Baba Yaga

Baba Yaga is the archetypal witch from Slavic and Russian folklore. She’s a much deeper and more intricate character than the witches of western European myth, a figure of both fear and hope.

Her name is as much a statement of her identity as any of her legends. The Russian term ‘Baba’ is subtle, and generally considered offensive. Specifically, a Baba is a scheming, nagging, spiteful woman, past her virginity; a woman given to jealousies and petty malice. ‘Yaga’ is sometimes translated as witch, but has other meanings as well, including ‘snake’, ‘something that is a horror’, and, most interestingly, ‘wrath’.

In her legends, Baba Yaga lives in the depths of the wild forest in a tall, rickety wooden hut surrounded by a ramshackle fence of human bones. The fence-post bones are topped with human skulls whose eye-sockets glow in the dark. The gate is a ribcage hung on leg-bone posts, with skeletal hands as hinges, and feet to bolt it shut. The keyhole has sharp teeth to bite the unwary. The hut itself is always found turned away from the traveller, and anyone who wants entry has to command it to present itself. The hut then stands up arthritically on huge chicken’s legs, screaming in pain, its bones popping, before turning round to inspect the brave visitor. It will decide whether to let the person in or not, and how long it will make them wait.

The witch herself is an ugly, bony hag with a long, curved, warty nose and chin, sharp teeth of iron, and long, lank grey hair that has not been washed in centuries. Her back is so twisted and bent by the years that her head almost touches the floor at times. She is as thin as a skeleton, and wears little more than filthy rags. She is guarded and helped by three sets of three helpers — guardians in the form of a ravenous dog, a malicious cat and a birch tree that can scratch out the eyes of the unwelcome; three strong pairs of ghostly hands, her Soul Friends, that help around the hut; and three enigmatic Horsemen, one black, one red and one white, who are midnight, day and dawn respectively.

When Baba Yaga goes hunting for victims to take home and eat, she ventures abroad in a large flying mortar bowl, using the pestle as an oar to propel herself quickly through the air, and her broom to sweep away any wake or trail she may leave.

Some visitors to the hut, like the victims she hunts for, are destined for her big clay oven. These unfortunates are given a hot bath and a hearty meal, which they eat, seated on a giant spatula. It is more usual for visitors to be given tasks around the hut, ones that seem impossible, but that are achievable if the guest pushes themselves, makes the most of their resources, and behaves properly. If the tasks are done, the guest is safe. As in fairy lore in the west, there are other rules too, which are not announced, and breaking them is also fatal. Asking questions about things inside the hut often breaks a rule, for example, but being meek, brave, hard-working and reasonably sensible is usually enough to earn survival, and maybe even a magical boon.

Often, Baba Yaga knows all about the troubles that have driven a hero to seek her out, and she will frequently help, particularly if the person has been wronged, and knows what to do to correct matters. If she does decide to help out, she can offer all manner of charms, amulets, spells and useful advice. On other occasions of course, the visitor transgresses, and is roasted and eaten.

Although she is definitely a cruel and unpredictable force, Baba Yaga often seems to be testing a person’s worthiness rather than just trying to get an excuse to have a Russian supper. If her visitor is an innocent being sent to his or her doom, then the chances are that despite seeming evil and terrifying, Baba Yaga will reverse the situation so that the guest wins freedom from both the hut and the cruel situation back home.  That’s not always the case, at least not overtly, but more often than not, the witch only actually kills those whose folly, greed or pride demand it.

As such, like many folklore figures, Baba Yaga is more a force of nature than a symbol of death and destruction. She’s vicious, unpredictable and always ravenous, but also full of power and wisdom, and often beneficial in a harsh sort of sense. In that sense, she represents Geburah, the scouring trial of rebirth: the wrath that cleanses away the old and broken so that the new and whole can be given life.