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The Punished Swede

Vilnius

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The Swedes thought that the vault of Saint Casimir’s chapel was golden and were shooting at it from the windows of the Castle gate and Colonel Diker was watching through the binoculars. As soon as he noticed that only the top was gilded, they stopped shooting.

One pushy warrior broke into the Chapel of the Gates of Dawn. The miraculous image adorned with a costly garment of silver, thickly gilded and inlaid with precious stones was there. Precious votives: necklaces of pearls, gold and silver crosses, medals, and other precious gifts, donated by people who had been favoured by the painting glittered around it. That Swede climbed on the altar, tore off the veil that covered the picture and wanted to steal the jewels.  He tried very hard, but couldn't tear off that garment, he even couldn’t tear off any of the freely hanging votives, as if an invisible force had nailed them to the picture.

Seeing that he was not getting anything, the Swede drew his sword and slashed the face of the Virgin Mary depicted in the painting. The slash made a wound and blood gushed out. Also, one of the saint's hands placed on the chest rose soon. The maiden pushed the blasphemer so hard with her hands that he flew out of the window, with outstretched arms until crashed onto the Castle gate. The bloodstain remained on the gate, where the Swede fell. For the whole century, there was no way to remove it. Even though it was often painted, plastered, and whitewashed with lime, the stain kept coming out. Even today, people still say that the gate was demolished because of that stain.

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