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(Music: Arkona - Zakliatie)

Baba Yaga is perhaps the most well-known character in Slavic mythology.

Folklorists note that the image of Yaga is one of the most difficult to analyze and is composed of a number of details. These details, put together from different fairy tales, sometimes do not correspond to each other, do not merge into a single image.
On the one hand, she is a creepy old cannibal crone, who prefers little children as a dinner.
On the other hand, Yaga acts as a grantor to whom the hero of the story comes for help. It is she trough whom the protagonists must pass in order to be able to pursue their goal in further. They receive a gift or secretly lure various artifacts from her, and only by visiting the hut they can move on. There is a version that she is Slavic version of gatekeeper to the kingdom of the dead. This suggests an analogy with the forgotten Slavic pagan goddess, the giver of life and death - Morana, who in fairy tales is also called Marya Morevna. This comparison is all the more convincing since a lot of witches, and even more so a goddesses, most often performed in two guises - a beautiful maiden and an old hag.
... Yaga sends souls to the light and receives them from there; she, as Morana, has the keys to kingdom of the dead, therefore, she has direct power not only over the souls of people, but also over nature. " A.A. Potebnja

I already had a chance to portray Yaga in a more familiar image of creepy cannibal crone, so this time I decided to look at the character from a different angle.?

https://www.deviantart.com/irenhorrors/art/Young-Baba-Yaga-862811927