The Karkonosze Mountain Spirit · The Old Man Who Guards the Herbs

In the legends of the Karkonosze, the “Mountain Spirit” is the master of these mountains: a long-bearded old man who guards the herbs and the gold inside them, appears to travellers who have lost their way, gives them a clue and vanishes.

Sometimes he raises a storm and traps people in the mountains; sometimes he lets them go. The weather in the mountains can turn within minutes, and locals put that down to him.

The weather station and the mountain shelter both warn of the same thing: the weather here does not get worse slowly, it gets worse suddenly.

Folklore / Lower Silesia · Poland / Time immemorial