petersburg is about 40,000.
1728 - Peter II, Peter the Great's son, becomes emperor and moves the capital back to Moscow.
1732 - Under Empress Anna, Peter the Great's niece, St Petersburg comes capital again.
1736-37 - Fire destroys downtown St Petersburg.
1741 - Elizabeth Petrovna, Peter the Great's daughter, seizes power after deposing the child emperor, Ivan VI, ruler for less than a year.
1750 - The city population reaches about 100,000.
1754 - Francesco Bartolomeo Rastrelli begins building the Winter Palace.
1757 - The Academy of Arts is founded.
1761 - Elizabeth dies, Peter III becomes emperor.
1762 - Peter is deposed by his wife, Catherine II (Catherine the Great).
1767 - Catherine begins buying art collections, laying the foundation of the Hermitage museum.
1777 - The city is hit by flooding.
1782 - The Bronze Horseman monument is unveiled.
1785 - The Marble Palace is built by Catherine II for her lover Prince Orlov and she purchases Diderot's library for her collection.
1789 - The Tauride Palace is built by Catherine II for her lover, Prince Potyomkin.
1795 - The Imperial Public Library is founded.
1796-7 - When Catherine dies, her son Pavel begins his short rule. Construction on the Mikhailovsky Castle begins. The Russian-American Company is founded to administer Alaska, a Russian territory.
1799 - Pavel is assassinated in Mikhailovsky Castle, and Alexander I, later known as Alexander the Great, becomes emperor.
1811 - The Kazan Cathedral is completed.
1812 - Napoleon invades Russia.
1816 - Russia's first stock exchange opens on the
Spit of Vasilievsky Island.
1823 - The Admiralty building is completed.
1824 - Flooding in the city.
1825 - Alexander I dies, and the Decembrists rise up when Nicholas I ascends the throne.
1826 - Five of the Decembrist leaders are executed at the Arsenal (now the Artillery Museum).
1832 - The Alexander Column is erected.
1834 - The Senate and Synod buildings, designed by Carlo Rossi, are finished.
1837 - Russia's leading poet, Alexander Pushkin, is killed in a duel. The first Russian railroad opens between St Petersburg and Tsarskoe Selo. The Winter Palace burns down, and is rebuilt nearly a year later.
1850 - The Annunciation Bridge, now Lt. Schmidt Bridge, opens as the city's first permanent bridge.
1851 - The Moscow-St Petersburg railroad opens.
1853 - The city's population is over half a million. Nicholas I dies. Alexander II ascends the throne.
1858 - St Isaac's cathedral is finished.
1860 - The Mariinsky Theatre is opened, and the State Bank of Russia is founded.
1861 - Serfdom is abolished.
1863 - A central water supply system is opened.
1869 - Medeleyev, a professor at St Petersburg university, creates the periodic table.
1879 - The first street lights appear.
1880 - Alexander II narrowly escapes a terrorist bomb explosion in the Winter Palace. A year later he is assassinated and later the Church on the Spilled Blood is built on this spot.
1885 - The St Petersburg sea port moves from the Spit of Vasilievsky Island to its current location in the city's southeast.
1890 - Pyotr Tchaikovsky's Sleeping Beauty premieres at the Mariinsky Theatre. The city's population reaches one million.
1894 - Alexander III dies. Nicholas II becomes tsar.
1898 - The Russian Museum opens.
1903 - The Trinity Bridge spans the Neva, spurring a building boom on the Petrograd side.
1905 - Hundreds of peaceful workers and their families are shot by government troops on Bloody Sunday on Palace Square. A general strike begins, leading to a full uprising across the empire.
1906 - As part of the government's concessions, the State Duma, the Russian parliament, convenes for the first time in the Tauride Palace.
1907 - The Church on the Spilled Blood is finished.
1910 - The city's population reaches over 2 million.
1914 - World War I. The city is renamed Petrograd.
1917 - Tsar Nicholas II abdicates in what is called the February Revolution. The Bolsheviks seize power in October. The city's population reaches its peak of 21A million.
1918 - The Bolsheviks forcibly dissolve the democratically elected Constituent Assembly, called just after the Bolshevik seizure of power to choose a new post-tsarist government. The Red Terror begins as anti-communist forces march on Petrograd. The capital is moved back to Moscow.
1919 - Petrograd is under siege by the White Army. The population flees as food supplies are cut off.
1920 - Only 700,000 people remain in the city, which is totally paralysed by the communist terror.
1921 - The sailors of the Kronstadt naval base rise up against the Bolsheviks. All are massacred.
1924 - Lenin dies; the city is renamed Leningrad. The third worst flood in city history strikes.
1929 - Communist authorities begin pulling down churches as part of their anti-religion campaign.
1934 - Sergei Kirov is assassinated in his office in PRECEDING PAGES: Lenin calls for revolution. LEFT: Peter I with his family in 1720. RIGHT: a commander of the Red Army.
 
Smolny, setting off the Great Terror.
1939 - The city population is 3.2 million.
1941 - In June the Nazis invade Russia, and in September the Siege of Leningrad begins.
1944 - The Siege is lifted. The city's population has declined to 500,000.
1948 - The so-called Leningrad Affair begins, leading to the repression of local intellectuals.
1955 - The subway opens.
1964 - The Peterhof Palace opens to the public after restoration of damage caused by the war.
1979 - Construction begins on the flood protection barrier in the Gulf of Finland.
1988 - Fire rips through the library of the Academy of Sciences, destroying thousands of rare books.
1989 - UNESCO makes the city a world heritage site. The population reaches 5 million.
1991 - Anatoly Sobchak becomes the city's first mayor.
1996 - Vladimir Yakovlev becomes city governor.
1998 - The remains of Tsar Nicholas II, his family and servants are interred in the Peter and Paul Cathedral. Financial crisis paralyses Russia.
2000 - Former city deputy governor, Vladimir Putin, becomes Russia's president, and Yakovlev wins re-election as city governor. The city becomes the official capital of the Northwest Federal District.
2003 - The city celebrates its 300th anniversary, marked by infrastructure projects.