At Yule, remember the Ladies. . .

You know Dasher and Dancer and Prancer and Vixen

Comet and Cupid and Donner and Blitzen

But do you recall the most famous reindeer of all?

Oh—wait. Wrong winter myth. Still, the problem holds.

When it comes to Yuletide, we tend to remember the characters who’ve been stamped, merchandised, and mall-Santa-fied into cultural immortality: Father Christmas. St. Nick. Santa in his many red-suited incarnations. In recent years, Krampus has clawed his way back into the collective imagination, and Iceland’s Yule Lads have begun sneaking into stocking lore.

But the women of winter? The witches, goddesses, bone-wives, and solstice crones who kept the dark at bay long before Rudolph ever lit a nose?

Forgotten. Softened. Or politely ignored.

Which brings me—inevitably—to Abigail Adams, who famously wrote to her husband, John:

“I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors.”

Consider this my seasonal obedience to that directive.

So, in the spirit of Yule—and of Abigail Adams—I give you the Yule Ladies: the women who ruled the long night, rewarded the worthy, punished the lazy, and demanded respect while doing it.

Befana

In Italian folklore, La Befana is a witch—yes, a witch—who delivers gifts to children throughout Italy on Epiphany Eve (January 5). Think Santa Claus, if Santa were an old woman on a broom, carrying judgment in one pocket and sweets in the other.

Her name likely derives from Epifania, and she roams during the Twelve Days of Christmas (famously celebrated in THAT song), rewarding good children and punishing the bad. She receives offerings. Dolls are made in her likeness. Effigies of her are burned. Bonfires blaze in her honor.

Befana is not a sanitized grandmother figure. She is folk memory made flesh. A woman who moves between worlds, keeping the moral ledger balanced while everyone else is busy singing carols.

Perchta

If Befana is judgment with a smile, Perchta is judgment with a blade.

Worshipped (or feared) across Alpine pagan traditions in Germany, Austria, and Slovenia, Perchta is often called the Christmas Witch or the female Krampus. Her name may mean the bright one or the bearer, and she is associated with Berchtentag, the Feast of the Epiphany.

Perchta also appears during the Twelve Days of Christmas as a guardian of spinning and domestic order. She is obsessed with household chores, especially unfinished flax.

If your house isn’t clean by Twelfth Night? If your spinning is left undone? She may slit your belly open, remove your organs, and replace them with straw, stones, and shards of glass.

Lazy children fare no better.

Even the diligent must leave her tribute: dumplings and herring in Thuringia, Perchtenmilch (oat and herring porridge) in Austria, eggs or dumplings left on the roof in Tyrol.

Perchta is not here to be liked. She is here to be obeyed.

Grýla

Long before Krampus became a pop-culture darling, Iceland’s winter terror had a name: Grýla.

She is a towering, mountain-dwelling witch who emerges each winter to hunt misbehaving children. She lives in a cave. She eats the naughty. She does not negotiate.

Grýla is the mother of the thirteen Yule Lads, mischievous figures who now pass for pranksters. She herself remains vast, ancient, and hungry. At her side stalks the terrifying Christmas Cat, said to devour anyone who doesn’t receive new clothes before the holiday.

Grýla doesn’t care if you’ve been good enough. She cares if you’ve been good at all.

Frankly? Krampus wishes. See Why Iceland’s Christmas Witch Is Much Cooler (and Scarier) Than Krampus.

The White Lady (Die weiße Frau)

Across Germanic folklore, the White Lady appears as an ethereal female spirit tied to Yule, winter, and the turning of the year. She is sometimes beautiful, sometimes terrifying, always powerful.

She may be the echo of an ancient goddess. A wise woman. A death-bringer. A guide.

She appears in mist and moonlight, shaking feathers like falling snow, warning travelers, offering wisdom, or demanding respect for traditions long forgotten. She embodies fertility, decay, and rebirth, walking the liminal edge of the Winter Solstice.

She is not a ghost to be dismissed. She is memory itself, wrapped in white.

So, during this Yule season. . .

Light your candles.

Sweep your floors.

Finish your spinning.

Leave the offering.

And when you tell your winter stories, remember the women who ruled the dark long before it was made safe.

At Yule, remember the ladies.