Museum of Icelandic Sorcery and Witchcraft — Attraction in Westfjords

I thought this place was so fascinating! It gives a very interesting glimpse into the history of the Westfjords. Yes, a lot of the stuff isn’t actual artifacts, but I didn’t care that much.

I didn’t care very much for the necropants. I’m not very surprised by them either as occult rituals involving the unalive exist in many cultures.

What I found especially fascinating is that in the face of harsh conditions and poverty, many of these people turned to witchcraft and sorcery. This is also a common tale across cultures, including in my home country (India). What makes it tougher in Iceland is that the land has always been sparsely populated and the elements are especially harsh here, so people tried many different ways to make ends meet.

The witch hunts here usually came about because of petty disputes between townspeople and neighbors, which usually resulted in the death of the accused.

Also very fascinating is that while witchcraft is typically associated with the “feminine”, many of the practitioners here were men!

If we approach this museum more as a history of the land, then it’s very, very interesting. That’s not to say that the magic isn’t real, because according to me, it...

The Museum of Icelandic Sorcery and Witchcraft proved to be a great way of ending our sojourn through the Westfjords, an easily reachable location in the charming village of Holmavik, on the eastern coast, by Road 61.

While not overwhelmingly large, it's packed full of exhibits representing various runes and stories of the use of sorcery in Iceland and its repression once Christianity became dominant in the country. You don have to keep in mind that it's a small museum, so don't expect to be awe-struck by the complexity of magnitude of the exhibits, but if you either enjoy history or have perhaps played Skyrim recently and feel pumped up mystic-wise, it'll be worth spending 30-60 minutes in there.

As an added bonus, the Museum cafe serves a decent selection and coffee and the gift shop offers an interesting, if a bit pricey (though I suppose not by Icelandic standards) collection...

Really cool historical and cultural artifacts, with a story behind each one. The museum is in Icelandic, but they have a booklet with all of the artifacts in many different languages - just ask for your preferred language and they probably have it! I really enjoyed learning about the history of witchcraft and sorcery. It also has a small restaurant attached to it called Restaurant Galdur, so we ordered food and while we were waiting for it, we checked out the museum. The owner (at least I think he was the owner) let us know when our food was ready. We ate (the food was really good!) and then went back to the museum to finish seeing everything. We stayed an hour past closing and they never once made us feel pressured to leave....