A lump of coal is way better than what you get from Gryla for being on the naughty list.

Gryla is a Ogress, some times a troll, or sometime a giantess that lives in a cave. She comes out of her cave during Christmas, gathers up the naughty children in a giant sack, takes them back to her cave and….eats them, yep, eats them. Told you the coal was better.

The earliest mention of Gryla was in the 17th century in a poem called Gryla & the Yule Lads. In the poem she speaks of going into town and doing things such as getting chubby children to bring back to put in a soup for her husband. We are also introduced to her Cat, The Yule Cat who fetches naughty children from their beds to bring to the cave for her to eat. By the end of the poem Gryla, her husband, and their 13 children enjoy a soup made out of the naughty children.

Ah, what have we here? The sons of Gryla have rewarded the good children. But for the bad, they have only left a moldy old potato. Why, this is a sign, surely! The good children who have been rewarded, I shall leave alone. But the wicked children – those shall I take!