On Bright Friday, in the Costesti commune, the southern county of Valcea, holy water flows from the tap, brought through the locality's water supply pipe, which has as its source 44 springs at the foot of the Buila-Vanturarita massif and which are sanctified every year by local priests during the Spring Healing Day.
The springs in Pietreni have been known for hundreds of years by the villagers, who are convinced that the water has miraculous powers, but also by hermits who have sought peace over time in the mountains that guard the town of Valcea. In fact, a monk from the Bistrita Monastery was the one who built here, at the beginning of the 18th century, a small church known today as the "Hermitage of 44 Springs" and where, on the first Friday after Easter, the ritual of sanctification of the waters takes place, told Agerpres.
People from all over the area used to gather in the village of Pietreni to participate in the consecration service of the small holy water. For several years, however, after the local authorities have captured these springs and use them as a source of water supply in the locality, the holy water reaches the households of the locals connected to the network.
"The tradition has remained, and here, in Pietreni, the water consecration service is held, the small holy water, right in the place where the people of Costesti benefit from water, so today they will benefit from holy water right at the tap. Next to the church is a gallery, which was dug by former political prisoners, and there are 44 springs where the water comes from the mountain, collects in a collecting basin and from there in a larger basin, some 300 cubic meters of water, from where it goes down to Costesti commune, to Pietreni and to Costesti, from where the world benefits from drinking water. They have, as they say, directly at the tap on Good Friday. It is even said that today the waters are sanctified and it is good to give water to animals so that they are healthy all year round," the mayor of Costesti, Toma Pestereanu, said.
The church next to the springs is dedicated to Saint Nicholas and is one of the most beautiful in Valcea County. Crowned heads of Romania passed through here, among them the ruler Alexandru Ioan Cuza, King Carol I and his daughter-in-law, Queen Maria. Local people say that the royal family had the intention of even building a palace in the clearing around the Pietreni springs, but gave up, because at that time there was no railway in the area.
The 44 Springs church was built between 1700 and 1701 by the hieromonk Stefan, the abbot of the Bistrita Monastery, as part of a hermitage also known as the Schitul Supiatra/Supiatra Hermitage, which was served by the Bistrita monks. In 1768, however, it became the chrism church of the village of Pietreni, after it was looted and set on fire by the Turks, and the villagers, together with the priest Patru Schiteanu, rebuilt it. Also the painting inside the church was done thanks to the care of the priest Patru Schiteanu, in 1779, by the painter Efrem Zugravul.
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