Isverna Commune – Asociaţia Pro-Mehedinţi

Thematic Route: The Cultural Heritage Route

Name of Touristic Attraction: Isverna Commune

Location: in Mehedinți County. Isverna Commune is located in the northern part of Mehedinţi County, at the limit of Mehedinți Plateau and Mehedinţi Mountains, on DJ 670, about 60 km away from Drobeta Turnu Severin.

Description: The commune is a place that offers tourists, a fairy tale natural setting. Situated on a mountainous relief, Isverna is a tourist attraction due to its many surrounding landscapes, but also due to the local people’s occupations and the traditions kept with holiness in these places. Here we meet artisans who create elements of folk and ethnographic art with skill and passion. Here we also meet the well-known Isverna Cave, which is surrounded by legends and mysteries and which can still not be explored, or Beletina Glade and Coşuta Springs and Gorges that create fairy tale landscapes for all tourists but especially for photography lovers.

Legend / Story / Impressions / Recommendations: Isverna Commune is also known due to many legends that surround it. Thus, it is regularly visited by tourists determined to find the famous hidden treasure at Isverna. The pilgrimage of these seekers arose due to a historical reality underlying the legends. During the reign of Alexandru Ioan Cuza, Milan Obrenovici, the Prince of Serbia, being in conflict with his brother, Mihai Obrenovici, because of the supremacy, decided to hide the Serbian treasure. The Prince then decided to cross the Danube. He passed it with 80 horses, carrying the country’s treasury, consisting of coins, ingots, jewellery, diamonds and pearls. It is not known the reason why the Serbian prince chose these places or the exact location of the hiding place, but it is known that an entire military unit worked for three years to build the warehouse, well defended by potential robbers and protected from the infiltration of the groundwater. The legends say that the place would be close to Cerna Peak, in a depression called today Valea Perilor, being at that time planted with rear trees. All the legends say that the galleries were built at both ends and that most of the gold and jewels were hidden here. The entry into the warehouse was blocked by a two-foot thick wall that formed a dam in the way of a spring, and thus a lake was created which still exists nowadays, which tends to confirm the authenticity of the legend. On the other hand, the access to the construction, through the formed lake, would require a complex and expensive work. The same legend states that all the 300 soldiers who worked on the construction of the warehouse would have been killed by the Serbian prince because they knew the details of the site and the access routes very well and the Serbian prince did not want to keep a witness, who knows his “little” secret. However, a certain man escaped from the murderous hands, a poor guard who, however, terrified of what had happened, decided to keep silent. The prince himself died in those places. He was found drowned in the lake. The conditions of his death are unknown even today. Several plans were found on him, but they were too degraded to be deciphered and to lead the people to the treasure. There is mentioned a single map that was found in good condition by priest Popescu in Zegujani. It is said that he investigated the systematic area during the Second World War, but disappeared afterwards. The locals suspect that he managed to disappear with a part of the treasure.

Information and Contact:

Isverna City Hall – tel: +40252 388 151

Route close to other thematic routes:

In the commune you can also visit:

– The Wooden church from Seliştea

– The Mount stone Cornet

– The lilac forest in Turtaba Village

In the area you can also visit: