Near the Krutynia River there are very mysterious and charming Masurian villages of Old Believers.

Who are the old believers?

   You have to go back to the second half of the 17th century. Well, the patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, Nikon, introduced many reforms in the Church that were not accepted by a significant number of the faithful. So they separated from the reformed Orthodox Church and remained with the old rites. They were called "old believers."

They were very repressed in Russia. This forced them to look for a new place for themselves and a normal existence. They migrated westward, until in the first half of the 19th century a group of them reached Masuria (Prussia). They settled there, establishing several neighboring villages. 

   They were very hardworking people. Before they built their houses, they cleared the Piska Forest so that arable fields were created here. Only later did they build residential and farm buildings. They built houses from logs. They did it in such a way that they connected them without using nails. Old Believers settling in new areas very often first built a "banie" or steam room to live in until the end of construction of residential houses. The man was not bathed, he could not go to the molenna, and those who were not on Saturday in the bathhouse were pointed at with a finger and compared to a pig. 

   At the center of the village stood Molenna, meaning the Church. The service in Molenna is run by an attendant (equivalent to pop, priest). He is elected by the assembly of the entire parish from among the most respected members of the community. Old Believers widely worshiped religious objects. Icons are the highest treasure for them - they are primarily used for contemplation, attentive and praying gazing at them. The icon must also have been found in every home. They were placed in the eastern part of the room, and the guest who entered the house first bowed deeply to the icon, and only then he greeted the hosts.

  In addition to icons, religious books were the most important. They had to be read very slowly, only flipping the pages with their right hand. It was forbidden to leave the book open, most often they had fittings locked with a special clamp. 

  Crosses are also surrounded by a special cult. They can be found on the pediment and dome domes, in the windows, over the windows, in the cemetery, over the gates and gates leading to places associated with the cult. During masses in molenna or prayers at home, Old Believers do not kneel, but bow down to the ground. To bow, they had a special pillow called the "lieutenant". When performing such bows, the praying man falls equally on both knees, while simultaneously resting his hands on the lieutenant, the head bowed at that time slightly touches the hands, and this lieutenant protects against dirt.

   About 1,000 Old Believers remained in Poland.

  Wojnowo history is very interesting. Well, in 1836, on the Duś lake, the Lavrenti hermitage stood. In 1847 a male monastery was created there. He operated very dynamically for 20 years, until 1867. Boys from the depths of Russia were brought in and educated by monks. However, from the moment when igumen Paweł Pruski left for Russia, the monastery began to decline.

In 1855, the young nun Eupraksja buys a monastery and adjacent areas and establishes a female monastery here. The nuns cultivated the fields, looked after old people and the disabled. However, with time, nuns decreased due to natural causes. There were no new takers. The last of the nuns died in 2006. 

She was buried, like other nuns, in the cemetery, which is located near the church, on the shore of Lake Duś. 

We will find white crosses there, some overturned (they must not be lifted, as is customary). Crosses were placed on the legs of the dead. The dead were put to the grave wrapped in the so-called sawan, which was a kind of sack ripped from one side.

   At present, the whole area is looked after by the son of Leon Ludwikowski, who received the rights to the object from the last nun in exchange for taking care of the molenna and the whole surroundings. The beautiful location meant that the object was transformed into an agritourism farm, and the molenna made available to tourists for sightseeing.

More information on this topic can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Believers