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The 18th Festival of Slavic and Cistercian culture in Ląd on the Warta River

This year`s Festival of Slavic and Cistercian Culture in Ląd on the Warta River will take place on 4 and 5 June.

The previous two editions of the Festival were held online. Although the programme was rich in events, including popular science lectures, shows, multimedia presentations, virtual exhibitions, educational activities, or an early music concert, the lack of possibility to experience the event`s live atmosphere limited its social reception.

This year, the Festival is returning to its earlier form to enliven the Ląd fields with the clang of swords and armour. There will be educational stalls, exhibitions and games. In addition, we are organising concerts, workshops, re-enactments and popular science lectures closely linked to this year`s festival theme - Plagues and Medicine.

Plagues have been a phenomenon accompanying humankind from the times when they began to form larger gatherings. Since nomadic camps gave way to settlements, and settlements to cities, infectious diseases, pests, and vermin have become an everyday reality for our ancestors.

However, the commonness of the problem did not mean that the inhabitants of the Greater Poland region resigned themselves to the disastrous effects of the misfortunes haunting them. They could not count on such luxuries as antibiotics or disinfectants. But the pioneers of medicine - and all those who cared about the fate of their fellow man - did their best to limit the spread of the plague.

Not all attempts or experiments were successful. But every effort to spread hygiene and every step to identify the source of the plague increased the chances of survival.

Human history should never be treated as an irrelevant collection of dates and events. On the contrary, engaging with history is learning to understand the processes that influenced the way our ancestors lived. Thanks to written records, archaeological excavations and anthropological research, we know a great deal about what misfortunes befell our ancestors and how they tried to cope with them.

We believe that we will manage to share this knowledge with the visitors to the 18th Festival of Slavic and Cistercian Culture in Ląd on the Warta River, which, after a two-year break, will once again take place in the cloisters of a post-Cistercian monastery and at the Slavic settlement.

See you on Saturday and Sunday, 4-5 June!

Re-enactment groups interested in taking part in the Festival are asked to send their applications to the coordinator at:
piotr.majorek@muzarp.poznan.pl

In the organisation of the event are involved, as every year:
Starostwo Powiatowe w Słupcy, Muzeum Archeologiczne w Poznaniu, Gmina Lądek, Wyższe Seminarium Duchowne Towarzystwa Salezjańskiego w Lądzie, Zespół Parków Krajobrazowych Województwa Wielkopolskiego w Poznaniu, and Stowarzyszenie „Unia Nadwarciańska”.