The fictional universe of The Witcher saga was created by Polish writer Andrzej Sapkowski in his series of books (The Witcher Saga). The universe was never officially named by the writer; the largest entity – the continent – is simply called The Continent, and Polish fans have labeled the universe Wiedźminland ('Witcherland').

The Continent was settled a few thousand years ago by the elves who came from overseas, meeting the gnomes and the dwarves. After a period of elven-dwarven wars, the dwarves retreated to the mountainous regions, and the elves settled in plains and forests. The story repeated itself about five hundred years ago, when human colonists arrived. The humans defeated the older races, and are now the dominant race; the others are considered second-class and often are forced to live in small ghettos inside human settlements, or in the most inhospitable regions of wilderness, as of yet unclaimed by the humans. In addition to elves, gnomes and dwarfs, other notable races on The Continent are the halflings and the dryads. Some other races – such as werewolves or vampires – appeared on The Continent due to a magical event known as the Conjunction of the Spheres.