Prince of the Rusyns, Lord of Mukacevo
Not for twenty-seven and not for thirty lands but in Subcarpathian Rus' lived King Volodar. People lived well during his reign. The herds were driven to pasture, and beneath the mountains the grapes grew; the rye, the wheat, and the forage waved in the wind. But old King Volodar died, and a new one ascended the throne. And this new king pulled a serpent named Veremij from the Danube River. He sent it to the Mukacevo hills and ordered the Rusyns to pay a tribute of twelve infants each month.
The serpent Veremij sowed much grief on the Cerneza Hora (Monk's Hill) on the waters of the Latorycja River -- grief which came upon the people on the great Hill. He had seven heads, devoured the children, and this went on for not just a year, or two, or three, or even four. Even our land became desolate, the oldsters left, and the children didn't grow up; the souls of the devoured children flew out, landed on flowers, and sobbed at the setting of the sun. And there, at the setting of the sun, over the wide expanse of Podolia ruled the brave Rusyn prince Fedor Korjatovyc. The news reached him about the serpent Veremij and about how the dragon devoured the sacrificed children. The prince thought a while and then mounted a winged horse and flew over the mountains and whirled into Mukacevo.
At midnight he stopped at the castle in Mukacevo. And then -- just before dawn a white-haired old man appeared, with his finger pointed toward Tokaj and exclaimed:
"Go to the plain at sundown and you will hear what grief there is in our Rusyn land."
The prince rode out on a horse at sundown from Mukacevo to Tokaj; the sun is shining and the red flowers are trembling under the dew all the way from Mukacevo to Tokaj. And from every flower the souls of children cry:
"O Prince, save yourself and us from the evil serpent Veremij!"
The prince went all the way to Tokaj and from then Tokaj to Makovyca, from Makovyca to Mukacevo, and was very surprised that there were no children anywhere, only old men and old women in every house.
"Bring me," - the prince said - "seven barrels of tar and seven wagons of hemp. For I shall be battling with this serpent."
The people brought from all corners of the land to Mukacevo not seven, but seven times the amount that the prince requested. And they gathered on Castle Mountain to watch what would happen.
The prince wound the hemp around his body and smeared himself with tar, took a very long sword and a shield with a six-pointed cross and went up on the Cerneza Hora to battle with the serpent.
And the serpent was laid out on the mountain, sunning itself in the sun; his seven jaws were flashing, his hide carefully glistened on his seven tails which come to a point; he was pompous and sumptuous like in a pea-pen. And so the serpent heard that someone was coming.
"I hear..." - he says - "I smell a Rusyn soul!"
"Why wouldn't it smell when I came?" - Korjatovyc said at this.
"What do you want here? Have you come to battle or to make peace?"
"What do you mean, to make peace? To fight with you, you accursed reptile!"
And so they began to fight: the woods began to rumble, and the ground started to shake. Veremij the serpent unwound, grasped the prince with its seven jaws, and also ripped off chunks of tar and hunks of hemp. And the prince swung the sword and severed a head. The severed head bounced, and blood flowed from it like a stream; the serpent burns like a fire, for he wants to live. He rowed up the Latorycja river and jumped in -- possibly the curative waters would heal his wounds.
In the meantime, the prince unwound the hemp from himself, smeared himself with the tar where needed, and the healed serpent Veremij then leaped out of the river. It charged the prince, and the prince slashed and slashed with his sword! Even the wind whistled in the woods! And once more as the prince slashed with the sword and another head flies off and bounces, and a new stream flows down the valley.
On the lone hill the bells were ringing, prayers resounding. The people fell to their knees neither alive nor dead.
Already six lopped-off heads of the serpent Veremij were bouncing around and the blood was flowing in six streams into the valley. And the lowland from Mukacevo to Tokaj was covered with red flowers which dance in colors in the sun. From each flower the childrens' souls were listening and entreating:
"Rescue us, o Prince, rescue us from the evil serpent Veremij!"
And again, the serpent leaped out, all fired up and yellow like wax. All the human blood drained from him; only the bile remained. The serpent rushed at the prince with scorching flames. He snatched the shield with the cross on it in his teeth and slammed the shield into the ground but the prince hit him on the head. The head didn't fly off so the prince slashed with the sword again; the head wasn't cut off, it only flowed with bile. With opened jaws the serpent wanted to grasp the head of the prince but the prince struck him the third time. He struck him -- and the serpent rolled over with difficulty, making the earth shudder. The bile from him flowed down the valley into a yellow sea!
The people on the hill above Mukacevo clapped their hands in amazement:
"Glory to you, o Sovereign!"
They came down from the hills -- this one with a fork, that one with an axe, and hacked the yellow monster into pieces, scattering them for the Latorycja to carry to the Danube River and the Danube to the Black Sea.
And from each flower in the other valley a soul flew out, became a drop of blood, and the drop transformed into a child. As many flowers as there were, so that many children were formed; all the blood was taken from the serpent Veremij. The yellow lake with the bile was left behind. As many children as poppy flowers are blooming, that many are clapped their hands and with thousands of voices sang:
"Glory to you, o Prince, that you vanquished the serpent Veremij!"
The prince looked at the field of children lost in the sea of snake bile and frowned. "Who is going to raise them, look after them, teach them, when in the whole country there are left only old men and old women?"
So the prince climbed on his horse and turned toward his native Podolia, to his beautiful Kamjanec. Thus he returned to his people.
And they blared the trumpets and sounded the drums early in the morning at the prince's courtyard in Kamjanec-Podolia.
"Prepare yourselves!" - the prince called to his troops - "Come, whoever wants to have orchards and grapevines, land for wheat, come down the path across the Carpathian Mountains! Take with you young ladies to raise small children, monks and nuns to teach children to read and write in school, for the joy of your prince and the glory of Rus'!"
For thirty-three days and nights along with the troops went the Podolian landlords, Rusyn sons, women, youths, monks and nuns, over the Carpathian Mountains. And the prince gave the landlords three hundred villages from Marmaroš all the way to Makovyca -- so their children and the Carpathian orphans would be able to grow up. For the monks he built a monastery on Soroca Hora (Magpie Hill), on the left bank of the Latorycja River so they would educate the children; and for the nuns another monastery -- on Cerneza Hora -- on the right bank of the Latorycja River -- so they could teach reading and writing. He also built the Church of Saint Nicholas -- with three domes, and beauty right out of paradise -- so that there would be Rusyn church services, so that pilgrimages would be held from that time to all eternity -- for the joy of the people and for the glory of Rus'.
And then the yellow sea from the serpent Veremij began to flow from below Mukacevo via the Latorycja to the Danube and from the Danube gushed into the Black Rus' Sea. And the children are growing like spring flowers, they are noisy like bees, and they sing songs, and with the songs the refrain:
"Rejoice, rejoice, Rusyn land!" "Radujsja, radujsja, Rus'ka zemle!"
And I was there, ate and drank richly did I, these songs I heard, and I so brought from there this tale from memory, with just a bit made up.
Translation: Andrew Huzinec
Editor: Richard Custer
Text copyright ©1995, Carpatho-Rusyn Society
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Last modified on September 27 1997
URL:http://www.carpatho-rusyn.org/crs/fable.htm
Greg Gressa
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