The annual cycle of folk customs in South Poland includes several elements that are part of the old traditions of religious dramas and mysteries. The origins of religious drama in Europe date back to the Middle Ages. The first performances of this kind appeared in the 7th century in Eastern Christianity and reached their peak in the 12th and 13th centuries in Western Europe. The earliest dramatic performances, inspired by Christ's Passion and Resurrection, were closely related to the liturgy of Holy Week. Over time, these plays accumulated an increasing number of secular scenes and characters, which influenced their paraliturgical nature and led to their loss of validation by the Church at the Council of Trent in 1545. Rejected by the Church, they moved into the secular sphere and found their place in the annual cycle of folk customs.
Folk rituals adopted only those elements of Passion plays or other religious dramas that were not directly related to the representation of the Passion itself. The passage of Christ from the judgment hall to Golgotha was too solemn and emotional a scene to be reproduced anywhere except on the sacred ground of churches, calvary parks, etc. Therefore, these plays had few or no references to the Crucifixion ordeal. The Polish folk tradition has preserved two themes rooted in medieval religious drama: the triumph of Palm Sunday and Judas' betrayal. Until the turn of the 19th century, the Palm Sunday procession usually included a reenactment of Jesus's triumphal entry into Jerusalem. It seems that a more persistent remnant of the old religious plays can be traced in the Via Crucis procession in churches on Good Friday and in the custom, still observed in some places, of having a guard of honor at Christ's Tomb on Good Friday. Likewise, the Passion Rites of Kalwaria Zebrzydowska continue to be performed every year in the Calvary Park on the hills surrounding the local Bernardine abbey.