Ural springs

“It happened in ancient times. When the sky was higher and the water clearer. He lived in the wilderness neither old nor young, neither lame nor oblique, cheerful and mischievous, in a word - a goblin. And his name was Gregory. He was not evil, but he liked to play pranks and play pranks. It used to lure a traveler into the wilderness, lead, lead through the clearings and along the edges, along the brown and young undergrowth. The poor fellow will shout "ay" enough, to the point of hoarseness. Then Grigory will lead him to a clearing with mushrooms and berries. And the one happy that he went out and did not get lost, it happened, and he would forget what he was going into the forest for.

And then one day he met a girl in the forest. She seemed to be not a beauty in her face, but he felt her spiritual beauty. And so that she was longer in the forest, he hid all the mushrooms and berries on her way. So they wandered all day through the forest. But still, towards evening, Grigory took her out to a clearing with berries and mushrooms, and then led her to the village. The girl fell in love with him. Gregory began to grieve and grieve over her. And then he disappeared somewhere. And in the spring, a spring appeared near the village with clean and tasty water, and since then people have stopped wandering in the forest. That girl, having learned about the spring, began to come to him for water to wash herself. This is how Grigory managed to get closer to his beloved, caress her face and hands. Since then, the people have nicknamed the spring Grigorievsky.

The beautifully equipped Silver Hoof complex in Kamyshlov, where the memory of the wonderful countryman P.P. Bazhov, and the traditions of the Ural land, and the amazing skill of modern craftsmen.

Kolomna spring

This is just a tale. But there is a living tradition before the start of haymaking, be sure to come here and ask the goblin Gregory to take the bad weather away from their haymaking. Just like washing newborn babies with water from it. And this custom has been around for more than a dozen years, it was kept even when the authorities struggled with any manifestations of superstition. A fairy tale is a lie, but there is a hint in it ... Each spring has its own legend, its own story, and it is passed on by local residents from generation to generation. All legends are different, like the keys themselves, and like them, the tales are bright and pure, and they certainly tell about eternal love, selfless friendship, loyalty and devotion that should accompany human feelings.

Is this not evidence of the holy attitude to water in Russia! Small bright keys pulsing from the depths of the earth, the blood of the planet, feed all the great rivers. And it is no coincidence that the words “clan”, “relatives”, “native”, “Motherland” and “spring” have a common root, symbolizing the connection of people with those places where their roots are, where the source of their kind.

There is also a purely rational explanation for the very special veneration of springs. As a rule, underground water, beating in them, is tasty and often curative. That is why our ancestors so guarded these sources of living water, that is why they erected pagan temples or Orthodox chapels over them, that is why he commanded these places as holy. But civilization changes nature. And today the world already really feels the shortage of clean water.

We pay dearly for the comfort and convenience of modern life. The ecological state of industrially developed regions is close to catastrophic, even groundwater suffers. This misfortune did not bypass the Ural region, whose industrial centers were conceived near rivers and lakes. But with all the awareness (and declaration) of the importance of solving environmental problems, city and regional authorities most often do not have money for environmental protection measures. Although, they say - “there would be a desire” or, which is more fashionable (and actual) - “political will is needed”.

Here, for example, the arrangement of springs in the Sverdlovsk region. It was enough to consider them “sources of non-centralized water supply”, create a state target program by the decision of the regional government, and ... sources of funding were found: funds from the regional budget within the framework of the regional state target program “Ecology and Natural Resources”, money provided to municipalities from the regional budget to solve local environmental problems, as well as own funds of organizations and citizens.

And it’s interesting that from the very first year of its work, the Program, in addition to its main goal - “maximum involvement in the structure of drinking water supply of natural underground sources, their arrangement and competent operation, preservation for the present and future generation, as well as environmental education and education” - began solve many other problems. According to Vyacheslav Surganov, head of the coordinating council for the implementation of the Rodniki program, this is one of the few programs where “everyone unites - state power, municipal self-government, labor and children's groups, individual citizens, moreover, of any age. Their goals and objectives are the same and the result is common. Feedback "people - power" on the example of the state program "Rodniki" is tangible and convincing."

For three years (2001-2003) 1140 springs were equipped in the Sverdlovsk region, including 338 springs!