The Völva Through Time

​What We Know
In the old sources, the völva was a seer. A staff-carrier. A speaker of fates.

She appears in the sagas and Eddas not as a myth, but as a woman who was sought out, feared, revered, or both. She was called upon before battle, during famine, in times when the thread of fate felt tangled or frayed. People would travel days to find her, prepare space for her, offer food and song and coin. In Völuspá, the gods themselves seek her counsel.

The word völva means “wand-woman” or “staff-wielder.” She was a practitioner of Seiðr, yes but more than that, she was seen as someone who carried knowledge that came from elsewhere. From beyond. From below.

She is described in detail in Eiríks saga rauða, arriving veiled, clad in a cloak of cat skins, seated high above those around her. Her staff is carved and crowned. Her voice is central. This is not some quaint village witch. This is a ritual specialist.

Archaeological finds confirm the presence of high-status women buried with staffs, rings, and other ritual items. Some wear elaborate dress. Some are buried on ships. Some lie beside sacrificial animals, herbs, or tools of divination.

We know she was real. Not every woman was a völva, but the role existed. It was respected, and at times, feared.

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What We Think
Now let’s step back from the texts and listen for the echoes.

Some scholars think the völur were traveling priestesses—independent women who walked from settlement to settlement, weaving fate and offering insight. Others believe they were tied to specific families, honored and housed by clans who saw their presence as both protection and power.

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There are whispers that the role went deeper than prophecy. That the völva was a weaver of community trauma, one who tended the rift between the seen and unseen. A kind of soul-mender. A memory-keeper. A truth-bringer.

There are also arguments—were they always women? Was the role gendered at all? Was it passed through blood, through training, through divine call? We don’t know for sure. What we do know is that Seiðr, and the role of the völva, often came with suspicion and danger. And still, the role persisted.

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We also think the Christian conversion tried to silence her. To turn her into a fairy tale. Or worse, a threat. The staff became a symbol of rebellion. The old songs became heresy. But the thread did not break. Some say the völva survives in the midwife, in the cunning woman, in the folk healer. Some say she waits in the mounds. Some say she speaks in dreams. And maybe all of that is true.

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What This Means to Me
I’ve never claimed the title lightly.

There are days I hesitate to use it at all. Because I know what it carries. I know what it risks. I know the weight of speaking on behalf of something that ancient. But the thread does not ask for permission. It pulls. And when I feel it pull, I follow.

I do not wear furs or sit on high platforms ( except an occasional Saturday night :) . I do not demand song before I speak. But I have listened to the land and been answered. I have asked the bones and been shown. I have been called a völva by others before I ever claimed the name for myself. And I hold that with reverence. Not as a title, but as a tending. A keeping. A remembering.

The völva is not a role I play. It is a root I grow from. She is not extinct. She is not costume. She is not safe.

She is what happens when the thread is picked up with both hands. When the voice speaks even when the world says hush. When the knowing refuses to be burned out. The völva of old walked with a staff in her hand and silence in her stride.
She did not apologize for what she saw. She did not flinch when the gods came calling.

Neither will I.

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- Nanna Seiðr-Born