"Hejnal" Top 5 Page for this destination St. Mary's Church Tip by breughel

If you want to know everything about the Hejnal read "Krakow in your pocket" under history "the Hejnal". You will learn that:

The 7 firemen chosen to play are on call for a 24 hour rotation and stay in the tower, after that they are off for 48 hours. The bell of the other tower of the church rings first and then the trumpeter opens the window first in the east and then in the three other directions. So if you didn't hear the first play run around the St. Mary Basilica’s to hear the others.

The melody came from Hungary and was used as a warning for fires or invasions as the word hejnal in Hungarian means ‘wake up’.

That the man playing in the tower at 54 m above the ground was shot in the neck by Tartar's invaders, thus abruptly cutting off the song in mid-melody is legend. More probably that the trumpeter was on guard on the city walls where he was shot and killed.