Ivanhoe- Ulrica the Hag

In his novel Ivanhoe, Sir Walter Scott first introduces the reader to his wild character Ulrica the Hag in chapter 24, where she is known as Urfried. She is spinning in the turret of de Bœuf’s castle where the captured Jewess Rebecca is led by two guardsmen. Scott describes the woman as an “old sibyl,” muttering a Saxon rhyme as she spins. Rebecca’s guards taunt the “old hag,” calling her an “old house-cricket,” though they do acknowledge there was a time when Dame Urfried’s slightest word “would have cast the best man-at-arms out of his saddle;” these days, however, Urfried is subject to the command of every groom.

Urfried tells Rebecca how her youthful beauty was twice as great as the looks of the Jewess herself. According to the old hag, she had a powerful position in Front de Bœuf’s castle in her youth. Though given a look of “malignant envy” from Dame Urfried, Rebecca treats the old woman with respect, calling her “good mother” and asking her mercy. The contempt Urfried shows the beautiful Rebecca suggests that the hag is more than capable of great evil; her disdain foreshadows the possibility o

Urfried shows Rebecca little pity or mercy because the hag was shown no mercy as a young women. Her harsh life has made her very hard and bitter in her premature old age. The only mercy she shows the Jewess is when Rebecca is able to persuade Urfried to leave the imprisonment of the tower and help the wounded Ivanhoe.

Her years of desperation come to an end after her “confession” to Cedric, when Ulrica is inspired to finally take her vengeance on Front de Bœuf. For years after her father’s death, she used her feminine charm and wiles to create quarrels among the soldiers that resulted in them killing each other. She even caused Front de Bœuf to kill his father; Ulrica was the only witness to this parricide. Her past deeds haunt her, and combined with her desperation and hatred, she is stirred once-and-for-all to exact the ultimate revenge on her captor. She tells Cedric that even if he will not help her, she will still take her revenge alone. Ulrica had hoped that she would find compassion in the son of her father’s friend, but he only shows her more disgust.

Though Ulrica is dead only seven chapters after first being mentioned, a great deal of her character is revealed through her confession to the priest-imposter Cedric, th

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