Miraculous painting of Our Lady at Gates of Dawn and other Vilnius, Lithuania Local Custom Tips

The painting of Our Lady, Mother of Mercy, at Gates of Dawn has been an object of pilgrimage for centuries. The cult began after the Muscovite invasion on Vilnius in 1655. The first - timber -chapel which was erected to house the picture burnt down around 1711 but the painting was saved by a young monk. It was kept for 20 years in St Theresa's church but then moved to a new brick chapel. When in 1799, under the order of the Tzar, the town walls were demolished, the Gates of Dawn remained intact.
The invocation in Mickiewicz's epic poem 'Master Tadeusz' published in 1834 brought the painting even more fame and contributed to the cult spreading not only in Lithuania but also abroad. During the partitions of Poland it was at the Gates of Dawn that patriotic demonstrations took place. The cult became part of the Polish independence movement. In 1919 a procession of scientists, students and state and church figures arrived at the Gates to thank Our Mother of Mercy for the re-opening of Vilnius University. The painting was crowned before Vilnius Cathedral in 1927 in a magnificent ceremony attended by the papal nuncio and the Polish heads of state.
During World War II thousands of the faithful came to pray at the Gates of Dawn for peace and independence. Even in Soviet times, when many of the churches in Vilnius were turned into stores or just shut down, the Gates of Dawn remained open.

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We came across this bridge by chance, only because a helpful man (well, a little drunk as well, but helpful anyway) who had approached us in the cafe in Uzupis showed us a 'secret passage' that let us make a short cut to St Anne's. So, instead of going down Uzupio St we turned right at the Angel of Uzupis into a covered passage (there was some construction work going on) and went down Malunu St to a bridge on the Vilnele.
And here we got a surprise. The wrought iron barrier of the bridge was covered all over with.... padlocks. They were all locked, some were rusty from the elements but all firmly attached to the barrier.
We thought it rather strange at first but on closer inspection we saw inscriptions on the padlocks - a boy's and a girl's names, a date and perhaps a picture of a heart. Some even had a picture of a young couple engraved by laser. The keys were not there so we suppose the newly-weds must have dropped them into the river in the belief that this will make their marriage last forever. Good luck to them!

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