![Marsilea quadrifolia denjisou01](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/71/Marsilea_quadrifolia_denjisou01.jpg)
In
Slavic folklore
Slavic folklore encompasses the folklore of the Slavic peoples from their earliest records until today. Folklorists have published a variety of works focused specifically on the topic over the years.See, for example, Kononenko 2007.
See also
* ...
, the raskovnik or razkovniche (
Serbian Cyrillic and mk, расковник; bg, разковниче ; russian: разрыв-трава; pl, rozryw) is a magical
herb. According to lore, the raskovnik has the magical property to unlock or uncover anything that is locked or closed. However, legends claim it is notoriously difficult to recognize the herb, and reputedly only certain
chthonic animals are able to identify it.
Names
The herb is known by a multitude of names among the South Slavs, and the names vary significantly by region. While ''razkovniche'' and ''raskovnik'' are the customary names in Bulgarian and Serbian respectively and the
root
In vascular plants, the roots are the organs of a plant that are modified to provide anchorage for the plant and take in water and nutrients into the plant body, which allows plants to grow taller and faster. They are most often below the su ...
is also preserved in the
Leskovac
Leskovac (Serbian Cyrillic: Лесковац, ) is a city and the administrative center of the Jablanica District in southern Serbia. According to the 2022 census, City of Leskovac has a 124,889 inhabitants.
Etymology
Leskovac was historicall ...
dialect as ''raskov'', in some parts of
Macedonia it is known as ''ež trava'' ("hedgehog
herb"). In the vicinity of
Bar (southeastern
Montenegro
)
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, capital = Podgorica
, coordinates =
, largest_city = capital
, official_languages = M ...
), the term is ''demir-bozan'', a
Turkish borrowing meaning "iron breaker". In
Syrmia, the plant is referred to as ''špirgasta trava ''(a
hapax legomenon
In corpus linguistics, a ''hapax legomenon'' ( also or ; ''hapax legomena''; sometimes abbreviated to ''hapax'', plural ''hapaxes'') is a word or an expression that occurs only once within a context: either in the written record of an entire ...
),
in
Slavonia
Slavonia (; hr, Slavonija) is, with Dalmatia, Croatia proper, and Istria, one of the four historical regions of Croatia. Taking up the east of the country, it roughly corresponds with five Croatian counties: Brod-Posavina, Osijek-Baran ...
it is known as ''zemaljski ključ'' ("earth key"), and in
Slovenia
Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...
's
Savinja Valley
The Savinja () is a river in northeast Slovenia which flows mostly in the Upper and Lower Savinja Valley ( sl, Zgornja in Spodnja Savinjska dolina) and through the cities of Celje and Laško. The Savinja is the main river of the Savinja Alps (Sl ...
as ''mavričin koren'' ("rainbow root").
Description and properties
Traditionally, it is considered that few people, if any, could actually recognize the herb.
However, in Bulgarian sources the raskovnik is sometimes described as a plant resembling a
four-leaf clover
The four-leaf clover is a rare variation of the common three-leaf clover. According to traditional sayings, such clovers bring good luck, though it is not clear when or how this idea began. One early mention of "Fower-leafed or purple grasse" is ...
. It grows in meadows and may be picked either while green and blooming or in
hay
Hay is grass, legumes, or other herbaceous plants that have been cut and dried to be stored for use as animal fodder, either for large grazing animals raised as livestock, such as cattle, horses, goats, and sheep, or for smaller domesticat ...
, when it is already dry. While it is not necessarily rare, nor does it thrive only in remote locations, it is nevertheless impossible to recognize by the uninitiated.
In the words of Serbian linguist and folklorist
Vuk Stefanović Karadžić, “It is some (maybe imaginary) herb whose touch is thought to be able to open every lock or closure.”
According to the legend, the raskovnik could unlock any gate or padlock, regardless of its size, material or key. It could also uncover treasures buried in the ground: in Bulgarian beliefs, it could split the ground at the place where a treasure lay so that people could locate it.
In some regions of Serbia, the treasure itself was a
black man in chains who requested that a raskovnik be brought to him. The raskovnik would break the chains and the man would disappear into the ground to be replaced by a cauldron filled with gold coins.
Other supernatural properties attributed to the herb by Bulgarians include the
alchemic ability to transmute
iron
Iron () is a chemical element with Symbol (chemistry), symbol Fe (from la, Wikt:ferrum, ferrum) and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 element, group 8 of the periodic table. It is, Abundanc ...
into
gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...
, the more general ability to make the one who picked it forever happy
or wealthy.
In some interpretations, the raskovnik is a wonderful plant that makes true whatever its owner desires.
Obtainment
![European hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/84/European_hedgehog_%28Erinaceus_europaeus%29.jpg)
The raskovnik is believed to have been sought after by
treasure hunter
Treasure hunter is the physical search for treasure. For example, treasure hunters try to find sunken shipwrecks and retrieve artifacts with market value. This industry is generally fueled by the market for antiquities. The practice of treasure ...
s,
sorcerers and
herbalist
Herbal medicine (also herbalism) is the study of pharmacognosy and the use of medicinal plants, which are a basis of traditional medicine. With worldwide research into pharmacology, some herbal medicines have been translated into modern remed ...
s who desired its magic powers for personal benefit. In Serbia, it was believed that there exist certain treasures, such as the Treasure of Tsar Radovan, which could not be unlocked in any other way but employing a raskovnik.
As, according to Bulgarian folklore,
tortoise
Tortoises () are reptiles of the family Testudinidae of the order Testudines (Latin: ''tortoise''). Like other turtles, tortoises have a shell to protect from predation and other threats. The shell in tortoises is generally hard, and like oth ...
s were the only beings who knew the appearance of the herb and the location where it grows, such people would try to obtain the raskovnik by deceiving a tortoise. They would find a tortoise nesting site and hem it in with a fence while the tortoise is away. When it returns, the tortoise would be unable to access its eggs, so it would return with a raskovnik in order to breach the fence. Thus, the tortoise would reveal the herb and people would acquire it from the tortoise, which does not need it anymore.
While the tricking of a tortoise was the most popular method in Bulgarian mythology, in
Dalmatia the legend refers to
snake
Snakes are elongated, limbless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes . Like all other squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales. Many species of snakes have skulls with several more j ...
s,
and among
Serbs
The Serbs ( sr-Cyr, Срби, Srbi, ) are the most numerous South Slavic ethnic group native to the Balkans in Southeastern Europe, who share a common Serbian ancestry, culture, history and language.
The majority of Serbs live in their na ...
another version involves the locking of young
hedgehog
A hedgehog is a spiny mammal of the subfamily Erinaceinae, in the eulipotyphlan family Erinaceidae. There are seventeen species of hedgehog in five genera found throughout parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa, and in New Zealand by introductio ...
s in a box for their mother to unlock. In Serbia, one would also have to be quick to take the raskovnik, as the hedgehog would swallow it after use. In any case, turtles, snakes and hedgehogs are all animals with chthonic characteristics which were often variously associated with the underworld in South Slavic tradition.
Karadžić also mentions another Serbian method to obtain the raskovnik. He recorded a story from the town of
Zemun
Zemun ( sr-cyrl, Земун, ; hu, Zimony) is a municipality in the city of Belgrade. Zemun was a separate town that was absorbed into Belgrade in 1934. It lies on the right bank of the Danube river, upstream from downtown Belgrade. The developme ...
about a merchant who desired to find the herb. The merchant locked an old woman into
leg irons
Legcuffs are physical restraints used on the ankles of a person to allow walking only with a restricted stride and to prevent running and effective physical resistance. Frequently used alternative terms are leg cuffs, (leg/ankle) shackles, foot ...
and let her wander in a field during the night; if the irons unlocked by themselves at a certain place, that would be a place where the raskovnik grows.
Metaphoric use
The legendary herb has entered the modern Bulgarian
vocabulary
A vocabulary is a set of familiar words within a person's language. A vocabulary, usually developed with age, serves as a useful and fundamental tool for communication and acquiring knowledge. Acquiring an extensive vocabulary is one of the la ...
as a metaphor for a magic key or a
panacea
In Greek mythology, Panacea (Greek ''Πανάκεια'', Panakeia), a goddess of universal remedy, was the daughter of Asclepius and Epione. Panacea and her four sisters each performed a facet of Apollo's art:
* Panacea (the goddess of univers ...
in the wider sense. The phrase “to find the razkovniche” („да намериш разковничето“ ''„da namerish razkovnicheto“'') means to find the solution to a certain problem, usually a complex or difficult one.
''Razkovniche'' is also the common Bulgarian name for the plant
European waterclover (''Marsilea quadrifolia'') which, in its appearance, has many similarities with the descriptions of the mythical raskovnik.
In eastern Serbia, ''raskovnik'' also refers to a specific plant used in vernacular medicine, namely ''
Laserpitium siler
''Laserpitium siler'', the laserwort, is a herbaceous perennial plant in the family Apiaceae. It is a robust perennial that can reach a height of about . It has bipinnate, alternate leaves, and produces compound umbels of white five-stellate flo ...
''.
References
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Slavic folklore
Bulgarian folklore
Croatian folklore
Serbian folklore
Slovene mythology
Mythological plants
North Macedonia folklore