Primorsk, Russia

History

It was first mentioned in Russian chronicles as Beryozovskoye (Берёзовское, lit. birch settlement) in 1268, when the Hanseatic merchants from Gotland petitioned the Novgorod Republic to secure their passage to the Neva River. The original Finnish name Koivisto means "a group of birch trees", "a birch forest". Swedish name Björkö means "birch island". Swedes annexed the region during the Third Swedish Crusade. Novgorod formally ceded the area to Sweden in the Treaty of Nöteborg in 1323. Thereafter Primorsk was organized under the control of the Fief of Viborg. It became a separate parish from the parish of Viborg in 1575. The Russians retook the islands at the close of the Great Northern War in 1721. This was confirmed by the Treaty of Nystad in 1721.

In 1710, during the Great Northern War, the troops of Tsar Peter the Great included the whole area of the modern Vyborgsky District to Russia. In the course of Peter's second administrative reform, the area became a part of Vyborg Province of St. Petersburg Governorate. The 1721 Treaty of Nystad, which concluded the war with Sweden, finalized the transfer of this part of Old Finland to Russia.

From the History section of Primorsk, Leningrad Oblast on Wikipedia, under CC BY-SA 4.0.