In Polish, English subtitles
A clip from the Polish film "The Old Fairy Tale When the Sun Was God"
The setting is 9th century, pagan Poland
This clip is the part of the movie when the tribal elders send an army to take care of Viking raiders.
Duke Popiel ?? is a cruel and corrupt ruler who cares only for wine, women, and song. He is greatly influenced by his wife, a beautiful but power-hungry German princess. Because of Popiel's misrule and his failure to defend the land from marauding Vikings, his twelve uncles and the tribal elders conspire to depose him; however at his wife's instigation, he has his uncles poisoned during a feast (she might have done it herself). Instead of cremating their bodies, as was the custom, he has them cast into Lake Gop?o.
When the tribal elders see what Popiel ?? and his wife have done, they rebel and raise an army. After losing the main fortress to the rebels the Duke, his wife, his son and his remaining men at arms take refuge in a stone tower on Lake Gop?o. As the story goes, a throng of mice and rats (which had been feeding on the unburnt bodies of Popiel's uncles) rushed into the tower, and devoured Popiel and his wife alive. According to some old Polish records the story is true except the mice and rats eat all their food up...
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Polish Film
English Subtitles
Bogdan Stupka (Actor)
Malgorzata Foremniak (Actor)
Jerzy Hoffman (Director)
Format: DVD US & Canada
- Category
- Battles 1-1000
- Tags
- pagan Poland, Duke Popiel