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The Not-So-Wicked Witch of the East

Baba Yaga

The Russian Garland of Fairy Tales : Bei... (by Steele, Robert)
Baba Yaga, Op.56 : Complete Score Volume Op.56 (by Lyadov, Anatoly)
Soul Eater 49 : Operation - Capture Baba... Volume No. 49 (by Ookubo, Atsushi)
Vasilisa (by Arnoldi, Nina Aleksandrovna)
Russian fairy tales (by Polevoi, P. (Petr))
Russian fairy tales from the Skazki of P... (by Polevo, P. (Petr))
Russian fairy tales from the Skazki of P... (by Polevoi, P. (Petr))

Forget pointed black hats, black cats, and riding on brooms. Well, maybe not the broom. Slavic folklore brings to children a much more frightening witch than anything dreamed up by Western Europeans. Native to Eastern European and Russian cultures, Baba Yaga blows through legend like a force of nature. Sometimes kind, sometimes cruel, and usually portrayed as a hideous, old hag living in a hut standing on chicken legs and surrounded by fence made of human bones, she wields a mortar and pestle and either a broom or mop, but she’s never predictable.

First mentioned in recorded literature by Mikhail V. Lomonosov’s Rossiiskaia grammatika (Russian grammar) in 1755, the iconic witch can be found in music, with the complete score by Anatoly Lyadov available in the World Public Library. She appears as a stock character in the Dungeons & Dragons role playing game and in the manga Soul Eater comics by Atsushi Ookubo.

Baba Yaga carries multiple meanings across the tales of her exploits, from cautionary to maternal. Sometimes she appears as a collective of three sisters. “The Maiden Tsar” recounted by Alexander Afanasyev speaks of Ivan, a merchant’s son, who encounters the witches’ hut turning slowly on its chicken legs. As is the inevitable fate of young and handsome heroes, Ivan finds trouble with a perilous Baba Yaga.

According to experts, Baba Yaga uses her broom or mop to sweep away all traces of her presence. She never rides it; she rides the mortar instead. According to legend, she rules over the elements represented by the White (“Bright Dawn”), Red (“Red Sun”), and Black (“Dark Midnight”) Horsemen. Bodiless pairs of hands also materialize to do her bidding.

In “Vasilisa the Beautiful,” which bears a marked resemblance to the ancient fairy tale of Cinderella, a merchant’s wife sends her stepdaughter, Vasilisa, to fetch light from Baba Yaga’s house. On her journey she encounters the witch’s horsemen. The witch takes her in, puts her to work, and eventually sends the young woman home to her cruel stepmothers and stepsisters. Vasilisa gets her revenge.

Altogether unrepentant and confounding, Baba Yaga has been lauded as an early example of feminism, but seldom all-evil or all-good. She represents the spectrum of humanity in her complexity.

For more exciting Russian fairy tales deemed suitable for young listeners, read the following. Stories contained within the first three titles overlap.

Russian Fairy Tales by Petr Polevoi
Russian Fairy Tales from the Skazki of Polevo, second edition by Petr Polevo
Russian Fairy Tales from the Skazki of Polevoi by R. Nisbet Bain
The Russian Garland of Fairy Tales: Being Russian Folk Legends by Robert Steele

By Karen M. Smith