Hedestad is a couple of kilometers away from Hedeby. Hedestad is on mainland and Hedeby is on an island. They are connected with a small road and a bridge. Both places are fiction.

Posted by TG in Stockholm , 23 December 2010

I would place it in Gavle county, but the film producers used Gnesta, south of Stockholm to stand in for Hedestad.

Posted by Andrew Situ in Fremantle ,

Larsson puts his “Hedestad” and “Hedeby” clearly on the coast “about an hour” north of Gävle, but as they (unfortunately don’t exist the filmmakers had to find something which resembles more or less the descriptions in the book.

As “heder” in Swedish means “hono(u)r” there’s quite heavy irony here as those activities in those places depicted in the book are actually quite far from honorable… :-pp Of course “the Honor of the (Vanger) Family” is a theme emphasized heavily in the book too.

Talking about name allusions I guess it’s not a coincidence that the name “Vanger” sounds quite similar than Wagner, another name quite heavily although also unfairly connected with the Nazis too… ;-))

Posted by Jussi Tuovinen in Helsinki ,

Another place I would say does not exist in real life would be Svavelsjo, supposedly on the outskirts of Sweden municipality. This is where the bikies who are in league with Niedermann are based.

Posted by Andrew Situ in Fremantle ,

Hedeby does exist. It is a place in neighbouring Denmark.

Another meaning of ‘hed’ is translated to ‘moor’.

So Hedestad and Hedeby could also mean “The town on the moor” and “The village on the moor”

Posted by Jörgen in Malmö, Sweden ,

Stad = city

By = village

Posted by Veronica in Södra Ängby ,

So this means Grimsby Town in East Yorkshire is actually a village?

Grimsby could be Grim’s (person) village.

Posted by Veronica in Södra Ängby ,

Original-Booktext: “After Uppsala came the string of small industrial towns along the Norrland coast. Hedestad was one of the smaller ones, a little more than an hour north of Gävle. That means: Hedestad lies somewhere between Söderhamn and Hudiksvall, may be Hudiksvall is Hedestad. But: Original-Text: ?It?s an old industrial town with a harbour. Population of only 24,000?. Hudiksvall has only 15.000 inhabitants.

Posted by satcat ,

satcat: Hudiksvall should have been the setting of the film instead of Gnesta, in that case?

Have you ever been to Hudiksvall? As far as I know there would be no island inhabited to the degree Hedby was in the area. It is however a beautiful city. They should have made the movie there.

Posted by A Molander in Regina SK Canada ,

Interestingly enough Noomi Rapace (Noomi Norén) was born 28 December 1979 in Hudiksvall

Posted by A Molander in Regina SK Canada ,

Hedeby in Denmark has got nothing whatsoever to do with Hedeby in the Millennium-series. One hour drive or by train north of Gävle would be somewhere between Söderhamn and Hudiksvall. There are some industrial municipalities along the coast there, for example Ljusne and Iggesund.

Posted by Shabbadang in Bromma ,

Hedeby is a famous archeological site of a 10th century Danish town. It was an important discovery that shed light on Viking culture at the height of that civilization. (see History of the Vikings, pg. 178).

Posted by Brettski in Bethesda, MD ,

And also, the 15 000 inhabitants of Hudiksvall is just the ones that live in the town, not including the ones that live in the Hudiksvall municipality. There is about 37 000 inhabitants in the municipality. Hudiksvall is definatly an old industrial town.

Posted by Maja in Hudiksvall ,

My feeling is Soederhamn!

Posted by ex-Hudiksvall ,