An Icelandic sign of eight staves around a centre. Its first record is Geir Vigfússon’s Huld manuscript of 1860: whoever carried it would not lose their way in storms. It is not a Viking compass.
Record, Folk and Modern are kept apart, and each one carries its source.
The Vegvísir is first recorded in Geir Vigfússon’s Huld manuscript of 1860, from Iceland. It says that whoever carries the sign will not lose their way in storms. That is the whole of its early story: nothing links it to the Viking Age.
To verify: The manuscript’s own wording, and where the Huld manuscript is kept
The Vegvísir belongs to the galdrastafir, the magical signs of Icelandic books of magic, drawn for keeping safe, for journeys and for good fortune. An older book of this kind, the Galdrabók of about 1600, was put together by four people and holds 47 spells and signs. The Museum of Icelandic Sorcery and Witchcraft, which tells this history, opened at Hólmavík in June 2000.
Online, the Vegvísir is often sold as a ‘Viking compass’. It is not one: its first record is the 1860 manuscript, long after the Viking Age. Some Nordic signs have also been taken up by extremist groups, so we check every Nordic design before we make it.
