In Star Wars: The Last Jedi, we finally saw the first Jedi Temple, located on the remote planet Ahch-To. This world, hidden in a distant region of the galaxy, had been protected by the Caretakers for thousands of years. The Jedi themselves had forgotten how to find Ahch-To, likely long before Yoda’s time, making Luke Skywalker the first Jedi to visit the ancient temple in over a thousand years. Luke went there hoping to learn the secrets of the Jedi, but the film doesn’t explain how he actually discovered the planet.
It’s now confirmed that Luke Skywalker used a device called a “Star Compass,” which is similar to the Sith Wayfinder from Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. Palpatine had discovered and hidden it in one of his secret observatories, and Luke later found it. It took Luke many years to understand how the Star Compass worked, but he eventually did. This understanding led him to abandon the galaxy and go into exile on Ahch-To after his attempt to train Ben Solo failed. Eight years after the events of The Last Jedi, the origins of the Star Compass have finally been revealed.
The Star Compass Was Originally Found on Naboo
Ancient Jedi explorers used devices called Star Compasses to travel through hyperspace and locate planets strong with the Force. They combined simple star charts with Force-based navigation. Luke Skywalker believed these Compasses – and similar Sith devices called Wayfinders – were early forms of Holocrons, capable of storing huge amounts of information in a small space. We see a prototype Star Compass in the series Star Wars: The Bad Batch, and it appears the Jedi didn’t invent the technology themselves. Instead, they adapted something that existed over 25,000 years ago.
I’m so excited about the new season of Star Wars: Young Jedi Adventures on Disney+! It finally explains where Luke’s Star Compass came from. Apparently, it belonged to an old ship called the Twilight Explorer, which used to travel the galaxy looking for planets strong with the Force. In the latest episode, they showed that the Twilight Explorer actually crashed on Naboo a long time ago. It was lost deep in the ocean, and Jedi didn’t find it again until the High Republic era, when they were able to recover the Star Compass.
We’ve pieced together the complete history of the Star Compass. The Jedi studied it for centuries, but never fully understood it. After the Jedi Temple was attacked and Order 66 was enacted, Palpatine seized it – along with many other Jedi artifacts. However, Palpatine couldn’t actually use the Star Compass, as it relies on the power of the light side. He likely just took it to feel powerful over the Jedi, and it was eventually discovered by Luke on Palpatine’s secret base on Pillio.
How the Star Compass Works
The show Young Jedi Adventures finally explains how the Star Compass functions. When turned on, it projects a hologram of its previous travels, automatically accounting for changes in the galaxy’s position over time. Keen viewers will realize this is very similar to the ancient starmap featured in Ahsoka. This makes sense because that starmap came from a powerful, ancient empire that existed long before the Republic, and it’s likely the original source of the Compass’s technology.
If this understanding is accurate, we can trace the complete history of this technology. The first Wayfinders were among the earliest dark side devices, and the 2024 Star Wars Encyclopedia states they were originally based on purrgils—massive space-dwelling creatures. It makes sense, then, to connect the very first Wayfinders to an ancient empire that actually traveled across the galaxy on these creatures. The Jedi likely studied and copied this technology to create their Star Compasses, and the Sith later went back to the original designs.
This explains why the Jedi couldn’t locate Ahch-To. Ahsoka’s starmap only provided directions from a specific starting point, guiding travelers between two places. To find Ahch-To, the Jedi would have needed to trace the exact path of the Twilight Explorer, which Luke Skywalker ultimately did, finally leading him to the hidden planet.
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2025-12-08 19:13