The Christmas Witch From Chilling Adventures of Sabrina Is Based on a Real, Terrifying Myth

Listen, Grýla is such a thing in Iceland, she's literally mentioned on the official Iceland website. She's an ogress who, according to the lore, lives in the Icelandic mountains. The small block of text goes on to paint her as a "dreadful character" who is "part troll and part animal." While this site in particular doesn't give any further physical description, an article from Smithsonian magazine has some choice excerpts from historic sagas and poems.

One says: "Here comes Grýla, down in the field / with fifteen tails on her."

Another: "Down comes Grýla from the outer fields / With forty tails / A bag on her back, a knife in her hand / Coming to carve out the stomachs of the children / Who cry for meat during Lent."

I suppose this is a great moment to tell you what Grýla does. According to Iceland's website and Smithsonian, she hunts down naughty children, throws them into her sack, drags them up the mountain, and then boils and eats them. She apparently even killed her first two husbands! Because she was bored!

What's interesting is that Grýla wasn't always a "Christmas witch." Stories of the ogress go all the way back the 13th century, but she didn't become a Christmas staple until the 19th century, according to Smithsonian. She's also been associated with some creature called the Yule Cat, which skulks around and eats people who aren't wearing new clothes.

Here's where the Yule Lads enter the picture. They are the 13 sons of Grýla, and they're very mischievous. According to the sources, the Yule Lads did, at one point, exist separately from Grýla, but eventually they all merged into one big, terrifying family. Wildly enough, each one has a name (translated from Icelandic) and a specific brand of mischief, all outlined on Iceland's official website.

1. Sheep-Cote Clod: Harasses sheep.
2. Gully Gawk: Hides in gullies and steals milk from the cowshed.
3. Stubby: Very short and steals pans.
4. Spoon-Licker: Yeah. He's very tiny and steals and licks spoons.
5. Pot-Licker: Steals leftovers from pots.
6. Bowl-Licker: He hides under beds and steals bowls!
7. Door-Slammer: Likes to forcefully close doors, especially at night.
8. Skyr-Gobbler: He just loves skyr, which is like Icelandic yoghurt.
9. Sausage-Swiper: Hides in rafters, nabs unattended sausages.
10. Window-Peeper: Looks through windows to find things to steal.
11. Doorway-Sniffer: Has a very large nose that finds traditional Christmas bread.
12. Meat-Hook: I mean. He steals meat with a hook.
13. Candle-Stealer: Technically he steals candles, but I think he eats them too?

According to the stories, the Yule Lads start arriving 13 days before Christmas, beginning on Dec. 12, each wreaking their own unique havoc. And that's basically it!

Obviously, the most glaring difference is that Chilling Adventures of Sabrina's Grýla is a witch. In this iteration, she has an origin story. During a terrible famine, she makes a pact with another witch in her coven: they would eat their own children to stay alive. After eating Grýla's only child, the other witch backed out of the pact, leaving Grýla devastated. According to Zelda Spellman, she's been wandering around, heartbroken, for 1,000 years.

So, in this version, Grýla is not an ogress or a demon or a horned creature, merely a woman gone mad. The Yule Lads still come into play; they get in when Miss Wardwell extinguishes the Yule Log's flame. They do have similar modes of troublemaking as well: door slamming, knife stealing, and so on and so forth.

The other major difference is that this Grýla no longer eats the flesh of children. Based on the way she speaks to little baby Letitia, it seems she adds children to her flock to fill the hole in her heart and to protect them. But hey, at least she's keeping some of the dark roots that stem from her origin.