While Andrzej Sapkowski's The Witcher novels introduced the School of the Wolf and the School of the Griffin, CD Projekt Red's Witcher video game trilogy expanded on the Continent's monster-hunters further and introduced several more schools, fleshing out the history of the Witcher profession. There is much more to witchers than what readers or gamers might see in Kaer Morhen. There are several witcher schools, each with its own approach to hunting monsters, earning coin and training witchers.
Before delving into these specific schools, it is important to know that they all share one root: the Order of Witchers, which was established in the Northern Kingdoms. The first witchers were created by the mage Alzur in the 10th century. In Morgraig Castle, in the Kestrel Mountains, the witchers were trained by knights, mages and other professionals in combat, magic and monsters. Unfortunately, Alzur and his fellow mages eventually left, leaving the Order of Witchers without a leader. Gradually, infighting caused the order to splinter off into these schools.
Geralt Belongs to The Witcher's School of the Wolf
The School of the Wolf is the one most Witcher fans are familiar with already. Headquartered at Kaer Morhen in Kaedwen, this school is the one that produced Geralt of Rivia and his compatriots: Lambert, Eskel and their mentor, Vesemir. The School of the Wolf was the last to be founded after the last members of the Order of Witchers became disillusioned with the sorry state of Morgraig. The birth of the School of the Wolf in Kaer Morhen was the death of the Order and began what witchers refer to as the Golden Age.
In the 1170s, some one hundred years before the events of Blood of Elves, peasants from around Kaedwen rose and attacked Kaer Morhen with the aid of mages, slaughtering the witchers and mages inside. This was the result of growing anti-witcher sentiment alongside the increasing rarity of monsters. With the destruction of the school, knowledge of the Trial of the Grasses -- necessary for creating witchers -- was lost. Vesemir was the only one to survive, though it's uncertain how he managed to escape the wrath of the Kaedweni folk.
The Witcher's School of the Griffin Was Noble
Spawkoski's Lady of the Lake does mention the School of the Griffin. In fact, Coën is hinted at having been formerly associated with it before joining Kaer Morhen. The School of the Griffin is a noble one, or at least, they try to be. It was founded by Erland of Larvik when he and 13 others left the Order of Witchers and traveled to Kovir and Poviss, to Kaer Seren. The keep had once housed Alzur and his fellow mages in the early days of their experimentation. The hallways became haunted with the specters of failed experiments and dead witchers. When Erland of Larvik came upon it with his posse, they vanquished the specters and made Kaer Seren their home.
The School of the Griffin tried their best to adhere to the original knightly principles of the Order of Witchers, though they maintained a strict neutrality, like the School of the Bear and School of the Wolf. For a time, the School of the Griffin enjoyed a grand reputation among the people and were even invited to court. However, because of the secrecy surrounding the contents of Kaer Seren's great library, a group of angry mages caused an avalanche that destroyed the castle and killed the witchers inside.
Witchers From the School of the Cat Abandoned Political Neutrality
Perhaps the most hated of all the witcher schools is the School of the Cat, formed by some of the younger members of the Order of Witchers, who stole away one night with alchemical tools and mutagens, believing that they could form a better order. They settled in Stygga Citadel in Ebbing, far down south toward the borders of the Nilfgaardian Empire. The School of the Cat did away with neutrality and got actively involved in the region's politics and sold themselves not just as monster hunters but as mercenaries, assassins and spies. It all went wrong when the School of the Cat's mages continued experimenting with creating truly emotionless witchers, leaving behind a pile of dead experiments in their wake.
One of them, Gezras, miraculously survived, waking up among discarded corpses. He freed other witchers and fled, taking shelter with a group of Aen Siedhe elves. In exchange, Gezras and the witchers aided the elves in their war. Their alliance ruined the reputation of the School of the Cat and led to the attack on Stygga Citadel by royal armies, unaware of the splintered status of the school. The armies massacred the inhabitants of the school-- which had been further weakened after Gezras infiltrated it and slaughtered the mages.
With the citadel in ruins, the remaining witchers from the School of the Cat established the Dyn Marv caravan, a mobile headquarters. Using a corrupted version of the trials, the School of the Cat trained new witchers, who took any job that paid, be it monster hunting, espionage or assassination. What truly distinguishes this school is that its trainees aren't limited to human boys. The School of the Cat trains human girls and even elves. While it was thought that the school had disbanded, there are rumors that witchers from the school have returned.
The Witcher 2's Letho Came From the School of the Viper
The first group of witchers to splinter off from the Order of Witchers went on to form the School of the Bear, which we'll get to. Sometime after that school's founding, it saw more infighting and betrayal from a group of students who nearly killed the School of the Bear's founder, Arnaghad. These witchers, led by Ivar Evil-Eye, then left and established the School of the Viper in the near-barren mountains of Tir Tochair, between the Nilfgaardian Empire's border and the Korath Desert. These witchers killed anything or anyone for coin-- monsters, humans and non-humans, earning a
But Ivar constructed the school for a special purpose, one he never revealed to his students: to defeat the Wild Hunt. To that end, Ivar ensured the school's fortress, Gorthur Gvaed, housed a library filled with tomes centered on the legendary elven horde. Unfortunately, the library was lost when the Nilgaardian army, led by the Usurper -- Emhyr var Emreis' predecessor -- marched in and attacked it after the School of the Viper refused to be absorbed into the empire. The witchers of the school are now scattered across Nilfgaard and the Continent.
Witchers from the School of the Bear Were Loners
The downfall of the Order of Witchers began when Alzur and his fellow mages, Cosimo Malaspina and Idarran of Ulivo, left. Without a leader to create order, the witchers began to threaten, cheat and trick each other out of contracts across the Continent. Finally, a burly monster slayer by the name of Arnaghad nearly killed one of his fellow witchers, Rhys, over a Chort contract. Knowing that he would be attacked by the rest of the Order, which he never felt particularly attached to anyway, Arnaghad gathered a group of witchers he knew he could rely on and returned to Morgraig Castle to face his former brothers-in-arms. He was defeated but managed to escape the castle and flee, with the surviving members of his group, to the Amell Mountains, where they founded the School of the Bear.
Arnaghad instilled a stronger sense of independence in his witchers and a focus on the Path, rather than any of the principles that guided the Order of Witchers. The school was successful for a time, and its members would often travel to Skellige for contracts due to the abundance of monsters. Eventually, however, the people of the regions surrounding the Amell Mountains came to despise the witchers, so much so that they banded together to destroy their headquarters at Haern Caduch, preferring the monsters residing in the mountains to the witchers. The monster hunters of the School of the Bear were more or less loners and harbored no loyalty to the school or each other. Rather than fight off a legion of humans, the witchers abandoned the keep and the School of the Bear.