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Bad Schandau – legends

Legend

Around Bad Schandau people told a particularly large number of legends – of the enchanted castle maiden in the castle well, of a fiery hound that is said to have once been a cruel knight of the Berka von der Duba family, of the singing rock near Postelwitz, and no fewer than two stories about where the name Schandau comes from.

Legend The castle maiden

On the Schlossberg above Schandau lies a half-buried well belonging to the old castle. One Sunday in March a beautiful maiden in old-fashioned dress appeared there to a pious journeyman tailor: she had been under a spell for 500 years, she said, and only today could he set her free – he had to come back on Good Friday and kiss her three times, whatever she might look like then. On Good Friday, as the noon bell rang, a shimmering green monster with a toad’s head writhed its way out of the well. The tailor cried “All good spirits!” and ran off – and with a wail of lament she sank back down for another 500 years. After that he went up every Good Friday; and there, one day, as an old man, he was found dead beside the well.

Legend The fiery hound

Every night at twelve, a coal-black, shaggy hound with fiery eyes is said to have run from the old castle on the Schandau Schlossberg through the Zaukengrund into the Kirnitzschtal and back again. People said it was the accursed knight Birk von Duba, who during a famine had set his dogs on the starving beggars to chase them from his castle. He was only released around 1700, by a girl named Anna Büttner: she was sitting at her father’s grave one night when the hound lay down beside her – and instead of running away, she stroked him. At that he leapt around her, wagging his tail, licked her hand and was never seen again.

Legend The Singestein near Postelwitz

A shepherd from Pirna saw a girl tending her goats over by Postelwitz; he played the shawm and she sang along. From then on, every moonlit night he swam across the Elbe to join her on the rock. On the evening before he meant to ask for her hand, he did not come – the Elbe had taken him. At midnight his figure appeared to her and asked her to sing her song one last time; then it melted away into the mist, and the girl fell asleep on the rock, never to wake again. At full moon, they say, you can still hear mournful notes coming from the “Singestein” (Singing Stone).

Legend Where the name Schandau comes from

No fewer than two legends explain the name, and neither is flattering. According to one, a Count of Camenz ran a treacherous knight through in the Kirnitzschtal and cried out in outrage: “Death and disgrace – Schandaue shall this place be called!” (“Schande” means disgrace.) According to the other, a princess of Meissen was riding up the Elbe, found the spot at the mouth of the Kirnitzsch charming and asked the people what it was called. The name sounded so ugly that she cried “Pfui, Schande!” (“Shame on it!”) and rode on. Meiche already pointed out that the first story comes from a novel of 1835.

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