Long ago, when I was a teenager, this mystical story my grandmother told me. Then I was very scared, although even now, after many years, I remember her with a shudder.
It may seem to someone that there is no mysticism here, but I think it could not have done without it. Grandmother was talking about her friend, named Nikolai. Young, he served in the Navy, part of him settled close to the farm, where, I must say, wealthy people lived.
So, there was such a terrible story. The daughter of a very rich man decided to marry a young, handsome guy. They bought everything for the bride - jewelry, shoes, a veil, but the girl could not choose a dress for herself. And in the evening, a knock at the door, a woman is standing on the threshold. People, the owners were polite, invited her to the house, asked why she came.
A stranger answered them that she wants to sell a wedding dress. Her daughter didn’t have enough, because the groom bought without her knowledge, but they don’t take it back. Parents began to doubt, but when the woman took out the outfit from the bag, the girl gasped directly. This is exactly what she dreamed of. The most curious thing is that the price for it turned out to be low.
And so, before the wedding, the bride goes to bed, and in the morning, they cannot wake her up. The lifeless body was examined by healers, ascertained death.
Parents were terrified of grief, the groom was all “black”, but nothing could be done. The most mysterious thing was that from what the young girl died, not a single doctor could say. The relatives refused to do an autopsy. And now, instead of a magnificent wedding, a tragedy came to the house. On the day of the funeral, they dressed the failed bride in a wedding dress, the one that was bought from an unknown woman, put on all the jewelry, shoes and a veil. The girl lay as if alive, and the grief of her parents was impossible to describe in words.
The coffin in which the body rested was decided to be placed in the family crypt.
A week has passed since the funeral. Nikolai, who served in the Navy, and was near the farm, was given a leave. He knew about the story that had happened, and now an idea crept into his head and his colleagues, who went on dismissal with him, to feed on the contents of the crypt, to remove expensive jewelry from the deceased. We thought and went. One was left at the entrance, the rest went inside. They opened the lid of the coffin - the bride lies as if alive. Jewelry began to be removed, and the girl suddenly opens her eyes and hugs one of the robbers. The men screamed, seized by their animal horror, so much so that they rooted to the place.
And the girl got out of her crypt and went home. Everyone who saw her fell into a stupor - the deceased is walking along the farm. Everything turned out to be very simple, on the night before the wedding, the young lady fell into a lethargic sleep, and the pulse in this state is very difficult to feel and the heartbeat too.
The story is very strange, because the dress that the strange woman sold turned out to be her late daughter. The girl did not live to see her wedding, she was fished out of the river.
It happens that a person is completely unlucky in his personal life, no matter what he does. So over one girl hung such a crown of celibacy. Some, after unsuccessful attempts, spit on everything and spend the rest of their lives alone, but not her. This girl had the biggest dream in the world - to get married. What she didn't do. But, as they say, no luck.
The strangest thing: both clever and beautiful, but there is no life. But even this is not enough. At thirty-five, she was diagnosed with a malignant tumor, two operations were performed, they thought it worked out, but no, metastases began, respectively - everything has already become clear. And before her death, she most of all lamented that she had never been married, that no one needed her. It was not easy for the mother anyway, and from these words the heart simply bled. She and her husband for forty years almost soul to soul.
In the end, the girl died. They buried her, celebrated a service in the church, a commemoration. Only nine days have not passed, she is dreaming of her mother - she herself is cheerful, beautiful, all glows, laughs all the time. And they have this conversation.
- Well, how are you, baby?
- Okay, mommy. Got married here.
— For whom? the old woman is surprised.
— Yes, there is one guy, good, kind.
- Well, you have to.
“Do you want me to show it to you?”
- Yes, of course, come on.
“Tomorrow at twelve, come to the beginning of the street, a house with a blue roof near the store, and you will see him there.
And that's it, the old woman woke up. He sits and cannot understand whether the dream was true or a lie. It seems that here she is a daughter, she still stands before her eyes, but all this is strange. It can't be like that. She suffered all night, overcame her husband, and he said: “If you want, go, it won’t decrease. So at least you can calm down."
At the appointed hour, a grandmother stands near that very house. Wrinkles, does not know how to enter, what to say. And around the people - darkness, the pasik drove up, everyone sits down there. More and more silently, if only they exchange a few words. When she saw women in black headscarves, she understood everything what kind of groom she was. And indeed, soon a zinc coffin was carried out of the house - in it was a boy at all, about eighteen years old, thin, pale.
Mother hustled a little more and found out - recently sent from the army - an accident at the exercises. Someone fired by mistake from their own, but hit the artery, they were not saved. An unsubscribe to the parents on a piece of paper, yes a load of 200, and her dead daughter's fiance. Here is such a story.
Reading time: 2 min
Every year my friends and I travel far from the city in search of new fishing spots. And one of these places turned out to be very dangerous and mysterious. I must say that our company is diverse: Max is a lawyer, Antokha is a builder, Semyon is a programmer, I am a doctor. With such a composition, even to the ends of the world. But that summer it brought us to a small farm of 30 houses. In fact, we would not have noticed him if not for Anton’s cry in the middle of the road:
- Turn around!
Max slammed on the brakes in fright, Sema poked his forehead into the front seat, grimaced:
- Are you crazy?
- Turn off, I say, there is such a beauty!
Max did not understand, snorted with displeasure, but listened.
The domina, which Anton noticed, was impressive: a solid log house with a high, sharp roof, a painted truth, a peeling porch and bizarre shutters.
- You look! This is a masterpiece of architecture! - already sat down with Antokh's delight, running around the house and photographing him on a smartphone.
We also admired, but not so violently.
- Carved shutters! Vintage! They are at least 200 years old! Handmade, jeweler straight! How did it survive... Eh, it's a pity we can't go inside.
The house was locked and looked uninhabited. I began to yawn, Sema, as always, buried himself in the phone, and Max climbed into the thick grass. It was he who discovered the river down the slope and an excellent place for a halt. We set up a tent, lit a fire and took out fishing rods. What a bite went! Just make sure you throw the bait.
Farm houses could be seen about a kilometer away, but we did not want to disturb the locals, and there was no need to. But they themselves did not go unnoticed. I undertook to boil the fish soup, seasoning it to my taste. He salted it, tasted it, and shuddered: an old man with a sparse gray beard, but a lively and inquisitive look, sat down next to him. Where did he grow up from?
He sniffed at the bowler hat and chuckled approvingly:
- Not everyone puts wild garlic in their ears. Not everyone will find it in the grass!
I took it as a compliment.
- Expanse is here for you!
The old man chuckled.
- Look! Urban, but you understand!
- I had a rural childhood.
Then the guys returned with a catch. We met.
Grandfather called himself Afanasy Savelich, said that before the farm was a big village, the villagers lived richly. And then everyone began to disperse, as dashing times have come ...
- Whose house is that? Anton asked curiously.
The old man chewed a blade of grass:
- So the landowner is. Only the landlord is long gone.
- With history mean? Max supported the conversation.
And then! It was built by Fyodor Mokry, self-taught from God, the house has been standing for two centuries, neither the revolution, nor the war, he does not care, and there is a library, and an orphanage, and a general store ..
- And now?
- It's empty now. Nobody stays there for long. But the house will outlast many of you.
- Craftsmanship is unique! Antokha sighed.
- Of course. The landowner built it for his daughter as a dowry, but it was not useful ..
I smelled an interesting story and invited the old man to have dinner with us - the fish soup was ready. Everyone reached for their plates. I won't brag, but I'm a master at cooking. Ate slowly savoring fresh sweet fish. It's already starting to get dark. Sema even forgot about his phone, but quickly remembered when his plate was empty and went to charge it in the car.
- And why was the dowry of the landowner's daughter not useful? I reminded.
So she died prematurely.
- Why did she die? If she was young, I insisted.
- So the young die, if death comes to them at someone else's call ...
At this point, Max turned on with his ability as a lawyer to understand allegory:
- Vasya, Afanasy Savelyich is trying to tell you that they killed her.
I frowned:
- Why not say it directly?
The old man smiled.
- That's why you are!
- He is a doctor with us, that's why he's kicking! Max chuckled.
- We respect dokhturov! the old man answered seriously. “But we don’t have them left on the farm, we treat ourselves with herbs.”
Why did they kill the girl? - Max directed the old man in the right direction of the conversation.
Afanasy Savelitch cleared his throat and sighed sadly:
- Martha was beautiful, stately, proud. Her father raised her alone, loved her, indulged in everything. She chose the groom herself, according to her heart. Father did not resist, although the guys and richer wooed. They began to prepare for the wedding. The landowner was in a hurry to complete the house in order to feast in it. But two days before the wedding, Marfa and her fiancé disappeared. The whole village was looking for...
Our narrator fell silent, pensively peering into the darkness.
Found? - I could not stand it.
The old man nodded in agreement.
- Found in the river. Upstream. It was a cruel death. Mutilated, mutilated, thrown into the water.
- Who? Groom? - again, included Max's inner lawyer.
- The guy was never found. But no one thought about it. He couldn’t do such a thing, he blew off dust particles from Marfa ...
- And where did it go?
The old man waved his hand dismissively.
- Look around, forests and fields, if you dig in, no one will find it, and you yourself will forget where you hid it, they used to say that they saw strangers passing by from the neighboring village, but this is nonsense ...
- Why?
The old man did not have time to answer. It seemed to me that someone was calling, and I interrupted:
- Do you hear?
Nobody heard anything.
- Where is Semyon? For some reason I got excited.
- Probably fell asleep in the car, - answered Anton, who had been dozing all this time.
But again I heard someone crying. I jumped up and ran to the car. Semy was not there. Started calling, no response. They grabbed the logs burning from the fire, split up and went to look for them. I went down to the river. Silence. The water rolls in black. I walked along the shore, again some strange sound - either a cry, or a call. I don’t believe in devilry, after all, a doctor, but then I got scared. And when the shadow flashed, the nerves passed. Is it a ghost?
Backed away. He stepped on a stick. She crunched loudly. I came to myself from a sharp sound. He bent down to the water to rinse his face and saw something white by the reeds... A shirt? Sema! Shouted at the top of his lungs:
- Here! Found.
And into the water. Pulled out. I'm pumping out. The guys are standing next to each other. The old man hobbled. But Sema shows no signs of life. I pump faster: two clicks per second, thirty per minute. God, how long has it been...
- Too late...
Don't think, do!
Finally he coughed! I breathed a sigh of relief. We all returned to the fire together. When Sema came to himself, he told that he had put the phone on charge in the car, and suddenly someone called him. Decided the wind is naughty. Suddenly there was another sound, like a cry. I went to him to the river and went out - what if the kid decided to swim? Nobody. I wanted to go back, but I got caught on something, my head was spinning. Fell. Semyon didn't remember anything after that. The old man grunted:
Did you hear the call and cry? This is Martha looking for her groom. A dead bride. A restless soul is waiting for a loved one, apparently, she did not find him in heaven, and she jokes among the living. A lot of people have sunk into the water here.
Semyon, not understanding, goggled his eyes. Max and Anton sat in silence, their heads bowed. Fatigue came over me, I wanted to sleep, and common sense resisted believing in the old man's tales.
- You scared us with your stories, Afanasy Savelich.
- Oh, they are not mine, the local people. I'll go. You get better, boy, - the old man got up and patted Seeds on the shoulder. - Yes, eat more, the thin one hurts, so your head is spinning from our clean air and herbs of smells. Be there!
- Maybe you should be seen, otherwise how will you go through the darkness alone? I started.
- Do not get lost yourself, but I will come here with my eyes closed.
In the morning we decided to interrupt our fishing trip and return home, out of harm's way.
I insisted that Semyon do a tomography of the head. It turned out that a couple of months ago in the gym he hit an iron bar, a hematoma formed, and against its background, overwork and excess oxygen led to fainting. Seems like a simple explanation. But the thought haunts me: I didn’t beat my head against anything, but I also heard that cry. And what would happen if I approached the river at night?
Vasily Gurihin, 42 years old
" and " Queen of Spades: Black Rite».
How did Svyatoslav come up with the idea to take such a popular topic for modern Russian cinema - a wedding (“ Bitterly!», « The best day», « Classmates”) - and turn it into a horror?
The director recalls:
“It all started with a small note, it seems, in the magazine“ Around the World ”about several strange wedding rituals and rituals: the groom was taking his bride to a distant province to introduce his family, and these relatives turned out to be, to put it mildly, strange people. The idea interested a group of producers, they approached me with an offer to write a script, but this line seemed to me not exciting enough. The amazing and frightening ritual of photographing the dead, which has existed since the middle of the 19th century, prompted us to develop the story somewhat, and from here, in fact, our dead bride appeared.
The picture sends viewers to terrible traditions and rituals that were popular in the 19th century, but, as it turns out, have not lost their relevance even today.
According to the plot, the main character - Nastya - her lover Ivan is taking to his hometown to get acquainted with relatives. At first, the happy girl does not notice the strangeness of others, creepy photos and talk about the mysterious pre-wedding ceremony, but when Ivan disappears, the bride realizes that she made a mistake and she faces difficult trials.
The custom of photographing the dead dates back to the early 19th century. For those who did not have the opportunity to order a portrait, photography was the only (and more convenient) way to immortalize the deceased.
The dead were photographed not only by the elderly, but also by children and adolescents, whose lives were taken away by diseases and disasters. With the help of special tripods, the deceased was given (at least they tried to give) a relaxed pose, and if the desired effect could not be achieved, they created the illusion of deep sleep.
It was also common to photograph the whole family or immediate family with the deceased. But photographers left special “symbols” next to the dead: an inverted rose in their hands, or, for example, a watch on which the time of death was frozen.
“At that time, for a girl, a wedding was practically equal to a transition to another world, another state. She seemed to be “dying” for her family and her former life. There were many beliefs associated, for example, with the death of the bride during the wedding, when she was considered the most vulnerable to the “other world”. Such brides turned into various demonic entities. It was on the basis of such beliefs that we built the plot, consulting with researchers in this field, ”
— notes the producer Vladislav Severtsev .
The creators of the tape decided to combine strange customs with the eternal theme of marriage and a variety of wedding rituals that were very popular among the ancient Russian peoples. The gloomy story, set out in the horror "The Bride", affects several time periods - from Russia in the 19th century to the present day.
The first trailer for The Bride shows a rather atmospheric old house:
In order to create a reliable visual sequence of the two eras, the shooting took place in a real house in the Stroganov estate near Moscow, where the decorators combined the interior and gloomy landscapes that were still left from noble times.
“Of course, we wanted a bigger and more spacious building for filming needs. And the number of rooms and their size initially did not suit us very much, so we had to redo something. In addition to the fact that inside we redecorated the estate for the period of time that we needed, it was actually restored by us. In Soviet times, it was converted into a hotel with all the appropriate attitude to floors and walls. We put the building in order, updated it, and then “aged” a little. Some of the filming also took place around the building in the adjacent park."
— says the director of the film.
Of course, the restoration of the house was not the only problem during filming. Actors are very superstitious people and many do not agree to act in a coffin, because this is a bad omen. The main character is played by actress Victoria Agalakova, for whom this work will be her debut in the title role in a full meter, and it is not surprising that the girl was very worried on the set. However, Svyatoslav reassured the actress, recalling that for filming " Kill Bill» Quentin Tarantino practically buried Uma Thurman in a coffin.
“The film aroused great interest in international markets, because, with the classical suspense structure of the plot, it carries the uniqueness of the theme associated with old Russian traditions. The teaser trailer for the film has already received more than 2 million views on YouTube alone, which underlines the lively interest in the topic,"December 22, 2016
The legend of the Dead Bride, or Ghost Wedding at Castle Windeck, is closely connected with the history of the Baden region, a vast region centered on Baden-Baden. Around Baden-Baden there is a so-called "Natural trail" (Naturpfad) - a tourist route with a length of about 40 km.You can read about this journey in cycle "Panoramic road around Baden-Baden" consisting of five parts.This is truly a real "road of fairy tales." It passes through four ancient knight's castles, a medieval monastery, through gorges and hills, past waterfalls and even Celtic sanctuaries. All this area bears the echoes of traditions, legends, fairy tales that have come down to us from ancient times. Even the art of music remained indifferent to these places. In Carl Maria von Weber's romantic opera The Free Gunner, the action takes place in the Wolf's Gorge near Baden-Baden. The legend about the Pulpit of the Angel and the Pulpit of the Devil is connected with the same gorge, which can be read Not far from the "Nature Path" are the ruins of the Windek Castle with its legend of the Dead Bride, a scene from which we can see on one of the frescoes of the Drinking Pavilion (Trinkhalle, Baden-Baden.
Alexandre Dumas, the father, who made a great trip along the Rhine in 1838, did not leave this legend with his attention.
GHOST WEDDING (DEAD BRIDE)
black forest
From the cycle "Legends of Baden-Baden"
Neu-Windeck Castle has been abandoned for many centuries. No one lives in it, because it is gloomy and eerie there, and people from neighboring villages who accidentally got into these places swore that they saw and heard something there that does not belong to the world of the living ...
One day, the young knight Kurt von Stein was away from home. He rode at night through the forest thicket. The places were unfamiliar to him, and the night turned out to be stormy: it was raining heavily and a gale was blowing. Suddenly he heard midnight strike somewhere, and saw a castle in front of him, surrounded by a wall with high battlements. He galloped to it, trying to hide there from the storm.
