What We Know

The völva wasn’t just a character in myth. She was real. Her presence ripples through both story and soil.

In the Old Norse sources, the word völva comes from vǫlr, meaning “staff” or “wand.” That already tells us something: her identity was tied to a tool. Not a weapon, but a symbol of power, boundary, and connection. In The Saga of Erik the Red, a richly dressed woman is described holding a staff carved with runes and tipped in brass. She’s seated high, veiled, adorned in animal skins and beads. She doesn’t ask questions. She answers them. That image, seated, veiled, powerful, appears again and again in the lore.

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Archaeology backs it up. Across Scandinavia, dozens of graves have been uncovered containing iron staffs, blue-dyed wool, beadwork, bone whistles, and other ritual objects. The grave at Fyrkat in Denmark is one of the most striking: a woman buried with a large iron wand, a cat-skin cloak, and magical symbols. Scholars like Hilda Ellis Davidson and Neil Price have written extensively on these burials, linking them to ritual function, not just personal wealth. (See Davidson’s Roles of the Northern Goddess and Price’s The Viking Way.)

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Law codes from Christianized Norway and Iceland also refer specifically to Seiðr, the practice most associated with the völva. King Magnus the Good’s law code names Seiðr directly and bans it. Iceland’s Grágás law collection includes penalties for calling forth spirits, shapeshifting, and sorcery. These were not vague accusations. They were direct legal threats. That tells us the practice was still active enough to alarm the law. And then there’s the role itself. In Völuspá, the Seeress speaks to Óðinn and recounts the beginning and end of all things. In Hrólfs saga kraka, a völva warns of betrayal. In Ynglingasaga, one reveals the fate of a king. These women are not side characters. They speak with weight. Their words move the paths of gods and rulers.

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Even outside Scandinavia, chroniclers noted the presence of magical women among the northern tribes. Tacitus, writing in the first century CE, described prophetesses among the Germanic peoples, like Veleda, who influenced politics. Adam of Bremen later wrote of women in temple spaces who may have served as oracles. These references are not myths. They are witnesses.

The völva’s role was feared, respected, and sought out. Whether she was highborn or wandering, veiled or seated, she stood at the edge of the known and spoke across it.

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Want to trace this thread further? I walk through the details of specific graves, burial goods, and law texts in the blog post: [The Record: Staffs, Stones, and the Law].

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What We Think

Come closer now. This is the part nobody agrees on, but everyone loves to talk about.

Some say the völva was a priestess. Others, a witch. A prophet. A performer. A political tool. A madwoman. A queen.

Maybe she was all of them. What we think we know about her keeps shifting. Like smoke. Like trance.

There’s a theory that Seiðr began as a hearth practice. Something rooted in women’s bodies, women’s rhythms, and women’s knowledge. It wasn’t for show. It was about survival. Reading the wind. Speaking to the dead. Keeping the tribe from unraveling. It wasn’t a spectacle. It was a responsibility.

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Some believe the role evolved. What started in kitchens and kin-circles may have become something more ceremonial. The veils and staffs and songs might have once been practical tools, not signs of status. The ones who used them weren’t distant figures on mounds. They were the aunt who saw things in dreams. The midwife who hummed to bones.

And then came the pushback.

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Talk to enough people and you’ll find some who believe no one today should use the word völva. They say it’s over. That it belongs to a different world, one we can’t reach. Some of that is grief. Some of it is pride. But underneath it all is something real. Names matter. And not everyone is ready to see that name carried forward by modern hands.

Still, if the thread pulls at you, are you supposed to ignore it? Maybe the word was never meant to stay buried. Maybe it’s not about acting like someone from the past. Maybe it’s about remembering something that never fully left.

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These stories don’t stop being true just because we stopped saying them out loud.

And here’s something strange. In almost every saga, the völva shows up without explaining herself. She doesn’t make small talk or soften the edges. She speaks. Then she leaves. As if to say, the knowing has been passed. What you do with it is your business now. That feels familiar. Like someone still walking among us.

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What This Means to Me

I didn’t choose the word völva.

It found me.
Like a thread sewn into the lining of my life, waiting for me to feel it pull.

I wasn’t trying to become something ancient.
I was remembering something I already was.

The first time I veiled my eyes, it wasn’t to be mysterious.
It was to see more clearly.
The world gets quiet when I cover my sight.
And that’s when I can finally hear them.

The staff doesn’t give me power.
It reminds me I already carry it.

I don’t sit on a mound to impress anyone.
I sit to listen. To settle. To breathe with the land.
To hear what waits beneath the silence.

People ask if I’m really a völva.
I don’t feel the need to answer.
The thread does that on its own.
It hums when I’m honest.
It tightens when I resist.
It pulls when I’m off course.

This isn’t a role I’m playing.
It’s a return.
To the women who buried their staffs with pride.
To the songs that rise up when no one is singing.
To the knowing that lives behind the ribs and never left.

What does it mean to be a völva through time?

It means I remember.
Even when it hurts.
Even when I wish I didn’t.
Even when no one else believes me.

I remember.
~ Nanna Seiðr-Born