Baba Yaga: The Ancient Origins of the Famous ‘Witch’ | Monstrum

Comments · 2.5K

• CO

  @Corporis · 5 years ago

  Baba Yaga has the coolest house of any monster covered so far. A fence made of bones with a skull lock?! So rad

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• HA

  @Hamstlanda · 5 years ago

  Fun fact: “Chicken legs” is a misnomer, the Russian words for chicken and smoking are quite similar: куриных - курьих. The correct meaning was “smoked legs”, as mentioned in the video the house looked like a burial house placed on tree stumps. there was a practice of burning the tree stumps to preserve them from rot.<br>Basically Baba Yagá’s house represented the gateway to the world of the dead

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• PE

  @petzi_9227 · 5 years ago

  In Serbian “Baba” means Grandmother. And my Grandmother would joke that she would turn into Baba Roga (Yaga), if we would misbehave

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• AN

  @andreandretta5259 · 5 years ago

  It&apos;s a monster of focus, commitment, and sheer f*ing will.

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• JA

  @janakracmarova7843 · 5 years ago

  I have read quite a lot books with old slavic tales. In majority of stories Baba Jaga is as you said old witch living in or near the forest and her house is full of magic things. She often help main character (young girl or young man or prince) and give him powerful magic gift (magical sword, axe, box, potion or flute) or advice but it&apos;s in exchange for some manual labor. So she is fair and wise character, but only to people who are fair, good and deserve it. I think she is cool character, because in many stories witches are evil, but baba Jaga is more neutral, she helps good people and punish bad people. Evil character in slavic tales is more often male like Koschei, which is immortal powerfull very skinny wizard (sometimes almost skeleton) riding magical horse. Sometimes he abducts princesses. Baba Jaga help hero to defeat koschei and save his lady.

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• AU

  @autumnelemental97 · 5 years ago (edited)

  Fun fact: in Polish translation of Hansel and Gretel, the witch is sometimes referred as Baba Yaga.<br>And Jaga itself is sometimes short name for name Agnieszka (Agnes).

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• HA

  @hannaberga7063 · 5 years ago

  I had to pause watching Ant Man when they were talking about how &quot;you don&apos;t find Baba Yaga, she finds you&quot; because the whole point is that YOU HAVE TO GO FIND HER!

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• SH

  @ShadaOfAllThings · 5 years ago

  &quot;Elemental Goddess? Dark Sorceress? Terrifying Granny?&quot;<br><br>Anyone who knows enough mythology will know immediately that none of these categories are mutually exclusive

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• AL

  @alexanderstone4486 · 3 years ago

  As a Bulgarian, she was absolutely the most prominant folklore figuire that we thought of and feared as kids, maybe the strongest counterpart from Eastern Europe to America&apos;s Boogeyman

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• MO

  @MoonBratStudio · 5 years ago

  Thank you so much for wearing my Baba Yaga sweatshirt! I&apos;m honored! &nbsp;--Moon Brat Studio

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• MA

  @MariaVosa · 5 years ago

  I too was utterly confused by the use of &quot;Baba Yaga&quot; as a code name for John Wick....<br>It&apos;s like calling him Medusa.

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• SA

  @SarahWolverine · 5 years ago

  Emily&apos;s little Wick rant at the end was delightful haha<br><br>I also find it interesting how that one Baba Yaga story with the girl who does the chores and gets rich, while her lazy stepsister gets eaten, parallels the German fairy tale of &quot;Frau Holle&quot; or &quot;Goldmarie and Pechmarie&quot; that I know. There we have the same family constellation, good girl falls down a well, ends up in a fairy tale land, meets Frau Holle, does her chores and gets showered in Gold at the end before she returns. Stepma and lazy girl see that, want that wealth and lazy girl also goes down the well but does nothing of worth and gets doused in bitumen at the end of her stay. The fact that baba yaga has a myth with a similiar skeleton, so to speak, just makes me wonder all the more where the roots of stories like these lie.<br><br>I really really love Monstrum for the thorough work it does in contextualizing myths and mythical figures, because fairy tales and myths and monsters and gods and godesses are such a deep look into a culture&apos;s psyche and history and enviroment. It shines light on who we are as people, who we are as cultures in such an honest way.

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