In the North, winter was never a backdrop. It was the main event.

Before electric light, central heating, and year-round supply chains, winter tested whether you had prepared properly and whether your community would survive at all. Food ran low and travel became dangerous. Storms erased paths. Darkness stretched long enough to make you wonder if light would ever return. This was the half of the year when people vanished, animals died, and the dead felt closer.

It is no coincidence, then, that Northern folklore fills the winter months with monsters.

These weren’t scary bedtime stories; they were warnings, plain and practical. If the wool wasn’t spun, the clothes left unmended, the food hoarded instead of shared, or someone stepped outside when the storm had already closed in, someone — or something — would take note.

This article explores those creatures as they were understood in the North itself:
Icelandic, Scandinavian, Baltic-Finnic, and Sámi traditions were shaped by hunger, cold, and long dark months. No Alpine demons imported for shock value. No modern tourist folklore sanded smooth for December markets. Just the beings that belonged to winter when winter could still kill you.

Because before Christmas lights and novelty sweaters, the North told a different kind of winter story — one with claws, teeth, and very little patience for the unprepared.

ICELAND: WINTER MONSTERS OF HUNGER AND HOUSEHOLD SURVIVAL

GRÝLA: ICELAND’S ORIGINAL CHILD-EATER

Long before she became a seasonal curiosity, Grýla was something far scarier.

Grýla is already present in Icelandic material by the medieval period, and she is never introduced as a harmless story figure. She appears as a giantess — sometimes a troll or witch woman — who comes down from the mountains once winter has set in. Her interest is not vague mischief but children who avoid work, disrupt the household, or refuse to do what is expected of them. There is no lesson delivered and no warning issued. Grýla does not scold children; she puts them alive in her cauldron and eats them.

In the earliest stories, Grýla is not tied to Christmas at all. She is a lurking threat throughout the year, but it’s the dark months when food runs short, work piles up indoors, and everyone is expected to pull their weight that she comes calling. If food is wasted, work left unfinished, or the daily routines of the household start to slip, the family are no longer safe from harm. Grýla is the consequence. 

She is described as enormous, grotesque, and unmistakably non-human: too many eyes, claws instead of hands, an insatiable hunger. She lives on the margins — in Iceland’s volcanic landscape, caves or mountains — places already understood as dangerous once winter sets in. 

In many stories, she is married to Leppalúði, described as a weak, frightened man who rarely leaves the cave. Some tales mention he is her third husband, implying that the earlier two did not survive her temper.

Later folklore places Grýla among a household of similarly unpleasant figures; most notably her sons, the Jólasveinar (Yule Lads), and the Jólakötturinn (Yule Cat) — but she is always the real danger. The others steal, disturb, and test boundaries. Grýla brings things to an end.

Grýla is sometimes compared to hag figures found elsewhere in Northern Europe, such as Perchta or Frau Holle. There are some parallels; they each appear in midwinter, enforce social and domestic duties, and are associated with judgement. Frau Holle is far kinder than Grýla or Perchta, though. What matters is that these figures appear in places where winter was harsh. Grýla belongs to Iceland in particular, shaped by a volcanic landscape that left little room for error and little mercy for those who fell behind.

TEACH YOUR KIDS ABOUT THE IMPORTANCE OF TIDYING UP, WITH THIS MAGICAL STORY OF FRAU HOLLE: 

THE JÓLASVEINAR: THE REAL YULE LADS (BEFORE TOURISM SOFTENED THEM)

Today, the Jólasveinar are often portrayed as harmless, gnome-like pranksters in festive jumpers, but this is a relatively recent development. In their older forms, they were not charming, and they were certainly not meant to be reassuring.

The Jólasveinar emerge from Icelandic folklore as a group of thirteen troublesome beings who arrive one by one in the days leading up to Yule. Each has a name, and each name is a confession; they describe exactly what they do when no one is watching.

• Stekkjastaur (Sheep-Cote Clod)
  Harasses sheep and tries to suckle them, though his stiff legs make him pretty bad at it.
  

• Giljagaur (Gully Gawk)
  Hides in gullies near farms, waiting for a chance to sneak into cowsheds.
  

• Stúfur (Stubby)
  Short and greedy, he steals scraps from pans and crusts left behind.
  

• Þvörusleikir (Spoon-Licker)
  Steals wooden cooking spoons and licks them clean.
  

• Pottaskefill (Pot-Scraper)
  Scrapes leftovers from pots that haven’t been properly cleaned.
  

• Askasleikir (Bowl-Licker)
  Hides under beds and waits for people to set down their food bowls.
  

• Hurðaskellir (Door-Slammer)
  Delights in slamming doors through the night, robbing households of sleep.
  

• Skyrgámur (Skyr-Gobbler)
  Steals and devours skyr, a vital winter food.
  

• Bjúgnakrækir (Sausage-Swiper)
  Hides in rafters, waiting to snatch smoked sausages.
  

• Gluggagægir (Window-Peeper)
  Peers through windows, scouting for valuables or food.
  

• Gáttaþefur (Doorway-Sniffer)
  Uses his enormous nose to smell out baked goods.
  

• Ketkrókur (Meat-Hook)
  Uses a hook to steal meat from rafters or storage.
  

• Kertasníkir (Candle-Beggar)
  Follows children to steal their candles — a serious offence when light was scarce.

Nothing about the Jólasveinar is meant as harmless mischief. Each of them interferes with something winter households could not afford to lose — food left where it shouldn’t be, stores not adequately secured, sleep broken when rest mattered, light taken at a time when there was very little to spare. In a world like that, mistakes add up quickly.

In the older stories, the Jólasveinar aren’t friendly visitors. They sneak into houses without permission, causing minor chaos and confusion. They don’t arrive with gifts, and they don’t reward good behaviour. 

The modern transformation of the Jólasveinar into cheerful gift-givers dressed in red owes more to 19th- and 20th-century nationalism, tourism, and imported Christmas imagery than to Icelandic tradition. Softening them made them marketable. It also stripped them of their teeth.

JÓLAKÖTTURINN — THE YULE CAT THAT DEVOURS THE SWEATERLESS

If Grýla punishes laziness and the Jólasveinar expose it, Jólakötturinn delivers the final consequence.

The Yule Cat is exactly what it sounds like: a vast, unnatural cat that prowls the winter nights, hunting anyone who has failed to receive new clothes before Yule. Not gifts in the modern sense, but clothing earned through work — wool spun, woven, and finished before winter closes in.

Those without new garments are eaten.

This is not whimsy. In Iceland, wool was survival. Autumn and early winter were defined by textile work: shearing, spinning, weaving, and knitting. These tasks produced the clothing that kept people alive through freezing winds and months of darkness. To lack new clothes by Yule meant something had gone wrong — either you had not worked, or the household had failed to function.

Jólakötturinn exists to make that failure visible.

The cat is monstrous not because it is cruel, but because winter is. Lack of warm clothes means exposure. Exposure means death.

New clothes were often given to children or labourers once their work for the season was finished, a practical sign that they were accounted for and would be kept warm. Having a coat or shawl meant you belonged inside the circle of care. Going without one marked you out. 

Unlike later European winter figures who threaten punishment for moral failings in the abstract, Jólakötturinn does not care whether you were naughty or nice. It cares whether you are dressed for the season. In that sense, it may be one of the most honest winter monsters ever created.

Modern retellings sometimes soften the Yule Cat into a quirky curiosity. This misses the point entirely. A giant, man-eating cat is not absurd in a culture where winter starvation was a lived memory. It is precise.

Where other traditions reached for demons or devils, Iceland gave winter claws and whiskers. And unlike imported figures meant to frighten children into obedience, Jólakötturinn warns everyone equally: if you do not prepare, winter will notice — and it will not be merciful.

Either that, or it just wants a ball of yarn to play with.

KEEP THE YULE CAT FROM YOUR DOOR WITH SOME NEW THREADS. OUR WEB OF WYRD HOODIE OFFERS RUNIC PROTECTION:

NORWAY, SWEDEN AND DENMARK: STORM RIDERS, YULE VISITORS, GOATS, AND WINTER LAW

THE WILD HUNT IN THE NORTH: OSKOREIA, ODIN, AND THE DEAD

Winter in the North was never quiet. Storms carried meaning, and in parts of Scandinavia, that meaning took the form of the Wild Hunt.

In Norway, later folklore preserves this under the name Oskoreia (or Åsgårdsreia): a terrifying midwinter host heard riding the storm winds, made up of the dead and other beings that did not belong among the living. Odin, or a figure closely resembling him, is usually placed at the head of the company. Hearing the Hunt was enough to send people indoors. Seeing it was thought to be worse.

Oskoreia was not something to celebrate or invoke. The stories warned against travelling during storms or wandering after dark in winter, when the veil between worlds was thin. Those who ignored the warning risked being carried off to join the procession or losing their mind.

Elsewhere in Scandinavia, similar ideas surface under names like Odens jakt or the Asgard Ride, sometimes described as heard rather than seen — dogs barking in the forest, sudden silence, the sense of something passing overhead. The details vary, but the message stays consistent: winter storms were not to be tested.

This brief outline only touches the surface. Its place here serves as a reminder that winter danger was not limited to hearth and household. Sometimes it came from the sky, moving fast, and already on its way.

LEARN ALL ABOUT ODIN’S WILD HUNT: WINTER’S MOST TERRIFYING PROCESSION

THE JULBOCK (YULE GOAT): FEARSOME SPIRIT BEFORE IT BECAME STRAW DÉCOR

Long before it was twisted into straw and hung from trees, the Julbock was a goat not to be messed with.

The Yule Goat turns up across Scandinavian folklore as a midwinter figure tied to Yule rather than as a single, fixed character with one story. Its roots likely reach back into pre-Christian belief, where goats were valued for their toughness, usefulness, and ability to survive where other livestock struggled. Later myth and folklore link the Julbock to Thor, whose chariot is pulled by goats — animals that can be killed, eaten, and miraculously restored, provided their bones remain unbroken. Even in that myth, survival comes with conditions.

In older winter traditions, the Julbock was not an ornament but a presence. In parts of Sweden and Finland, young men dressed as the goat and went from house to house demanding food and drink, testing hospitality, and causing disruption. The goat could be threatening, obscene, or deliberately frightening. Refusing it or mocking it was unwise. 

A similar instinct appears elsewhere in Northern Europe — most notably in the Welsh Mari Lwyd, another animal-headed winter visitor (in this case a horse skull) who arrives at the door to demand food and booze via a verbal contest (pwnco). Different shape, same purpose: midwinter was not the time to fail at hospitality. Luckily for the Scandinavians, a rap battle against the Julbock was not required.

The Julbock’s visit was not a performance for entertainment. It was a ritualised reminder that winter demanded generosity and caution in equal measure. Hospitality was not optional during the dark months. Turning away a visitor carried consequences.

The Julbock also appears as an enforcer rather than a gift-bringer. In some traditions, it was the goat that punished misbehaviour, broke into homes, or frightened children into obedience. Only later does it soften, gradually losing its menace as other figures — most notably Santa Claus — absorb the role of reward and judgement.

The transformation of the Julbock into a decorative object is a perfect example of how winter folklore was domesticated over time. As winter stopped being a season that could wipe out a household outright, the figures tied to enforcing it lost their authority. What had once tested households became a symbol safe enough to sit on a mantelpiece.

FINNISH & SÁMI WINTER SPIRITS: A GLIMPSE INTO THE FAR NORTH

Move north and east, and the winter dark deepens.

In Finnish and Sámi traditions, winter is not crowded with neatly named monsters, but it is no safer for that. Danger doesn’t always arrive as a figure you can point to or name. More often, it lies in the land itself. Forests, frozen water, and weather take on a will of their own once winter settles in, and they are not shaped around human needs. The stories that come from these regions reflect that reality, where survival depends less on outwitting a creature and more on reading a landscape that has turned against you.

FINNISH WINTER SPIRITS: WHEN SACRED BECOMES DANGEROUS

In early Finnish belief, many beings later labelled as “monsters” were not originally evil at all. They were powerful. Winter is what changed their tone.

Hiisi is a good example. In its earliest form, hiisi referred to a sacred grove or a powerful place in the landscape. Over time, particularly under Christian influence, hiisi became something darker: a dangerous forest spirit, giant, or demon associated with wild places. In winter, those wild places were lethal. Getting lost in a frozen forest did not require malice — only cold.

Näkki is a danger throughout the year, but winter elevates his power. You’ll find him at the lakes, rivers, and shorelines; places where you should always be cautious. But once the cold sets in and the nights are darker and longer, the risk increases. Ice looks solid when it isn’t, and water that might have been avoided in summer becomes deceptively reachable. Tales of näkki sit right on that edge, warning against frozen surfaces and solitary wandering in a season when one wrong step was enough to end things.

Ajatar, a forest demoness and bringer of illness, embodies another winter fear — disease. Cold, hunger, and sickness were tightly linked, and Ajatar’s presence in folklore reflects that reality. She is less a character than a personification of how winter preys on weakened bodies.

These figures are not seasonal mascots. They are explanations for why people vanish, fall ill, or die when winter tightens its grip.

SÁMI WINTER BEINGS: HUNGER, ISOLATION, AND THE WRONG KIND OF STRENGTH

Sámi winter folklore must be handled with care, not because it is fragile, but because it is often misunderstood or flattened. Sámi cosmology does not frame winter monsters as simple villains. Winter itself is spiritually charged and dangerous, and the beings associated with it reflect imbalance, hunger, and misuse of power.

The most widely known figure is Stállu.

Stállu appears as a large, ogre-like man-eater — strong, greedy, and often foolish. In many stories, he lives alone or in small family groups, hoarding food and preying on others during times of scarcity. He is frequently outwitted rather than overpowered, which is telling. Stállu represents the wrong response to winter: isolation instead of cooperation, greed instead of sharing, strength without wisdom.

Some traditions suggest Stállu may also function as a parody of outsiders or invaders — powerful but clumsy figures who do not understand the land they move through.

In Sámi shamanic traditions, winter is thought of as a time when spiritual boundaries are less stable. Travel between realms becomes easier, but more dangerous. When people fall ill, lose their way, or suffer a run of bad luck in these stories, it’s rarely brushed off as chance. Something has gone wrong somewhere. The spirits of winter aren’t presented as judges weighing up good and bad behaviour, but as reminders that there are limits — to where you go, how long you stay, and what the season will tolerate.

What unites Finnish and Sámi winter beings is restraint. These traditions do not overcrowd the dark months with spectacle. They allow cold, hunger, and isolation to do most of the work. The spirits simply give those forces a face — or sometimes just a name — so people know where not to go, what not to touch, and when to turn back.

DRAUGR AND WINTER DEAD: WHEN BURIAL MOUNDS DON’T STAY QUIET

Winter has a habit of waking the dead.

In the sagas, it is no accident that the restless dead most often rise during the cold months. Winter locks the land in place, limits movement, and forces the living indoors. It also sharpens unresolved tensions — inheritance disputes, grudges, and unfinished obligations — the very things that draugar are made of.

The draugr is not a ghost in the modern sense. It is a physical corpse, swollen, heavy, and stubbornly present. Draugar guard burial mounds, hoard wealth, and attack those who trespass. They are driven by greed, envy, and a refusal to let go of what was theirs in life. 

One of the clearest saga examples of the winter dead refusing to stay put is Þórólfr Twist-Foot (Thorolf Halt-Foot), from Eyrbyggja saga, who rises from the dead to terrorise his household and neighbours. His draugr nature is tied directly to his character in life: cruel, stubborn, and possessive. Thorolf’s death itself is wrong from the start. He dies sitting upright at the household table, eyes open, staring ahead. Arnkel, his son, recognises the danger immediately. No one is allowed to pass in front of the corpse’s line of sight. A cloth is pulled over Thorolf’s face. When the body is removed, it is taken out through a hole cut in the wall rather than the door, an attempt to confuse the dead man and prevent him from finding his way back.

None of it works. The oxen used to carry Thorolf to his grave die soon after. Livestock that wander near the burial site sicken and collapse. Shepherds vanish. As winter deepens, Thorolf begins to walk, haunting the valley where he was buried and making travel dangerous for anyone who crosses his land.

Arnkel has the body moved and a wall built around the new grave, as though stone and labour might succeed where ritual failed. Not long after, Arnkel himself is killed under unclear circumstances. Thorolf returns with greater force, raging through the district until a final solution is attempted. His body is exhumed once more, burned, and the ashes scattered into the sea. Only then does the haunting end.

Then there’s Glam, who appears in the Grettis saga. Glam is a foreign labourer, hired to tend sheep through the winter at a remote farmstead called Þórhallstaðir. From the outset, Glam is marked as a bad fit. He refuses to attend church, mocks Christian customs, and ignores warnings about the dangers of working alone during the darkest part of the year.

On Christmas Eve, Glam goes out into a storm to check the sheep and never returns. When he is found, his body is twisted, blackened, and unnaturally heavy — already showing signs of becoming something else. After burial, he rises almost immediately. Animals are killed, people are driven mad with fear, and the farm is effectively abandoned. Glam does not roam widely like Thorolf; he dominates one place completely, making it uninhabitable.

When Grettir finally confronts him, the fight takes place at night, in winter, under terrible conditions. Grettir defeats Glam, but not without cost. As he dies, Glam curses him, condemning Grettir to bad luck, social isolation, and a fear of the dark that will follow him for the rest of his life. The curse works. Grettir’s later misfortunes are all traced back to this encounter.

What makes Glam significant is why he becomes a draugr. He is not greedy, and he does not cling to land. He fails because he ignores winter itself. He goes out into a storm on a liminal night, dismisses warnings and works alone. Glam embodies a different lesson from Thorolf: not the danger of holding on too tightly, but the danger of arrogance and isolation in a season that punishes both.

The winter dead do not exist to scare children into obedience. They are warnings aimed squarely at adults.

LEARN MORE ABOUT DEATH AND THE AFTERLIFE IN THE VIKING AGE

SHARED NORTHERN THEMES: HUNGER, DARKNESS, AND MORAL WARNING

Across the North, the monsters belonged to a time when winter was a real threat and people needed ways to pass that knowledge on without writing it down. Hunger, cold, darkness, and isolation were familiar problems, and over time, the monsters became familiar.

These stories are not especially concerned with good and evil. They tend to focus on smaller, more practical failures: work that was put off, food that was kept back, doors that should not have been opened. There was no time for good intentions, only action.

That is why the monsters stuck around. They were useful. Even after the conditions that produced them faded, the stories persisted. They stayed on in altered form, less as myths than as quiet reminders of how the season once behaved.

IF THESE OLDER TRADITIONS STILL RESONATE, YOU’LL FIND THEM REFLECTED IN THE BOOKS, ARTWORK, AND DESIGNS WE CREATE AT NORTHERN BLACK. FEEL FREE TO HAVE A BROWSE.