About Traby town

About Traby town, forester Viktor and Zhemyslavl

If we look at the map of Belarus, Grodno region, we will immediately see: the agricultural town Traby is conveniently located in a forest area, not far from the highway Minsk – Vilnus through Rakov, Oshmyany. And there is the famous Golshany, as well as Zhemyslavl, and ancient Krevo: with the ruins of a stone castle of the XIV century...

Researchers of antiquity, by the way, say: the tradition of stone-defensive architecture in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania began from Krevo Castle. At the same time, Krevo was one of the political centers of ancient Lithuania, one of the centers of ethnic and political processes on the eve of the emergence of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. And Traby was useful in those historically important processes: according to documents, at that time it belonged to Prince Trabus. There was even his castle! We read about this in one of the sources: "The wooden castle, the residence of the Grand Duke Trabus, was built on a high hill (now the Castle Hill)". Nowadays, few people mention the Duke, but he is the ancestor of many royal heads of Europe. According to the authors of the book "Picturesque Russia" (1882), the princes are descendants of the Golshanskies, whose family Sofia Golshanskaya, the third wife of King Jagiello, comes from. And from the children born in wedlock, the royal dynasty of the Jagiellons enlarged and grew. Read about this and about other things in the previous notes (No. 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9).

But then, in 1996, during our "Hiking to the Kingdom of Far Far Away", these details were beyond our modest knowledge about the places of Grodno region which we were walking through. Now it is enough to type the required query, press Enter, and the Internet will give out more information than is necessary – just choose. Therefore, we asked with great interest the people about the history of the region in which they lived and worked.

After Golshany we came to Traby late in the evening, it was already very dark, so, naturally, we did not see there much. The streets were quiet... We stood in confusion, not yet knowing what lay ahead. We had to look for an overnight stay somewhere. And then a young local guy caught our attention. This is how we met Viktor Zavadsky, whom we now call the forestry master. He was hurrying down the street. And he did not immediately hear when we called him. Finally he came up to us. The first thing that I remember was the smile of the young man. It was so bright and friendly, as if we had known each other for a very long time. And the guy behaved with dignity. We said who we were, where we were from and where we were going. We asked: where is the school, is it possible to spend the night there? Viktor immediately realized that the travelers needed a place to stay overnight, and took the initiative: "So, you don’t need a school, come to my place." In his house, we gave each other a second glance, had delicious tea and went to bed: because we were worn to a frazzle.

At that time, Viktor was 22 years old. He had already graduated from a forestry college, served in the army, and was working in the local forestry. From the way he did pull-ups on the beam under the ceiling in the house, it was clear: the guy was well trained and kept himself fit. And when we we having hot pancakes for breakfast, we, as they say, "had a heart-toheart talk". By the way, pancakes were baked by Viktor's grandmother – Stanislava Dobrolovich. In the morning, her grandson called her. Apparently, she lived next door in another house. The grandmother's name in the city was Kavalikha. Observing their communication, we realized: Viktor and his grandmother were good friends.

In those years, we knew little about Traby, so we listened with interest to our new acquaintance. He said that the princes Trabus had lived here since ancient times. "Maybe you are their descendant?" we asked. "Maybe so," Viktor laughed. There was a soft dignity in his manner: inborn, natural. We immediately noticed his good sense of humor and told him about it. In this regard, he recalled an incident that happened to him during his service in the army. Once the mother of his fellow-soldier came to see her son. Viktor was present at their meeting. They talked about various things,

Traby in 1915

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Church of the Nativity Virgin Mary in Traby

including God. And suddenly she told Viktor: "God wants you to laugh." And Viktor immediately laughed! Then he felt some force pierce his body. Mystic! But it's a fact. Since then, he admitted, any good joke made him laugh, and added that humor and joy were highly valued in his family. "Soul – to people, life – to home. Heart – to a woman, honor – to none. By V. Korotkevich" – these are the farewell words Viktor Zavadsky wrote down in our travel diary and left an autograph.

When writing these notes, we clarified: these lines were first discovered by researchers of Vladimir Korotkevich's work in the writer's preface to the book "Memory of the Belarusian Land" (Minsk, 1979). And the lead to them is as follows: "An ancient principle that came from somewhere, but paraphrased, has forever become ours." We believe that it was formulated and rhymed by Korotkevich himself. And after the sentence there is the following phrase: "People imbued with love for my native Belarus! Majestic and proud, it deserves it!" On the morning of April 29, 1996, we found ourselves in such a high, sublimely patriotic force field in the former possessions of the Grand Duke of Lithuania Trabus, together with a young forester, the son of a village teacher of the Belarusian language Valentina Zavadskaya. Together with hospitable, considerate, sharp-tongued Mrs. Kovalikha and her delicious pancakes.

We left Viktor's house after breakfast at 8:35 am. And as soon as we left Traby, we immediately stopped. As it usually happens, we really wanted to talk about the people who had received us so warmly. The weather was mild and the air was a little humid. It had rained at night. We heard the first cuckoo. We laughed, remembering Viktor's grandmother, her statements about love. We asked her: "Is there love in life in your opinion?" "Of course there is, – she answered, turning to Ivan. – You’re taking her with you." She probably thought that Ivan was driving Valentina in a stroller... And we were also impressed by her words: you can get out of luck, but never out of love.

The mood was good, uplifted during the day, as happens after meeting good people. Therefore, on that day, for Ivan it was easy to write poetry. About storks. As they say: he had a flash of inspiration. During a rest halt in Zhemyslavl, we admired spring games of couples of storks. The storks there were amazing, sleek and large. They looked like kings. Maybe because they lived near the local palace. We came to this conclusion looking at the abandoned palace of the Umyastovskys princes. And storks, there were about 20 of them, we circling high in the sky above us.

And now, as we are writing these notes, a revelation has come! There, in Golshany, Traby, Zhemyslavl there were such huge layers of history.... Princes, kings... Lords. Famous people. Rulers. Something attracted them to these beautiful places – to live there, build ancestral castles, palaces... And therefore, from the height of our time, we wanted to delve a little into the history of Prince Trabus and his descendants. In particular, Viktor Zavadsky told us on the phone on September 8, 2021: "Somewhere there is an engraving of Prince Trabus. Rectangular shaped. There are no traces of the castle itself. In Traby, one might say, there is the Castle Hill: when you go from Ivye, you will immediately see it. This elevation is to the right of the road, from some places you can also see it straight ahead. Nobody has excavated the hillfort here yet. At least officially. I know that Prince Trabus was one of the ancestors of the princes of Golshany. "

Many scholars are sure that there was once a castle in Traby. And what it looked like – one can only guess. On the map of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, M.-K. Radziwills (2nd edition, 1613) marked the castles of that time. Today, in none of those settlements the remains of the former castles have survived. The castle in Traby resembles a quadrangular fortification with walls and corner towers. Judging by the miniature, the central tower is the main one in the complex. Most likely, this tower overtoped the gate, as it is located in front of the silhouette of the walls. On the site there is Castle Hill, a small moat, coins and hewn stones are often found there. However, in fact, archaeological excavations have never been carried out in Traby. According to some sources, there were ancient settlements in Traby and its locality much earlier than the 13th century. There are many legends and myths about the history of

Viktor Zavadsky: “I am still young at heart! There are many interesting stories in life, there’s never a dull moment, even though we live upcountry. And the forest is my life."

those lands. Those interested can get acquainted with them on the website of Traby School Museum of History and Local Lore.

But it seems to us that it would be worthwhile to put at least a commemorative boulder sign in Traby: as a reminder of the small homeland of many royal heads of Europe. And although the greatness of Traby is in the past, this is an important part of the history of our Motherland. Moreover, as the famous song says, "nothing on earth passes without a trace." Since ancient times, local residents have a certain cultural background. There is a high culture of everyday life, hard work, a tendency to order. And forestry has been practiced here since the dawn of time. Viktor Zavadsky is an example thereof. He still works as an assistant forester in Traby forestry and has extensive professional experience. In 2001, he told us that he was married and had a four-year-old son, Anton. "I work as an assistant forester in the same Traby forestry, I am satisfied with my work. I always go to the forest with a light heart and return home with a calm soul " – these are the lines from Viktor's letter, which we keep in our family archive.

The forest problem has always been relevant for Belarus, since forests in the country are one of the main renewable natural resources. Moreover, it is our most important national wealth. In order to manage them competently, to properly master forestry, there is a Ministry of Forestry in the country, almost a hundred forestry enterprises have been set up in Belarus. And the conversation with Viktor Zavadsky in those years turned out to be meaningful. We learned with interest that among other problems in forestry (felling, reforestation, control over the condition of trees...) there is also monitoring

KSENIYA KULIKOVA of the territory: have strangers appeared in the area adjacent to Lithuania? Foresters have established close cooperation with Survilishki border post of Lida Border Guard Service. Foresters also collect spruce and pine cones. Then they are transported to the seed station and processed – and the forestry gets the seeds. The seedlings are grown in a forest nursery. According to Viktor, they mainly plant pine, spruce, and in some cases – birch: when they see that none of the coniferous trees will grow on barren land, because birch is an unpretentious tree, it grows everywhere. And industrial birch wood is needed. Today in the possession of the Ivye forestry enterprise there are about 90,000 hectares of land. It includes nine forestry enterprises, a main forest nursery, a woodworking shop, a hunting complex and a hunting paddock. But the main achievement is the people who put a lot of effort, diligence and skills into the development of the enterprise. They are veterans, experienced employees and young people. All those who today, with their hard work, modern approach, improve the work of forestry, find new ways and approaches in their lives.

When we recently asked Viktor what he would say about the forest from the point of view of a modern forester, we heard from him: – You can talk about the forest for a long time, philosophize. But I am not a poet or a philosopher. And for a long time I have been looking at the forest from a practical point of view: how we can earn money. To get something there and then sell it at a profit. It turns out that the forest for me is primarily a reliable business partner, but with a difficult character that should be constantly taken into account. I remember when I went to study at Polotsk Forestry College, I thought: we, foresters, will protect nature. I had such a "psychological attitude" from school. To be honest, the forest will live without us, without people, as it lived for millennia before us. But oddly enough, we protect it first of all from ourselves... From those who, being in the forest, can unintentionally or deliberately harm it, for example, by fire. And we do not cut down unnecessary trees in the forest, we are constantly restoring forests. By the way, I sometimes give such arithmetic to skeptics in response to a reproach: you, they say, will soon cut everything down... Our forestry enterprise has 8,000 hectares of forest. The average growth per hectare is 4 cubic meters of wood per year. So, in our country, more than 30,000 cubic meters are growing annually. And we cut down about 15,000. Plus, we plant new plots. We will never cut the forest at this rate: nature has a large margin of safety if the forest is managed wisely. Viktor has repeatedly invited us to come to Traby (125 km from Minsk) to see how beautiful the town has become. And he promised to take us to the forest, show us his domain, introduce us to his family and colleagues. He did not forget: when we left Traby in 1996, Valentina seemed to bless the guy. She said: you will meet a good girl who will be a good wife to you. And so it happened. Viktor and Olga (she is the chief livestock technician of Traby agricultural enterprise) have three

Traby forestry building

children. All are adults. Anton graduated from the Belarusian State University of Informatics and Radioelectronics with a degree in Radio Engineering. He works now. And the middle daughter, Aleksandra, is studying there in her 3rd year. The youngest Aleksey is in the 6th grade. Viktor's invitations are always sincere. Certainly not everything goes well. He said, come to gather mushrooms. Sometimes there are so many of them that you need a minitractor to carry the out of the forest. Viktor is not a mushroom picker, he is a hunter, he keeps dogs – Russian hounds. He loves foiling, sees special beauty in it, gets great pleasure from its sounds and noises. And he feels sorry for animals. Even wolves.

And in Zhemyslavl we stayed not far from a beautiful palace – also on Viktor’s advice: he advised to pay attention to this local landmark. Which we did. Only with time did we learn about the origin of the palace, the so-called Umyastovskys estate. There is a lot of interesting information about it on the Internet. Many who have visited Warsaw compare the estate with the royal residence of Stanislav August Poniatowski, the last king of the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth. They even say that this was his main project. It is known from the history of the "copy": in 1805 Zhemyslavl passed into the possession of the Umyastovskys, representatives of the count's family. This old Belarusian noble family was not rich, but respected. The first owner of the estate was Count Yakov. For the next three generations, the main income came from a small distillery, which is still in operation. After the death of the last Count Vladislav, his wife Yanina donated the estate to Vilnius University. Probably, this was the last hope to preserve Lazienki of Zhemyslavl for posterity.

The Umyastovskys palace stands aside from the houses of local residents on the shore of a picturesque lake. We rested nearby, looking at the palace, which was gradually falling into decay. In 2013, a fire broke out in it – the estate was badly damaged. This monument of palace and park architecture of the 18th-19th centuries, or the palace, as the locals call it, was destroyed, and its ownership changed. And later, as we read , the complex of buildings was put up for auction again. This time the owner was Minsk company "Graditel", headed by Mikhail Glinsky. What are his plans for the revival of the object, if changes are expected, and what will be the final result? He answered these questions of our colleagues from the newspaper "SB. Belarus today" (kondratsieva@sb.by): "Those ruins (he showed) where there used to be a stable, are not ours. The park is not ours either. We will prepare documents for their withdrawal, in order to create later a single ensemble and attract tourists, offer them horseback riding along the alleys. We are planning to build a small cafe in the former barn, and we will make hotels in two outbuildings to the right and left of the palace. The main building will definitely host a museum, a hall for celebrations and official receptions, as well as several VIP rooms. Pre-design work has been done. And there is a common understanding of where and what will be located. The first thing we started doing here: we provided round-theclock guarding of the park. Secondly, we mowed and cleaned pathways to the lake. Of course, if we want the park to be ours, we have plans on how to use it. Local residents said that there were once popular discos here. We want to make a dance floor. We will try to attract people here. I would very much like the school to be preserved in the agro-town. There are not many

Landscapes in Zhemyslavl are wonderful

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children, but we are interested in people living here. Tourists will come, including from abroad. Someone has to meet them. We are very concerned about this issue."

Of course, it will take time to restore the Umyastovskys palace. But the fact that things are moving is encouraging. After all, we see how much is being done throughout Belarus in this direction. There are such well-known, promoted "projects" as Nesvizh palace and its park complex, Mir and Lida castles. And soon, according to the news, tourists will visit six halls located in the first stage of the Old Castle in Grodno. And the infrastructure with Golshany Palace in the center is already gaining momentum (we wrote about this), work is also underway in Krevo Castle: last year and in 2021, the northwestern wall was finally restored there... Many buildings that have been destroyed for decades are finally being restored or projects are being developed for their conservation and restoration. It is possible that a wooden palace will be built and restored in Traby over time – in memory of the Grand Duke Trabus, a relative of many royal heads of Europe. Let it be the embodiment of the imagination of a modern architect, but on the basis of a solid historical foundation. At first glance, our Belarus may seem like a young state, but in fact it has strong, powerful roots growing from time immemorial. We can be proud of this, building our own future and the future of our country.

Ivan and Valentina Zhdanovich