tourpoland

25.05.2015 Each of us certainly knows the legends of Popiel or the Wawel Dragon, but few people are aware of the existence of legends that relate to the family surroundings. What is the reason for this ignorance? People who knew them died, material sources fell apart from old age. However, I got to the local poet and former teacher - Mrs. Maria Ludwiniak, who wanted to share with me the legends of my site that I had no idea about. "To begin with, I will say briefly that for many years I have been a resident of the sacred and manual lands. They are lands with a very rich history that would take young people to get to know each other and the great charm of nature. When it comes to legends, they are folk tales, fantastic, about supernatural characters, about supernatural phenomena, the real world exists next to the wonderful world. And this is one of the legends I described here, the oldest, manual legends of Mancha. This is the legend of the ghost horse. It concerned mainly the road running from Czekaj to the east towards the Saint. The road led through the forest called Łatajski Bora. It was difficult to cross, pass and even ride a horse cart. Some sections of the road were bumpy, full of protruding roots, others with deep ruts full of mud and water. The last difficult section to follow was the sands of Ciepła Góra, running across this road. As legend has it on this road people wandering at night often encountered a horse. Upon seeing the man, the horse escaped the road and, mournfully, galloped deep into the forest towards the swamps. Even more often, the wanderers heard only a pitiful neigh without seeing the horse. 64 years ago, I rode this difficult road several times during the night, but I never met a phantom horse and never heard his neigh. All I could hear was the gasping and moaning of a horse pulling a cart, which I was riding, sitting next to the coachman on a sheaf of straw covered with wool, homespun striped uniform. I remember those old "iron trucks" with flickering kerosene lamps placed on the left sides of their sides. The pothole carts banged loudly, slurried in wet places, and creaked in Ciepła Góra. The tired horses breathed heavily, panted, sweated, but the carts pulled. More than once in front of Ciepła Góra, people came out of the carts and pushed them forward, helping horses overcome the most difficult section of this road. In those years gone by, I listened to the stories of many older people who said they heard the horse's neigh on the road and even saw his shadow. An old man once told me, his name was Antoni Sałański, as in the days before World War I, the inhabitants of Czekaj repaired this forest road. They removed unnecessary shrubs and trees, drained the road by digging ditches on both sides of it. Deep ruts filled the soil from the ditches. One day, digging ditches, they came across a horse skeleton. They were a little scared, but they gathered horse bones in a linen cloth, carried them to Ciepła Góra and buried them in the sand, near the marshes. Then, near the place where they dug horse bones, they hung a small chapel on the tree, made of several boards. In the middle of the chapel they placed a picture of a Guardian Angel. I saw this chapel, I saw it many times. Years went by, the picture faded, the boards fell apart, the roadside trees rotted, people telling the legend of the ghost of the phantom died. ”The second legend tells about the extraordinary power of a certain nearby stream. "The legend of a spring flowing from Ciepła Góra. I remember the clean, beautiful forests surrounding Czekaj and the long sandy mountain along the edge of these forests. This mountain, known as the Warm Mountain, ran in one place across the old road connecting the sacred lands with the holdai land. On one side, the Ciepła Góra road separated marshes from the forest. And so it is today. On the other hand, it separated fields and the village of Choiny from the forest. Many local stories and legends were associated with the road, forest, swamp, Ciepła Góra and the spring flowing from it. Over sixty years ago, I met an elderly woman from Choin at the spring flowing from Ciepła Góra. She came with a bucket for spring water for the great-granddaughter's bathing. At that time, the woman told me the story of the spring flowing out of Ciepła Góra. It sounded more or less like this: it was the second half of the nineteenth century, part of the Polish land in this nearby area was under Russian partition. Polish insurgents often fought secretly with troops of the tsarist army. Once, after winning the battle with the invader's troops in the Kamieniec forests, one young, slightly wounded Polish insurgent was instructed by his commander to reach Czekaj. He was supposed to report to the heir of the manual land of Andrzej Zamoyski to give him a report on the battles of the insurgent troops with the invader's troops. He wandered, so he spent several nights wandering through forests and fields, he was already close to his destination, only 2 km separated him from Czekaj, when he suddenly collapsed. Blood leaked from the wounded wound and he fell unconscious at the foot of Ciepła Góra. A herd of black crows jumped from the clumps of white birches growing near the mountain and crashed frightfully over the dying insurgent. When suddenly a guard of cold water emerged from the slope of Ciepła Góra. She washed the tired body, stopped the blood flowing from the wound and gave the insurgent an already departing life. The insurgent reached Andrzej Zamoyski, he fulfilled his task, and the spring from the slope of Ciepła Góra flowed, flowed, flowed for many, many decades. For many years, women from Choin brought water from a spring for bathing babies. Apparently, children bathed in this water were joyful and healthy. Spring water cured them from all burns, abrasions and sweat. Maidens who washed their heads in spring water had beautiful, healthy and shiny hair. The old people soaked their feet in the water, tired and sore, because this water brought them relief, and the fields on which the clump of white birches grew to the present day are called "Fields under ravens." This legend was created after giving land to peasants and similar legends arose not only in this area, but also in other distant villages, but always related to dishonest land measurements. False fires almost always represented repentant souls in all legends. I learned about these fires a long time ago from an elderly stranger, he grazed cows, I passed by and said that at night these fires fly out of the swamps and measure the land from the beginning. Listening to him, I wrote such a poem: Under Ciepła Góra on a monthly night, strange things were happening. Something was hiding? With the bubbling of mud, dirty forces from the swamps flashed fire and then silence and in a moment swamp vapors enveloped Over fields, forests, meadows and marshes blue fires roseHigh? No ... the souls of the rulers dismissed their penance for wrong measurements. They measured, ran like crazy, and when the first chickens fell asleep. Erroneous fires tired work, they returned deeper into the swamps. Conversation with Mrs. Maria Ludwiniak was for me an unusual trip into a half fantastic world and at the same time connected with the places I visit every day. Unfortunately, among the majority of the local community, these stories still remain unknown and await their time.