The February Revolution in Petrograd

Low wages and inflation increased workers' problems. Exam tip: connect wage demand with economic crisis.

Formation of Soviet made workers and soldiers an organised political force. Exam tip: understand Soviet as a representative institution.

The February Revolution was the first phase of the Russian Revolution of 1917. Exam tip: understand it as part of that larger process.

The correct answer is A, food shortage and factory lockout. In Petrograd, wartime disruption reduced the regular supply of bread and other essentials, while factory owners’ lockouts added unemployment and anger among industrial workers. These immediate hardships transformed existing dissatisfaction into mass demonstrations and strikes. The protest movement was therefore connected to material conditions, not to a sudden discovery of gold, foreign travel by peasants or a new church festival. Those alternatives have no direct connection with the February 1917 disturbances. The governing idea is that short-term economic crises can trigger wider political movements when people already distrust an unpopular government.

Demonstration in the city centre put more pressure on the government. Exam tip: connect place with political pressure.

After the February Revolution of 1917, Tsar Nicholas II abdicated, ending Tsarism—the autocratic monarchy in Russia. A constitutional monarchy was not established in its place; a Provisional Government was formed later. Exam tip: link the February Revolution with the fall of Tsarism and the October Revolution with the Bolsheviks coming to power.

The correct sequence begins with lockout and moves to Tsar's abdication. Exam tip: remember events for sequence-based questions.

The Tsar ordered the army to suppress the demonstrations. Exam tip: remember that the army's changed attitude was important for the Revolution's success.

The soldiers' mutiny weakened the Tsarist government's repression. Exam tip: treat the army as a base of Tsarist power.

The unity of workers and soldiers weakened Tsarism. Exam tip: remember this unity as a decisive force of the February Revolution.

The correct answer is A, Petrograd. The February Revolution began in Petrograd, the Russian capital then known as St Petersburg and later renamed Leningrad during the Soviet period. Demonstrations by women workers demanding bread expanded into strikes, and soldiers eventually refused to suppress the crowds. Because the capital contained major factories, government institutions and military units, events there rapidly challenged the Tsarist regime. Moscow was also important in Russia but was not the main starting point of this revolution. Berlin and Paris were capitals of Germany and France, so they are geographically and historically unrelated to the main site of the 1917 Russian uprising.

The correct answer is B, workers’ quarters and factories. Petrograd was socially and spatially divided by the Neva River. The right bank contained many industrial areas and densely populated settlements of workers, while the left bank was associated more with administrative buildings, palaces and important institutions. This physical arrangement helped protests spread because large numbers of workers lived close to the factories where they worked. The answer does not mean that every worker or factory was located only on that bank, but it identifies the dominant pattern described in the textbook. Palaces and embassies, only farms and a sea port do not accurately describe its main character.

The Winter Palace and official buildings were on the fashionable left bank. Exam tip: remember place and class difference together.

The correct answer is D, shortage of bread and food. During the First World War, transport difficulties, military demands and disruption of supplies made it difficult to bring adequate food to Petrograd. Long queues formed, and workers and their families faced hunger while the government appeared unable to solve the crisis. The bread shortage therefore became a powerful immediate cause of demonstrations, especially when combined with wartime losses and poor working conditions. Excess gold and growing sea trade describe neither the crisis nor its social effects. Russia was not under foreign rule at that time; the central problem was the failure of its own Tsarist government to provide stability and supplies.

The correct answer is A, a lockout in a factory. On 22 February 1917, the management of a factory in Petrograd locked out its workers. A lockout prevents employees from entering or working, so it immediately threatened their wages and livelihoods. Instead of isolating the dispute, the action encouraged workers in other factories to express solidarity, and the unrest grew into wider strikes and demonstrations. The opening of a new parliament, a Tsar’s coronation and a peace treaty were not the events that triggered this stage of the February movement. The governing concept is that an employer’s industrial action can become a political crisis when it occurs amid severe shortages and widespread opposition to the regime.

The correct answer is B, a sympathy strike. A sympathy strike occurs when workers stop working to support employees who are facing a dispute, dismissal or lockout elsewhere. After the factory lockout in Petrograd, workers from other factories joined the protest rather than treating the matter as an isolated workplace issue. This action demonstrated solidarity and helped convert a local industrial conflict into a city-wide movement. It also shows how workers’ collective action can challenge both employers and an unpopular political regime. A soldiers’ strike, church strike and foreign-trade strike are not the terms used for this event and do not explain the workers’ organised support for one another.

On 23 February 1917, women workers in Petrograd played a leading role in strikes and demonstrations against bread shortages and the war. Other workers soon joined them, and the movement spread rapidly. Tsarist officials did not lead the protests; they were part of the ruling system. Exam tip: remember the beginning of the February Revolution through women workers’ protests for bread and peace.

The action of 23 February was linked with International Women's Day. Exam tip: remember it with women workers' activism.

The correct answer is A. At the beginning of the February Revolution, no political party had planned and actively organised the entire movement. It developed through strikes and demonstrations by workers, particularly women workers demanding bread, and then gained strength when soldiers refused to fire on the crowds. Political parties later influenced events and helped shape the new political situation, but the initial outbreak was largely spontaneous rather than a centrally directed party campaign. It is therefore inaccurate to say that every party supported the Tsar, that a church party led the revolt or that foreign parties took power. The key concept is the distinction between a spontaneous mass upsurge and a planned revolution led from the start by one organisation.

Workers moved toward the centre where official areas were located. Exam tip: connect spread of movement with place.