„The legend of coal” (Romania)
Once upon a time it is said that there were many magical and surreal things happening in the Jiu Valley which was also called the Valley of the Burning Stones.
On this land there were two sisters witches: Rosia, a good witch, and Lesia, a bad witch. There were also many spirits, dragons and good fairies too.
At the bottom of the mountain, in a nice house, there lived a young man named Carbunel. He was a handsome, brave, hard-working young local man who was working all day long and in the evening he loved reading books. He read all kinds of books as he was smart and wise. His favourite season was winter because in winter he had more time to read. He didn’t lose any time searching for fire wood because near his house he found a lot of stones which were burning very well, better than wood, and they kept his house warm.
After the long cold winter, the spring came and along with it, came many people who were searching for the burning stones. Among these people there was a strong man, Padurean, who had a wife and three beautiful daughters. One day, Carbunel ran into the youngest of Padurean’s daughters named Leocadia. Leocadia was tall and slim, extremely beautiful and in her long white dress she looked like a delicate flower. Carbunel instantly fell in love with her.
But the bad ugly witch, Lesia, was envious because of the girl’s beauty and decided to put a spell on her: she would see Carbunel as a hideous beast so they could never be together, married and happy. Mo matter how much he tried to get close to the girl, to please her and no matter how the girl’s family tried to help them, Leocadia couldn’t stand Carbunel because of the spell.
Watching his huge suffering, the good witch, Rosia, and other good fairies decided to help him and lifted the spell off Leocadia. It was a blessed day and all of them started preparing for the wedding. Just a day before the wedding Carbunel had a bad hunch about his future wife. This bad premonition came true: his mother-in-law came to his house and told him that Leocadia and her father were both dead. They were killed by the bad witch who threw on them huge piles of burning stones from the mountain.
It is said that since that day Carbunel, heartbroken, lost his will to live and ran to the mountain, found a cave no one knew about and stayed there with his grief and unhappiness and never came back in the valley.
It is also said that since that day a lot more other people came to that land to search the burning stones. These burning stones were now called Carbunel’s stones or on short “carbuni”(coal) and they were as black as the mourning clothes and as Carbunel’s soul because of his huge grief.
“About evil Mrs. Zabrzeska” (Poland)
Mrs. Zabrzeska, the wife of the castle’s owner in Zabrze, had an only daughter whose she didn’t love. Nobody knew why she didn’t love her. Blowing out with anger, she sometimes tortured and hit the innocent child. One day, Mr. Zabrzeski – caught her doing that. He got so furious that he sentenced his wife to death. She was tore apart by two horses. However, despite the suffers caused by the mother – the daughter also died from missing her. Mr. Zabrzeski, being not able to get over the loss of the only child, set the castle on fire. That is why the following owners of the castle had to rebuild it many times. It was becoming neglected so many time that it finally totally disappeared.
“About poor Journeyman, the saint Jon” (Poland)
One day came to the castle in Zabrze a poor Journeyman, asking for help. He was given a lot of money in return for guarding the Zabrzeski’s castle on a donkey for few days. However, it wasn’t long when the owner noticed that his new guard is missing. He also got scared of the fact that the poor man could tell the robbers where he keeps his treasure. To avoid being rubbed, he put all his treasure and money into a heavy golden trunk and dig it into soil. Soon, at this place, a beautiful lime tree grew. After a while, when Mrs. Zabrzeski decided to dig the trunk out it turned out not to be there. He jumped into the tree and committed a suicide because he was so angry and sorry for the treasure loss. Till today it is believed that the poor Journeyman was the saint Jon who wanted to punish the greedy owner.
To memorize this event, at the outskirts of the city, the monument of the saint Jon was founded in XVIII century. Nowadays it stands on the graveyard on Staromiejska Street, situated on the oldest grave from XIX century.