The Kitchen Witch is a very old custom which originated in Germany, or possibly Norway.
It dates back as far as the 1500's, maybe farther. (Can you tell that the origins of the Kitchen Witch are shrouded in mystery?)
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| This one is the squeezey arm kind of doll. Usually they are hanging dolls,like the other one. |
The Kitchen Witch is a good witch, and is meant to be kept in the kitchen, to insure that pots don't boil over,roasts don't burn,and sauces don't spill.
Why have I never thought to put one in the kitchen for Ken?!
It's supposed to be good luck to give someone a Kitchen Witch,and she usually will have a tag explaining what she's for.
This small Kitchen Witch is about 5" tall. Usually they are a little bigger.
This larger Kitchen Witch belongs to Emma. She's a more typical size.
See you tomorrow for another doll.
My Nana had one of these! Exactly the same as the one in black here! I'd completely forgotten that, now I suspect I'm going to have to find myself one
ReplyDeleteI guess they are still out there, but they look different now. I like the old girls like these.
DeleteI saw this doll at one point in my life. I just had no idea who she was!
ReplyDeleteThere are gazillions of them, in all different outfits and sizes. They're all very similar though.
DeleteThey’re Russian/Ukrainian aka Slavic in origin. Read about Baba Yaga and you’ll see she was the prototype for most storied witches…including the one in Hansel and Gretel!
ReplyDeleteI'm sure there have been forms of such witches all over the place. As for origins, I'm still seeing Scandinavian, German, or Nordic origins as the most likely. Baba Yaga was one of my daughter Emma's favourite stories when she was a kid, as I read her the Baba Yaga story from one of my childhood books. I'm not sure Baba Yaga is the basis for the Kitchen Witch though, as the Kitchen Witch has been traced as far back as the 1500's, and Baba Yaga's first clear reference, according to Wikipedia, was in 1755. As for Hansel and Gretel, who knows how old that story is, as it was a German folktale, around for ages, before it was collected by the Brothers Grimm, and included in one of their books, which was first published in 1812.
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