The Vilnius Wolf
"One day, the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas went for a hunt, ten miles away from his then capital, Trakai.
The hunt was successful – the Duke came upon a huge beast, a taurus*, and killed it.
As it was too late to go back to Trakai, Grand Duke Gediminas stopped at Šventaragis valley and slept there. During the night, he had a dream that on the mountain a large iron wolf was standing and howling loudly, with the voice of hundreds of wolves.
Gediminas woke up from his sleep and said to the chief pagan priest, Lizdeika: "I have dreamt a strange dream" and described everything that had happened. Lizdeika said, "Grand Duke, the iron wolf means that the great capital will be located here. The howling of the wolf means that the sound of this capital will be heard all over the world".
The next day, Grand Duke Gediminas immediately sent people and founded one castle in Šventaragis valley and another on a high mountain nearby. And to those castles he gave the name 'Vilnius'."
[source: IronWolf.LT]
*clarification of what type of creature this is comes from draugas.org :
"An unusually large wild bull, identified as be-in a member of a now extinct species known to sci-ence as Bosprimigenius and to Lithuanians as “tauras.” This species of wild ox is called the aurochs in English."
The Vilnius Wolf
"One day, the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas went for a hunt, ten miles away from his then capital, Trakai.
The hunt was successful – the Duke came upon a huge beast, a taurus*, and killed it.
As it was too late to go back to Trakai, Grand Duke Gediminas stopped at Šventaragis valley and slept there. During the night, he had a dream that on the mountain a large iron wolf was standing and howling loudly, with the voice of hundreds of wolves.
Gediminas woke up from his sleep and said to the chief pagan priest, Lizdeika: "I have dreamt a strange dream" and described everything that had happened. Lizdeika said, "Grand Duke, the iron wolf means that the great capital will be located here. The howling of the wolf means that the sound of this capital will be heard all over the world".
The next day, Grand Duke Gediminas immediately sent people and founded one castle in Šventaragis valley and another on a high mountain nearby. And to those castles he gave the name 'Vilnius'."
[source: IronWolf.LT]
*clarification of what type of creature this is comes from draugas.org :
"An unusually large wild bull, identified as be-in a member of a now extinct species known to sci-ence as Bosprimigenius and to Lithuanians as “tauras.” This species of wild ox is called the aurochs in English."