The Miraculous Spring and the Dead Tree

The spring, emerging from the ground through seven outlets, was known locally as early as the Thirty Years’ War. The legends agree that a dead cherry tree stood beside it. In one version the landowner, farmer V. Šrejber of Svatoňovice, from what is now house no. 68, gave it to the lodger V. Prouza, who did not fell it. Šrejber ordered a small statue of the Virgin Mary and placed it on the dead tree. A year later it began budding on seven branches and bore fruit by St Wenceslas’s Day. Another version says a local cottager wanted to fell the tree. But when he took up his axe, he heard an unknown voice say, “Do not cut me.” This happened three times. He nevertheless began chopping, but the axe flew from his hands and wounded his leg. The Virgin Mary appeared to him in the tree and advised him to wash his leg in water that began flowing from its root. The wound healed immediately. Soon sick people began gathering at the spring, and many miraculous cures are recounted here. Later Malé Svatoňovice became a renowned pilgrimage and spa destination. The Baroque Chapel of the Seven Joys of Mary stands above the spring.