Baba Dochia's Legends
Babele" are the first nine days of March. They are usually bad-tempered days, associated with the idea of fight between winter and spring. Each person should choose one of these days before the 1st of March. The weather during that particular day will give that person a clue about how the next year will go for him.
There are many legends associated to these days. One of them tells about an old woman who saw the bright days of late February and, believing that the winter was over, took her sheep up to the mountains. She put on nine sheepskin coats (cojoace) and left for the mountains. Each day she took off one coat as the weather got warmer and warmer. But in the tenth day the weather became dreadfully cold, and she froze, turning into a statue. This legend is connected to a certain stone, in Ceahlau Mountain, in Moldavia. It is said that this impressive stone, surrounded by little stones (the sheep), is in fact, Baba Dochia (or Evdochia).
But this stone has also another legend, taking us back to the times of the formation of the Romanian people. Dochia was the sister of Decebal, the Dacian king defeated by the Roman Emperor Traian. Traian intended to marry Dochia, but she refused to submit to the enemy of her people. So, she dressed like a she-shepherd and ran away in the mountains. But Traian followed her, and when he almost got to her, Dochia asked the Supreme God, Zamolxe, to turn her into a stone. So he did, he turned young, brave Dochia and her sheep into stones. The spring coming out from that rock is said to be the tears of Dochia.