Bolshoy Dom (russian: Большой дом, lit. ''the Big House'') is an

office building An office is a space where an organization's employees perform administrative work in order to support and realize objects and goals of the organization. The word "office" may also denote a position within an organization with specific dut ...

located at 4 Liteyny Avenue in

Saint Petersburg Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

. It is the headquarters of the local Saint Petersburg and

Leningrad Oblast Leningrad Oblast ( rus, Ленинградская область, Leningradskaya oblast’, lʲɪnʲɪnˈgratskəjə ˈobləsʲtʲ, , ) is a federal subject of Russia (an oblast). It was established on 1 August 1927, although it was not until 194 ...

branches of the Federal Security Service of Russia (FSB) and Main Department of the

Ministry of Internal Affairs An interior ministry (sometimes called a ministry of internal affairs or ministry of home affairs) is a government department that is responsible for internal affairs. Lists of current ministries of internal affairs Named "ministry" * Ministry ...

. The building is located in the Central District of Saint Petersburg at the beginning of Liteyny Prospekt, one block from the Neva River, at the site of

Imperial Russian The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. The ...

Old Armoury Building which burned down in 1917. It was originally constructed in 1931–32 for the Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU), the

secret police Secret police (or political police) are intelligence, security or police agencies that engage in covert operations against a government's political, religious, or social opponents and dissidents. Secret police organizations are characteristic of ...

of the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

at the time. The building was designed by Soviet architects

Noi Trotsky Noi (Noah) Abramovich Trotsky (russian: Ной Абра́мович Тро́цкий; March 15, 1895 – November 19, 1940) was a Soviet architect. Biography Born in St. Petersburg to a family of a typesetter, Trotsky took art classes from ...

, Alexander Gegello and Andrey Ol in the late Constructivist style. The Bolshoy Dom building is part of a larger

complex Complex commonly refers to: * Complexity, the behaviour of a system whose components interact in multiple ways so possible interactions are difficult to describe ** Complex system, a system composed of many components which may interact with each ...

which includes the

detention facility A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, correc ...

on Shpalernaya Street, with both gaining notoriety as a prison during the

Great Purge The Great Purge or the Great Terror (russian: Большой террор), also known as the Year of '37 (russian: 37-й год, translit=Tridtsat sedmoi god, label=none) and the Yezhovshchina ('period of Yezhov'), was Soviet General Secret ...

under

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secretar ...

. In July 1934, the building became local headquarters of the newly-created People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD), when the OGPU was reincorporated as the

Main Directorate of State Security The Main Directorate of State Security (russian: Glavnoe upravlenie gosudarstvennoy bezopasnosti, Главное управление государственной безопасности, ГУГБ, GUGB) was the name of the Soviet The ...

(GUGB) of the NKVD. Bolshoy Dom subsequently became the local headquarters for the more widely known Committee for State Security (KGB) when it replaced the NKVD, and remained under KGB usage until the

collapse of the Soviet Union The dissolution of the Soviet Union, also negatively connoted as rus, Разва́л Сове́тского Сою́за, r=Razvál Sovétskogo Soyúza, ''Ruining of the Soviet Union''. was the process of internal disintegration within the Sov ...

in 1991. Bolshoy Dom became the subject of numerous

urban legends An urban legend (sometimes contemporary legend, modern legend, urban myth, or urban tale) is a genre of folklore comprising stories or fallacious claims circulated as true, especially as having happened to a "friend of a friend" or a family m ...

in Soviet and Russian culture due to its association with the secret police, including all buildings of the FSB being nicknamed Bolshoy Dom. The common

conspiracy A conspiracy, also known as a plot, is a secret plan or agreement between persons (called conspirers or conspirators) for an unlawful or harmful purpose, such as murder or treason, especially with political motivation, while keeping their agre ...

theory about the building is that it contains a large amount of secret underground floors, leading to jokes about Bolshoy Dom being the tallest building in Saint Petersburg. There is also a legend that the building survived the Siege of Leningrad during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

because

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

was aware that German prisoners of war were housed in the top floor, preventing it from being bombed.

References

External links

Big House
@ Encyclopaedia of Saint Petersburg Buildings and structures in Saint Petersburg Political repression in the Soviet Union Federal Security Service Prisons in Russia KGB Constructivist architecture Government of Saint Petersburg Prisons in the Soviet Union Buildings and structures built in the Soviet Union Cultural heritage monuments of federal significance in Saint Petersburg {{SaintPetersburg-stub