Kriváň (2494 m) is characteristic peak in the western part of the High Tatras. It is situated at the end of the long comb of the Krivánska crotch joining the main comb of the High Tatras from Čubrina.
Several combs join the top of the peak. The southern and south-western one are the only ones interesting for tourists. The south comb goes through the Daxner saddle and Small Kriváň, then it forks into several combs and ends at Nad Pavlovou.
The south-western comb falls through Vyššia and Nižšia Priehyba down to well forested Grúnik, a memorial of the Tatras guerrillas which fought in this area. In the southern as well as south-western slopes of Kriváň you can still see the remains of miners´ houses who mined in this area in the 15-th and the 18-th century. The first ones who ascended up to the top of the peak were certainly unknown miners. The ascent of an evangelic preacher and a natural scientist A. Czirbesz with friends is only the first documented. Others famous ones were for example: the English traveller Robert Townson (1793), the French natural-scientist Belsazar Hacquet (1794), the Polish geologian Stanislaw Staszic (1805) or the Swedish botanic Göran Wahlenberg (1813). The first winter ascent was done by Theodor Wundt and J. Horvay in 1884.
To remember the ascent of the king Fridrich August II. (1840) an obelisk was built on the top of the peak. The obelisk was destroyed by the Slovak patriots shortly after, participants of sc. national walks. The first national walk was organised on August 16, 1841, under the leadership of Ľudovít Štúr and Michal M. Hodža. The biggest one was organised by Štefan M. Daxner in 1861. Since 1955 the traditional national walks have been devoted to the Slovak National Uprising and the local heros.
Kriváň thus became a symbol of the freedom of the Slovaks and an important motive for poesy of Ľ. Štúr generation. It still has an important position in the Slovak folk songs and poems.
