The Dragon's Den
Natural limestone cave, opened to visitors in 1918
A spiral staircase inside the Thieves' Tower takes you down through the rock to a damp, cool passage in the limestone. This is the Dragon's Den, the cave that lies beneath the western side of Wawel Hill. According to the oldest Polish legends a dragon lived here and terrorised the town until a clever shoemaker's apprentice, or in some versions the prince Krak himself, fed it a sheep stuffed with sulphur. The dragon drank from the Vistula until it burst, the town was saved, and Kraków took its name from its founder.
The cave is about eighty metres long and consists of three chambers connected by narrow passages. It formed naturally as water dissolved the limestone of the hill, and the walls still show the smooth, rounded surfaces typical of such caves. In the sixteenth century, when the castle above was at its most splendid, the cave had a much less noble use: it housed a tavern and a brothel that was popular with soldiers and students. Later the Austrians walled it up, and it was only reopened and made safe for visitors after Poland regained independence in nineteen eighteen.
The route is one way and ends at the riverside walk, so it makes a natural end to a visit. Just outside the exit stands the bronze dragon by Bronisław Chromy, which breathes real fire every few minutes to the delight of children. The legend of the dragon is one of the oldest in Poland, first written down in the thirteenth century, and the cave is where the story and the place become one.
Did You Know? In the sixteenth century the cave beneath the royal castle housed a tavern and a brothel.
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