Katla

Katla is a true witch of Eyrbyggja saga — a sorceress whose spells shield her wicked son Odd from justice. When Odd does evil and is pursued, Katla hides him again and again by her magic, casting illusions over her searchers so that they see only harmless things — a distaff, a goat, a pig — where her son is concealed, sending them away baffled time after time. Only a counter-witch can finally see through her sorcery and break the concealments, and Katla is taken and stoned. She belongs to the corpus's rich strand of practical witchcraft — not grand mythic magic but the household sorcery of illusion and concealment, used by a fierce mother to protect a guilty son. Katla is the saga's image of the malevolent witch-mother — the sorceress whose spells of seeming hide a wrongdoer from the law, until a stronger magic strips the illusions away and the truth, and her punishment, comes out.