Nikita Kozhemyaka

In olden times, a fearsome dragon appeared not far from Kyiv. It dragged many people from Kyiv to its lair, where it devoured them. The dragon also abducted the king's daughter, but instead of eating her, it locked her tightly in its den. A little dog from the princess's home followed her. Whenever the dragon flew away to hunt, the princess would write a note to her father and mother, tie it to the dog's neck, and send it home. The dog would deliver the note and bring back a reply.

One day, the king and queen wrote to the princess: "Find out from the dragon who is stronger than it." The princess began to question the dragon and eventually learned the answer.

"There is," said the dragon, "a man in Kyiv named Nikita Kozhemyaka—he is stronger than I am."

When the dragon left to hunt, the princess wrote a note to her parents: "There is a man in Kyiv named Nikita Kozhemyaka; he alone is stronger than the dragon. Send him to rescue me from captivity."

The king found Nikita and, together with the queen, went to beg him to save their daughter from her terrible plight. At that time, Nikita was tanning twelve ox hides at once. When he saw the king, he was so frightened that his hands trembled, and he tore all twelve hides at once. Nikita became angry that they had frightened him and caused him such a loss, and no matter how much the king and queen pleaded with him to go and rescue the princess, he refused.

So, the king and queen devised a plan. They gathered five thousand young orphans—children orphaned by the cruel dragon—and sent them to beg Nikita to free the Russian land from this great calamity. Moved by the orphans' tears, Nikita himself began to weep. He took three hundred poods of hemp, tarred it, wrapped himself in it, and set off.

As Nikita approached the dragon's lair, the dragon locked itself in, barricaded with logs, and refused to come out.

"Come out to the open field, or I'll tear your lair apart!" shouted Nikita, and he began to scatter the logs with his bare hands.

Seeing that there was no escape, the dragon came out to the open field.

They fought for a long time, but eventually, Nikita knocked the dragon to the ground and was about to strangle it. The dragon then begged for mercy:

"Do not kill me, Nikita! There is no one in the world stronger than you and me. Let us divide the world equally: you will rule one half, and I will rule the other."

"Very well," said Nikita. "But first, we must draw a boundary so that there will be no disputes between us."

Nikita made a plow weighing three hundred poods, harnessed the dragon to it, and began to plow a furrow from Kyiv. The furrow was two and a quarter fathoms deep. Nikita plowed the furrow all the way to the Black Sea and then said to the dragon:

"We have divided the land—now let us divide the sea, so that there will be no disputes over the water."

As they began to divide the sea, Nikita drove the dragon into the Black Sea and drowned it there.

Having accomplished this holy deed, Nikita returned to Kyiv and resumed his work of tanning hides, taking no reward for his labor. The princess returned to her father and mother.

They say that Nikita's furrow can still be seen in some places across the steppe: it stands as a ridge two fathoms high. The peasants plow around it but do not touch the furrow, leaving it as a memorial to Nikita Kozhemyaka.

↑ To the top

Nikita Kozhemyaka

More fairy tales