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Pochaina — a small underground river flowing near the walls of the Kremlin in Nizhny Novgorod through a stone pipe. The main source of water within the city limits of Nizhny Novgorod during the early historical period.
Nature of the phenomenon
It is believed that the river was named by Yuri Vsevolodovich, the city's founder. It reminded him of Kyiv — there, between the hills, a similarly small, clear stream called the Pochaina descended to the Dnieper. He gave the Nizhny Novgorod river the same name. The name is ancient, Russian, and meaningful. Pochaina comes from the word "chayat'" — "to await." A place for sentries and outposts — the very first line of the city on the Dyatlov Hills.
A market was located here, first mentioned in a chronicle in 1341. Today, only the name of Pochainskaya Street recalls this river; the river itself was put into a culvert in the mid-nineteenth century.
The Pochaina's significance for the city
According to legend, the source of the river is sealed by a stone; if the stone is moved and the river is set free, terrible calamity will come upon Nizhny Novgorod.
In the nineteenth century, local historians recorded this legend as follows: "when the end comes for Nizhny Novgorod, a mighty torrent will burst from beneath the stone at the Pochaina's source, the river will overflow, flooding the city and everything around it."
Given that Nizhny Novgorod was founded on hills roughly one hundred meters high, this would indeed have been a catastrophe of tremendous scale.
This legend is evidently connected to the traditional wood carvings that adorned homes in the villages and towns of the Nizhny Novgorod region — the famous "faraonki," "sea people," half-human, half-fish figures resembling the Russian rusalki as the common people imagined them in their folk beliefs.
But rusalki are the product of pagan fantasy, so for the sake of piety these carvings were called "faraonki" — remnants of Pharaoh's army, drowned by the prophet Moses in the Red Sea.
A similar legend existed in Pereslavl-Zalessky, where it was said that a day would come when Lake Pleshcheyevo would "burst" and flood the city for the sins of its people — and that would be "the end of the world." Even in the last century, many townspeople in both Nizhny Novgorod and Pereslavl genuinely believed these legends.