10.09 km from the center of Nida
The Hill of Karvaičiai (around 59.4 metres high) is on the northern part of the Karvaičiai Landscape Reserve, between Preila and Pervalka. It keeps one of the most tragic stories of a village buried under the sand in the Curonian Spit. Up to 1797, the village of Karvaičiai existed instead of the hill. Its citizens moved from one place to another several times while retreating from the shifting sand. Yet, even the new place on the coast of the Karvaičiai Bay did not save them. After a long and unfruitful fight with sand, having lost their church, the people left the village of Karvaičiai. Some of them moved to the southern periphery of Juodkrantė, while others came to Nida and Nagliai (Agila).
The buried village of Karvaičiai is the birthplace of Liudvikas Rėza (1776-1840), one of the most well-known folklorists and poets of the 19th c. and a professor at University of Königsberg. He was the first to publish The Seasons by Kristijonas Donelaitis in 1818 and his fables later on. In 1825, he published the first collection of Lithuanian folk songs, called Dainos (Songs) as well as ran workshops on the Lithuanian language at the University of Königsberg.
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