Sabała or Sablik (born Jan Krzeptowski né Gąsienica; 1809-1894) was a Goral amateur musician, storyteller and folk singer active in or around the Tatra Mountains.
Sabała, together with his brothers, adopted the surname of Krzeptowski to distinguish themselves from the rest of the large Gąsienica family.
Set free, he abandoned his earlier life and, instead of settling down as a farmer, took up storytelling and playing music.
[6][7] Sabała's folk tales (Polish: gawędy), both those invented by him and those he merely repeated after others, have been popularized by Stanisław Witkiewicz, Henryk Sienkiewicz, Wojciech Brzega and others, who have published them in numerous collections, including: Thanks to Sabała's friendship with some of the more renown Polish authors of late 19th and early 20th centuries, he was featured as a semi-fictional protagonist in numerous works of literature, including by Henryk Sienkiewicz (Sabałowa bajka, 1884), Stanisław Witkiewicz (Na przełęczy, 1891), Kazimierz Przerwa-Tetmajer (Legenda Tatr, 1910), Władysław Orkan (novella Przez co Sabała omijał jarmark w Kieżmarku), Jalu Kurek (Księga Tatr, 1955) and Józef Kapeniak (Ród Gąsieniców, 1954).
[8][9] In 1979 Sabała's house at Krzeptówki was turned into one of the branches of the Tatra Museum, it returned to private hands in the following years, but is still available for tourists.
[10] There are streets named after Sabała in numerous Polish cities, including Zakopane, Warszawa, Bydgoszcz, Kraków, Łódź and Jelenia Góra.