Baba Yaga

Slavic world · Eastern European forests

A forest witch who lives in a hut standing on chicken legs.

Baba Yaga is neither a simple villain nor a kindly helper. Her hut turns away from visitors, her fence may be decorated with bones, and her questions test whether a traveler deserves aid or doom. In many Slavic tales she guards thresholds: childhood and adulthood, home and wilderness, fear and cleverness.