About the Oltenians, they are known to be very funny and impish, but sometimes their jokes take root and turn, over the years, into true urban legends. This was the case in the town of Caracal in the county of Olt, which got to be, by chance, the capital … of stupidity.
In the mid-nineteenth century, a legend began to circulate in the area, according to which the chart with stupid people would have overturned in Caracal and from here the stupidity would have spread throughout the world. It is said that one day, in immemorial times, the earth’s wise people would have caught the fools, tied them up, and put them into a chart to bring them to trial because they were spreading their stupidity on the earth. Going up a hill, on the road to Caracal, the chart would overturn after a wheel was broken. The stupid people seized the opportunity and fled where they saw with their eyes. Since then, everyone knows that in Caracal the chart with stupid people overturned.
Some locals say that, in fact, it was a chart that was transporting convicts from Craiova to court in Bucharest. When the chart was overturned, the convicts escaped and were never caught. Others claim that a chart full of flasks was overturned on that hill, but when someone told the incident, the word “flasks” (“ploşti”) was misunderstood, which would have been confused with “stupid people” (“proşti”).
In fact, the legend would draw its roots from a real historical event, a fact also confirmed by museographers from the Museum of Romanati from Caracal. In 1848, a revolution took place in the Romanian Countries, started in a larger, European revolutionary context. On 21 June 1848, in the locality of Islaz, 60 km from Caracal, a large popular assembly was organized where a proclamation was read that provided, among others, the administrative and legislative independence of the Romanian people, equal rights, freedom of the press, disobedience of gypsies, education for both sexes or the abolition of punishment by beating or death. Without the support of the army, the ruler of the Romanian country signed the revolutionary proclamation.
Then, the Revolutionary Government and part of the crowd left from Islaz to Caracal, after which they went to Craiova, a city chosen as the meeting place of the provisional government and the first capital of the revolutionary from 1848, before heading to Bucharest. The leaders of the Revolution went on horseback, while the crowd followed in charts. Reaching the southern barrier of Caracal town, at an intersection on the outskirts of Corabia town, which still exists, the revolutionaries were greeted by the county leader. It is said that just then a wood broke from the wheel of a char with revolutionaries, which overturned with its occupants. The fact was placed on the participants’ enthusiasm for the success of the revolution. Most of the revolution’s supporters were simple persons, among the people, who at that time were generically called “the rabble” (prostime) not because they were stupid, but because they generally did not have access to education (there were not enough schools, they had no money to send children to school, children were used for physical work, etc.). By then, the term did not have a pejorative meaning.
Over time, either the meaning of the word “the rabble” (prostime) has changed, either there has been confusion between the meaning of the words “the rabble” (prostime) and “stupid people” (prosti), or, running from mouth to mouth, the story has become distorted. It is certain that she has come to this day in the version of the “chart with stupid people”, which has given birth to many jokes, but also reasons for annoyance in Caracal.
Bibliography :
• Mugurel Manea, “Legends of Caracal, five out of seven are true: the place where the car with fools overturned, the prison on Libertăţii street, the cemetery on the Resurrection street VIDEO”, 5 August 2014, <https://adevarul.ro/locale /slatina/legendeledespre-caracal-e-mit-e-realitate-1_53e061360d133766a804ce73/index.html>
• Mugurel Manea, “The history of jokes about Caracal. What is real and what is false in the jokes about the place where the chart with stupid people overturned ”, 3 February 2015, <https://adevarul.ro/locale/slatina/istoria-glumelor-dprre-caracal-real-fals-bancurile -about-place-to-inverted-tall-stupid-1_54d10334448e03c0fd3f5d74 / index.html>
• Dana Fodor and Răzvan Mateescu, “The wonders of Caracal town”, <https://artizanescu.ro/blog/minurile-orasului-caracal/>