9 Mythical Beings from the Tatra Mountains
The south of Poland is home to the amazing Tatra Mountains, the highest mountain range in the country. Local folklore says you can find a whole host of strange uncanny beasties there, so let’s take a look at the likes of the rainbow-coloured King of Snakes, the weather-controlling Płanetnik, and the dancing three deaths.
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Cover of Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer’s book ‘The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains’, 1906, photo: National Digital Library Polona
The year 1906 saw the publication of the wonderful book Bajeczny Świat Tatr (The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains) by Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer. This outstanding poet and writer, who lived in the years 1865-1940, is a household name in Poland as he was one of the country’s most important modernist authors. He gained widespread popularity thanks to his series of poetry volumes titled Poezje (Poetries) which include decadent pessimistic works influenced by the philosophy of Schopenhauer and Nietzsche.
However, Tetmajer is also valued for his work referencing Poland’s highlander folklore. He was born in the southern village of Ludźmierz, near to the Tatra Mountains. He explored them as a teenager and continued to do so later on in life. Eventually, he gained a wealth of knowledge about the culture of this amazing region, which he would write about in books like 1914’s Na Skalnym Podhalu (In the Rocky Podhale Region) or the aforementioned The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains. The latter book describes the folklore of the Tatra Mountains, focusing on such things like religious beliefs and… mythical beings.
Tetmajer writes that the breathtaking landscapes of the loftiest mountain range in Poland inspired its inhabitants to invent fantastic entities:
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For as long as anyone can remember, mountains have excited the human mind, its capabilities and creative powers; they stimulate human imagination […] by bringing before the eyes unusual, infinitely varied images that can’t be encountered elsewhere. When you look from a peak or a pass on a rainy stormy day, when the processions of mists wander through the valleys, ravines into meadows with broken rocks – how many apparitions, shapes, figures and scenes can you see there!
Author
From ‘The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains’ by Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer, trans. MK
In The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains Tetmajer describes a number of mythical beings conjured by the imagination of the Tatra highlanders. Below are just some of this book’s phantasmagorical beings which, according to legend, used to inhabit the Tatra Mountains in fairy-tale times.
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An illustration from Artur Oppman’s book ‘The Legend of the Shepherd and King of Snakes’, 1929, photo: National Digital Library Polona
We begin with what is definitely one of the Tatra Mountains’ most prominent mythical beings, the King of Snakes. It’s a monster from a popular Tatra legend that was published in numerous iterations. Other than Tetmajer’s book, it also be found, for example, in 1905’s Baśń Tatrzańska o Królu Wężów (A Tatra Fairy Tale About the King of Snakes) by Kazmierz Łapczyński.
The King of Snakes was a giant snake with a crown on its head whose henchmen, the black knights, plundered Tatra villages and kidnapped young women. Eventually, the monster was challenged by the valiant hero Perłowicz who was conceived (quite curiously) after his mother had eaten a magic pearl. After a number of adventures, Perłowicz managed to defeat the King of Snakes and banished it and the black knights to underground caves.
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The snakes had their king. It was so huge that it could coil around a large crag; its scales shone with every colour, and on its head there was a golden comb – a crown. […] Oftentimes people would see the King of Snakes as it warmed itself in the sunshine. Its entire body would sparkle then, looking like a rainbow lying on a rock.
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From ‘The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains’ by Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer, trans. MK
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Lake Morskie Oko in the Tatra Mountains, photo: Jan Włodarczyk / Forum
Like the King of Snakes, our next mythical being is also a huge animal. According to Tetmajer, a giant monstrous fish inhabited the Tatra Mountains’ iconic lake Morskie Oko, one of the most picturesque spots in the region.
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In lake Morskie Oko there was to be a huge fish, with a ram’s head, which snatched black sheep. This fish was to have a giant diamond in its head, between the eyes. I know that the late Wojtek Samek, whom I knew as a child, ‘shot at this fish.’
Author
From ‘The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains’ by Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer, trans. MK
It ought to be added though, that Tetmajer goes on to speculate that this monster might have in fact been… an otter. Someone could’ve misinterpreted the sight of an otter swimming though Morskie Oko as a monster and that’s perhaps how the story of the Morskie Oko fish originated.
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Pisana Rock in Kościeliska Valley, photo: Jerzy Opioła / Wikimedia.org
Next up we have another mythical being living in a Tatra water body. Tetmajer writes that underneath Pisana Rock is a pond where a unique duck resides. Each year, this duck lays a single golden egg! However, nobody has ever managed to reach this pond…
The impressive Pisana Rock lies in Kościeliska Valley and is a dozen or so metres high. You can indeed find a cave at its base, partially filled with water, from which a stream flows. The cave is linked to a couple of other Tatra myths too – some say that long ago a group of outlaws stored their golden loot there. So, it appears that precious eggs might not be the only treasures hidden in Pisana Rock.
Also, according to a popular legend the cave in Pisana Rock is where the so-called sleeping knights reside. These knights are in a state of eternal sleep, waiting for the right time to come to the aid of Poland. To honour this legend, in 1896 the sculptor Juliusz Bełtowski carved a sleeping knight in the rock above the entrance to the cave in question – it’s still visible today. It ought to be added though, that a different version of the legend of the sleeping knights places their cave somewhere in Tatra Mountains’ Mount Giewont.
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Cover of the book ‘A Tale About a Płanetnik: A Selection of Novellas’ by Władysław Orkan, 1926, photo: National Digital Library Polona
Another mythical Tatra being linked to water, the płanetnik was a daemon that could control rain, hail and weather in general. Tetmajer calls it ‘one of the most interesting and fantastic highlander fantasies’.
There were multiple płanetniki (the plural form of this daemon’s name) and they were typically imagined as men in straw hats and coats dripping with water. A płanetnik would drag clouds across the sky and have bags filled with hail which he would scatter across the earth. This daemon could be either malicious or friendly, depending on its relationship with particular humans. If a płanetnik disliked a certain village, he could destroy the crops there with hail. On the other hand, the daemon would protect those that he considered his friends.
Occasionally, a płanetnik would come down from the skies and spend time among people. In The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains, Tetmajer tells a charming story about a płanetnik that comes to live at a water mill and is regularly given food by one of the mill’s workers, Sobanek. In return for this hospitality the daemon always warns Sobanek about upcoming rainy weather. Eventually, the płanetnik leaves the mill and goes back to his business of dragging clouds through the sky. Before departing, he warns his host about a particularly dangerous cloud that will one day come over the mill, allowing Sobanek to take precautions.
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‘Dziwożona’ by Jan Styfi, an illustration from the weekly ‘Tygodnik Ilustrowany’, 1864, photo: Antykwariat Biz / wikimedia.org
Whereas a płanetnik could be either malicious or friendly, our next being was strictly evil. A dziwożona was a malevolent female daemon that would kidnap newborn babies and young women. Tetmajer writes that there were numerous dziwożony (the plural of ‘dziwożona’) in the Tatra Mountains.
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On mounds, in burrows on streams, and in mountain pasture gullies sat the dziwożony. They walked about naked, were similar to women, very ugly, hairy, and had loose hair and eyes that shone like oil lamps. […] On their heads they wore red hats or wreaths of buttercup flowers.
Author
From ‘The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains’ by Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer, trans. MK
Dziwożony would bedevil people not only by kidnapping babies and women but also by stealing. These daemons were known to pilfer all sorts, like musical instruments, potatoes and beer. They would also suck the milk out from farm animals like cows and sheep.
Dziwożony were dangerous but they had a significant weakness – they were afraid of bellflowers. You could ward them off by holding these flowers in your hand or by entering an area, such as a meadow, where bellflowers were growing. Tetmajer calls these daemons a ‘completely original product of highlander imagination’.
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The Brocken spectre in the Tatra Mountains, photo: Wojciech Strozyk / Reporter / East News
Another evil apparition that looked like a monk would kidnap young women and carry them off to the Tatra precipices. According to Tetmajer, the monk would show itself in the mountains just before there was a flood in the foothills. Sometimes people wandering through the Tatra Mountains would see the monk in the mist hovering over the valleys and lakes.
On examination of this phenomenon, the monk appears to be linked to an optical illusion known as the Brocken spectre. Here’s how this curious visual phenomenon is described by Encyclopaedia Britannica:
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The apparently enormously magnified shadow that an observer casts, when the Sun is low, upon the upper surfaces of clouds that are below the mountain upon which the observer stands. The apparent magnification of size of the shadow is an optical illusion. […] The phenomenon is often observed on mountain peaks but is recorded in literature with special reference to the Brocken, a peak in the Harz Mountains in Germany.
Interestingly, in Poland, the Brocken spectre is itself sometimes referred to as ‘the monk.’ So perhaps, this story from the mountains of an entity seen in clouds of mist is rooted in this optical phenomenon. It’s worth adding that according to Polish legend, if a mountain traveller sees the monk (or the Brocken spectre), they will end up dying in the mountains. You can dispel this curse though if you keep going and make sure you see the monk two more times. After that, your mountain journeys will be safe.
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A panoramic view of the Gorce Mountains, photo: Marek Podmokły / AG
The aforementioned evil apparition isn’t the only mythical entity linked to monkhood in The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains. Tetmajer also writes about the ghost of a monk that used to come out from a tree trunk:
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On Mount Centyrz […] there was a huge tree trunk, from which a ghost in the shape of a monk wearing white robes and a hood came out at night. When his feet reached the ground, he was as small as a white mushroom, but he grew quickly and became as tall as a young spruce in a matter of moments.
We ought to mention here that Mount Centyrz lies in the Gorce Mountains located about 30 kilometres to the north of the Tatra Mountains. It seems that Tetmajer included a belief linked to the former mountain range in a book about the latter one due to the proximity of the two regions.
The Mount Centyrz ghost is said to have been the spirit of a monk who had abandoned his monastery and committed a mortal sin. After dying at the hands of a band of outlaws, his ghost was condemned to remain on Earth in atonement for the clergyman’s transgressions. The said spirit appeared rarely and never harmed any people it encountered. One day, a pious man came across the spectre who shouted at it: ‘Let every soul praise the Lord!’ To that, the monk’s ghost replied: ‘I praise Him as well.’ After that, the spirit disappeared and never showed itself again.
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Detail of ‘Danse Macabre in Tallinn’ by Bernt Notke, 1475-1499, photo: . Art Museum of Estonia / wikimedia.org
Like the Mount Centyrz ghost, the three deaths would also appear at nighttime. This mythical threesome roamed through the wilderness of the Tatra Mountains region. They were feared because they would force people… to dance! If the three deaths caught you, you had to dance with them all night long among the wild bushes and juniper shrubs. This dance was said to be highly unpleasant as it left the unwilling dancer exhausted almost to the point of death. Not to mention that by the end of the night the poor dancer’s shoes and clothing would be ruined from all the movement. During their hellish dance the three deaths would sing a song:
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We, the death sisters
Born without a mother
Strangle the race of mortals
Who by God were fathered
People would observe the three deaths from afar out of nervous curiosity – wherever the threesome went, somebody was bound to die. Unfortunately, Tetmajer doesn’t provide a description of what the three deaths looked like.
We conclude our list with a more well-known monster. The Tatra werewolves weren’t much different from their counterparts elsewhere, being people who, due to a curse, would occasionally transform into a violent part wolf, part human creature. This curse was a form of punishment for severe crimes. A person transformed into a Tatra werewolf specifically would still have the body of a human, but the head of a wolf.
Tetmajer gives a curious description of how a human underwent the change into a Tatra werewolf:
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When the time comes for such a human-werewolf to be transformed, they go onto the stump of a cut tree, jump from there, make a somersault in the air and turn into a werewolf.
Tatra werewolves were feared as they would attack and even kill humans and farm animals.
In The Fairy-Tale World of the Tatra Mountains, Tetmajer also writes about a couple of other mythical Tatra beings. These include the blood-sucking daemons strzygonie and the female daemons boginki which were prone to pranks. If you’re ever in the Tatra Mountains, you never know – perhaps you’ll be able to (safely) spot some of the fantastic entities mentioned in this article!
Written by Marek Kępa, Jul 21
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