Iron nail with vintage tassel, vintage bra straps, antique screw. Measures approx. 10” long. Wired attached clasp. Can be used as a bag charm or wall art. For protection.
Across Sweden, Germany, Scotland, and Ireland, forged iron nails were believed to:
Repel fairies, elves, land spirits, trolls, the dead, and witches
Break hexes or prevent the evil eye
“Nail down” luck, fertility, livestock health, or property boundaries
Seal doors, cradles, or barns against harmful spirits
Protect children and childbirth
Disrupt shape-shifting or illusions
Iron was the technology and craft of fire, deeply feared by spirits of wood, water, and air.
A single square nail hidden under a threshold or hearth kept the tomte cooperative and prevented mischief.
Placed in Swedish cradle frames to keep mylingar (unquiet child spirits) and vättar (wights) away from infants.
A small packet with herbs and a nail, carried for:
preventing nightmares (mara),
protection from the rå spirits in forests and waters.
A nail hammered into the birth-room wall to ensure easy labo and repel trolldom (witchcraft).
Used in Central Europe long before England:
Nails, pins, hair, urine
Buried under the threshold to reverse hexes or trap malevolent spirits.
In old Bavaria and Slovenia: People hammered nails into sacred trees or posts as votive offerings for healing or protection.
A bent nail or three nails in a triangle protected cows from: milk theft by witches, alpine night-hags, vampiric beings like the strigoi-like stihi spirit found in Slovenian lore.
Two nails bound together to form a protective cross, carried by blacksmiths and shepherds.
To prevent haunting or revenants.
Iron Nail in a Witch-Bottle (Scottish variant): Combined with urine, rosemary, red thread—used to break curses.
Rowan wood pierced with an iron nail → against the sìth (fae), second sight, and ill intentions.
To block wandering dead and unseelie beings from entering.
Three iron nails tucked under the mattress, points outward, to keep changelings away.
Coffin nails (often collected from churchyards):
charm bags,
warding against nightmares,
weather magic and fishing luck.
Stops: fairies, bean-sídhe, sick-child snatchers.
Protects from faery abduction, being “led astray.”
Less common, but in some regions the cross was fixed with a nail to ward off lightning and storms.
Irish households placed 4–9 nails around the bedpost for anti-nightmare charms and protection from the Old Hag (sleep paralysis).
Like Scotland, used in apotropaic medicine:
carried to stop bleeding,
placed under sick children to break faery enchantment.
Iron nail with vintage tassel, vintage bra straps, antique screw. Measures approx. 10” long. Wired attached clasp. Can be used as a bag charm or wall art. For protection.
Across Sweden, Germany, Scotland, and Ireland, forged iron nails were believed to:
Repel fairies, elves, land spirits, trolls, the dead, and witches
Break hexes or prevent the evil eye
“Nail down” luck, fertility, livestock health, or property boundaries
Seal doors, cradles, or barns against harmful spirits
Protect children and childbirth
Disrupt shape-shifting or illusions
Iron was the technology and craft of fire, deeply feared by spirits of wood, water, and air.
A single square nail hidden under a threshold or hearth kept the tomte cooperative and prevented mischief.
Placed in Swedish cradle frames to keep mylingar (unquiet child spirits) and vättar (wights) away from infants.
A small packet with herbs and a nail, carried for:
preventing nightmares (mara),
protection from the rå spirits in forests and waters.
A nail hammered into the birth-room wall to ensure easy labo and repel trolldom (witchcraft).
Used in Central Europe long before England:
Nails, pins, hair, urine
Buried under the threshold to reverse hexes or trap malevolent spirits.
In old Bavaria and Slovenia: People hammered nails into sacred trees or posts as votive offerings for healing or protection.
A bent nail or three nails in a triangle protected cows from: milk theft by witches, alpine night-hags, vampiric beings like the strigoi-like stihi spirit found in Slovenian lore.
Two nails bound together to form a protective cross, carried by blacksmiths and shepherds.
To prevent haunting or revenants.
Iron Nail in a Witch-Bottle (Scottish variant): Combined with urine, rosemary, red thread—used to break curses.
Rowan wood pierced with an iron nail → against the sìth (fae), second sight, and ill intentions.
To block wandering dead and unseelie beings from entering.
Three iron nails tucked under the mattress, points outward, to keep changelings away.
Coffin nails (often collected from churchyards):
charm bags,
warding against nightmares,
weather magic and fishing luck.
Stops: fairies, bean-sídhe, sick-child snatchers.
Protects from faery abduction, being “led astray.”
Less common, but in some regions the cross was fixed with a nail to ward off lightning and storms.
Irish households placed 4–9 nails around the bedpost for anti-nightmare charms and protection from the Old Hag (sleep paralysis).
Like Scotland, used in apotropaic medicine:
carried to stop bleeding,
placed under sick children to break faery enchantment.
