The Scottish Hagstone: A Holey Stone with a Protective Purpose

<Updated July 2026>

The hagstone has been a featured favourite of The Stone Circle from the outset. We make frequent trips just to hunt for these in a variety of locations. The lowlands contain the best chances of finding a Hagstone in Scotland.

Traditionally, locals would wear hagstones in order to ward off ‘hags’. The Scots believed that wearing the holed stone was enough to bless them with goodness. The hag – another term for an evil witch – would see the stone around their neck and be scared away. This was one of many traditions for seeing off witches in the old days.

Of course, the Scots loved magic that was bound to the land. There are a thousand traditions regarding the placement of horseshoes for good luck, iron to keep away the fey, rowan trees planted to keep witches off property, and a hundred other such tales. The hagstone is one such Scottish good luck charm. They are still worn for protection to this very day.

Like a Witch's Ball, a hagstone can be hung in the window of a home to deter the evil hags. The witch's ball would reflect the hag’s face back at them, thus frightening them away because of how ugly they are. We tried to find a link to the Witch's ball but couldn't get one. You used to be able to buy them in the Lead Mining Museum in Wanlockhead.

In other traditions, the hagstone can also be used as a ‘Seer stone’, which brings us to our second tale.

The Brahan See'er

The Scots used to have a very famous Seer (See'er, or one who sees) named the Brahan Seer. Legend has it that many of his prophecies were fulfilled. He predicted the ending of most of the clans, and of the old ways. He once told a scribe of prophecies so outlandish that the man threw the whole document into the fire in disgust… but the Seer had the Two Sights, an ability to see into more than this world.

It was through his mother that he received the Two Sights. Kenneth the Sallow, his born name, was gifted a stone with a hole in the middle. This blue and white hagstone allowed him to peer through and into the future. How did he get it? His mother went to a graveyard at night, bound the ghost of a Danish Princess, and demanded it as the price for her return to her peaceful rest. The trade was made and ever since the hagstone has been a symbol of sorcery, all over both this known world, and the next.

So What Are Hagstones Actually?

<Don't Read This Bit If You Want To Preserve The Magic!!>

Hagstones are often made of flint in other parts of the UK, particularly in England. This is due to old organic matter and chalk beds mingling off the coast of England somewhere. A lot of the hagstones from the Isle of Wight and Essex are old sponge fossils where the sponge in the centre has decomposed, leaving a hole.

However, in Scotland where we collect they seem to be made sometimes of basalt, sometimes of limestone. You get a certain type of clam which burrows down deep into softer rocks, like limestone, and makes the hole.

The holes can also be made the way you might think, by a trapped small stone rotating in the current.

And of course, fairies.

Unique Scottish Hagstones for Sale from The Stone Circle

Sometimes called Adder Stones, Seer Stones, Holy Stones, and a hundred other names, our hagstones are picked by us from Ayrshire, Scotland. Each one has been lifted or dug out, taken home, given a scrub in warm, soapy water, and left to air dry.

Our unique hagstones are ethically sourced minerals, without mining or any damage to the local area. The only carbon cost has been the small amount of fuel taken to get there and back. They will be shipped to you via Royal Mail and, if Internationally, will be trackable.

They will have come from the land, to our house, to you, with no factories or processing in between.

Our intention? To spread some of the magic that connects this land to the people who belong here… one way or another.

Get Your Unique Scottish Hagstone Here! You can also buy our Genuine Scottish Hagstones from our Etsy shop, should you have any worries that we are sketchy.