Philippa Eilhart

Philippa Eilhart (Polish: Filippa Eilhart) was King Vizimir's advisor, and remained in Redania's court even after his death, for which she was likely responsible. She is one of the few sorceresses able to polymorph.

She led the Thanedd coup against the Brotherhood of Sorcerers, intending to neutralize suspected traitors allied with Nilfgaard. Later, she helped found the Lodge of Sorceresses and is considered its leader.

She was, among several others Lodge members, one of the victims of the Witch Hunts. Her tortures and death by the hand of archpriest Willemer's men are described in introduction of chapter 11 of the Lady of the Lake. Many years later, she was exonerated and canonized as Martyr Saint.

Even though Geralt never meets this sorceress face to face, her name appears in conversation then and again. It is also speculated that either her or Keira Metz is speaking with Triss Merigold through the latter's magic mirror at the very beginning of Chapter III.


 * "The sorceress Philippa Eilhart is in town," — says a townswoman in the Trade Quarter.

Philippa Eilhart is a main character in The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings. She maintains quarters in the dwarven town of Vergen, which she used to share with her "lover" and apprentice, a "leashed sorceress", Cynthia, as well as a house in Loc Muinne. Geralt first has an encounter with her at the end of Chapter I, using Síle's megascope while investigating the disappearance of Triss Merigold, if he aids Iorveth before the fight with Letho.

Associated Quests

 * A Matter of Life and Death
 * Royal Blood
 * Hunting Magic
 * The Eternal Battle
 * Where is Triss Merigold?
 * Hatred Symbolized
 * Death Symbolized
 * Vergen Besieged
 * Prelude to War: Aedirn
 * The War Council
 * The Spellbreaker
 * For a Higher Cause!

Journal Entry

 * This was hardly the first time Geralt and I encountered Philippa Eilhart – jewel of the court at Tretogor and once the trusted sorceress of King Vizimir II. Philippa was one of the most talented mages of those times – only a handful ever mastered the art of polymorphy. Her intellect and the influence she held at the Redanian court were not to be underestimated. Proud, independent and extremely beautiful, as graceful in a fanciful yet elegant dress as in a man's traveling outfit, she was beyond any doubt one of the most attractive women I have ever known. Yet I would not count Philippa among the most pleasant of females, despite her indisputable though chilly charm. Her gaze alone was enough to make the most confident men shudder, and the mere thought of spending a night with her would make their flesh creep.


 * At the time Philippa Eilhart was staying in the town of Vergen as part of Saskia the Dragonslayer's inner circle. Her motives remained unclear, to say the least – the former court magician had never been known for her altruism.


 * However, one cannot deny that without her help Geralt would not have found his way through the magical mist. Philippa rendered him an invaluable service at that time.


 * Her qualifications in the area of curses, magic and supernatural phenomena were undeniable. If there was anyone to help the witcher in this regard back then, it was certainly Miss Eilhart. Still, I was extremely glad that it was Geralt, and not I, who was forced to speak with the Tretogor magician.


 * It was Philippa who gave the witcher the list of the ingredients for the antidote for the poison plaguing Saskia. The knowledge of recipes, ingredients and their specific properties is always extremely helpful in learning magical arcana, and few could equal Eilhart in that regard.


 * Philippa tricked everyone, not only casting a charm on Saskia under the guise of aid, but also using Geralt and Iorveth in her machinations. On the one hand it was inevitable. On the other, it left a bitter aftertaste, giving rise to the thought that sorceresses' misdeeds are responsible for the widespread mistrust towards their profession and perhaps even towards the female gender. Eilhart abducted Saskia and left for Loc Muinne. Back then we did not know what she was planning.


 * If the Kaedweni win the siege of Vergen:
 * Fleeing the victorious Henselt, Philippa Eilhart moved with Síle and Saskia to Loc Muinne, where a summit of sorcerers and crowned heads was to take place.


 * If Philippa Eilhart had counted on her troubles coming to end in Loc Muinne, she miscalculated. She was arrested by the Redanians just after arriving, and placed in a dungeon where she awaited the king's judgment.


 * In retribution for certain events of the past, not to mention her recent activities, the sorceress was brutally blinded during an initial interrogation. Death seemed an increasingly likely prospect, and it seemed only a miracle could save her.


 * If Geralt chooses to help Philippa instead of saving Triss:
 * Geralt had no desire to help a magician who repaid his trust with treason, but Philippa's arguments were justified. Only she could lift the spell from Saskia, thus the witcher was forced to trust her words once more.


 * One might have thought that a blind, exhausted sorceress would have no hope of flee. Yet she seized a moment in which both her guardians were distracted and deceived them. Philippa Eilhart risked it all on one gambit and transformed into an owl, fleeing Loc Muinne. Given the presence of the vengeful Iorveth, one might say that fear gave wing to her escape plan.

Philippa reappears in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. Having survived Loc Muinne, she flees to a hideout in eastern Velen. She contacts Margarita Laux-Antille, explaining her plan to regrow her eyes by cultivating tissues on precious stones, just as Vilgefortz did, and to revive the Lodge. When she went to Novigrad to seek help from her former lover, the sorceror Arthur de Vleester. Having humiliated him in the past, de Vleester convinced her she's be safer in her owl form, before slapping a dimeritium band around her ankle. Following de Vleester's execution during the witch hunts, Philippa fell into the possession of Zoltan Chivay, whom affectionately named her Polly. He later lost her to Sigismund Dijkstra, who made the mistake of removing her dimeritium band, she returned to human form and attacked. Only Geralt's intervention put an end to her rampage. Philippa was then recruited to help stop the Wild Hunt in exchange for amnesty from Emperor Emhyr var Emreis.

After Margarita is rescued from Oxenfurt, she and Philippa meet with Ciri to offer her equal partnership in the Lodge, to which she declined.

If Geralt chooses to participate in the conspiracy to assassinate Radovid, Philippa spies on the meeting in her owl form. Following the deaths of Radovid's escort by Geralt and the Temerians, Radovid bangs on a nearby door, only to find Philippa waiting for him. She blinds him with magic dust as payback for taking her own eyes before stabbing him in the ribs.

Philippa later assisted Geralt in seeking out the Sunstone to help their plan to lure out the Wild Hunt. While searching through the Skellige caves, Philippa discussed with Geralt his overprotective attitude towards Ciri, stating that the Lodge are not a pack of wolves he can scare away with his sword, to which the witcher insisted that he could because they are.

Journal Entry

 * Philippa Eilhart, one-time advisor to King Vizimir II, called the Just, member of the Council of Mages and later founder of the Lodge of Sorceresses, had played a momentous part in the history of the world as well as in Geralt's life.


 * There could be no denying her talent, yet neither could one claim she did not also at times demonstrate sickly ambition. Very trustworthy reports indicated she had had a hand in King Vizimir II's death, and, as a member of the Lodge, was implicated in the murder of two other monarchs as well - Demavend of Aedirn and Foltest of Temeria.


 * For this reason the one-time "Jewel of the Court at Tretogor" was now a wanted woman, the quarry of special forces from the North and Nilfgaard alike.


 * Vizimir's son and successor, Radovid V, was particularly eager to capture her. During their last encounter in Loc Muinne he had had Philippa's eyes gouged out, yet she had fled and he wanted nothing more than to stick the head of "Tretegor's Jewel" on a spike above the city gates.


 * Thanks to her mastery of the difficult art of polymorphy, Philippa had been able to evade her pursuers by transforming into an owl. Then she had holed up in a hideout outside Novigrad to wait out the worst.


 * Imagine our surprise when we learned Philippa had been right under our noses the whole time! During her flight from her pursuers she had sought shelter with an old lover and fellow mage. He must've still born a grudge, however, for he tricked her and imprisoned her in her owl form. After the with hunters carted him off, his house was plundered and the owl wound up in the hands of... our dear friend Zoltan. Sadly Triss discovered this right after Zoltan had lost the owl in a game of cards - meaning our search had to continue.


 * Philippa's new "owner"? Dijkstra. Was it a coincidence that she was now in the hands of her spurned-ex-lover and hated enemy? Triss certainly didn't think so, instead suspecting the former spy had woven a gwent-centered web of subterfuge in order to settle some old score.


 * Luckily for Philippa, Geralt got things under control and saved her from whatever delights Dijkstra was planning.


 * Though the Lodge's prior actions were highly controversial, Philippa stubbornly worked toward its reconstitution, offering Ciri the chance to join it as a full and equal member.


 * If Geralt chooses to complete Reasons of State:
 * One can call historical justice the fact that Philippa Eilhart, Radovid's old tutor, ended the crazed monarch's life. In doing so she also exacted revenge for her blinding and the death and persecution of her fellow mages, so many of whom had died in agony on Radovid's orders.

Trivia

 * Her nightstand in Vergeni quarters is highlighted when the Witcher's Medallion is used, though it seems inaccessible.
 * As mentioned before, she's a well known for her taste in women; In The Witcher 2, she can be seen with her female lover Cynthia, in which two cutscenes are possible. The first one is Cynthia giving Philippa a massage, in which Philippa moans in a rather pleasing, sexual way. The second one is with Philippa striking Cynthia's buttocks with a riding crop, or whip: Cynthia is topless and Philippa is in a red gown. Cynthia's moans are more of pleasure than pain. Also, Skalen Burdon refers to her sexuality by saying: '"My favourite type of magic - Lesbomancy."' during the 'curing' of Saskia the Dragonslayer.
 * She sports the inscriptions on her outfit associated to sorceresses.

Gallery
Filippa Eilhart Philippa Eilhart Philippa Eilhart Philippa Eilhart Filippa Eilhart