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The crowd you see outside the Old town Hall just before noon each day is waiting for the goats to appear. At 12:00 precisely, the two tin creatures appear from a door in the façade and butt heads a dozen times. The first goats were installed in 1551 by Bartłomiej of Gubin, and over the years have been restored and replaced. The present goats date from 1954. The legend goes as follows: when the clock was unveiled in 1511, it was to be shown off to the governor of the Poznań province. The hapless cook preparing the celebratory feast burnt the venison. Panicking, he went out and stole a pair of goats to cook instead. But they escaped to the City Hall tower where the bemused guests saw them butting heads up on a ledge. The governor whimsically decreed that mechanical goats be added to the clock. The fate of the cook remains a mystery, though the chances are he would have been tied up to the whipping post directly outside and given a bloody good thrashing.
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The crowd you see outside the Old town Hall just before noon each day is waiting for the goats to appear. At 12:00 precisely, the two tin creatures appear from a door in the façade and butt heads a dozen times. The first goats were installed in 1551 by Bartłomiej of Gubin, and over the years have been restored and replaced. The present goats date from 1954. The legend goes as follows: when the clock was unveiled in 1511, it was to be shown off to the governor of the Poznań province. The hapless cook preparing the celebratory feast burnt the venison. Panicking, he went out and stole a pair of goats to cook instead. But they escaped to the City Hall tower where the bemused guests saw them butting heads up on a ledge. The governor whimsically decreed that mechanical goats be added to the clock. The fate of the cook remains a mystery, though the chances are he would have been tied up to the whipping post directly outside and given a bloody good thrashing.
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Poznan Town Hall, Stary Rynek 1
