Honningbrew Meadery sits just southeast of Whiterun and brews the mead that has made its name known all over Skyrim. The site has two buildings: the meadery itself, where owner Sabjorn sells his goods, and the boilery, whose front door is always locked. Until the Thieves Guild gets involved, it is the main rival of Maven Black-Briar‘s meadery in Riften.
What you’ll find
- The meadery – Sabjorn sells food and mead here, roughly 20 bottles at a time, with stock that seems to refill daily. Mallus Maccius and Eimar can also be found at the meadery.
- The upstairs office – locked until “Dampened Spirits”; holds most of the valuables, a note, a skill book and a chest behind an expert-locked door with no key.
- Honningbrew Basement – a cavern with a dangerous mage named Hamelyn, skeevers, spiders and a skeever nest.
- Honningbrew Boilery – reachable only through the basement; home to the giant vat and a locked chest. The key hangs by the door for your exit.
- Stacks of mead: 87 bottles on the shelves, 61 in barrels and 46 empty barrels around the site.
Quests
Dampened Spirits is the big one: you get the keys to the basement and office, deal with Hamelyn and his skeever problem, and tamper with the vat. The office also contains one of the targets for “The Litany of Larceny”, and the Honningbrew Decanter is wanted by Delvin Mallory.
Notable items
- A Game at Dinner (Alchemy), upstairs on the bedroom table
- Three Thieves (Sneak), in the basement
- Honningbrew Decanter, Hamelyn’s Journal and Maven’s letter proposing a partnership
- The Great War, The Real Barenziah II and IV, and volume 2 of The Lusty Argonian Maid by the bed in the loft
- A bottle of Black-Briar mead hidden under Sabjorn’s bed – awkward
Tips
Read Hamelyn’s journal after you deal with him – his motives are worth a look. Don’t visit the basement or boilery hoping for respawning loot; only the main building resets. After the quest, the signs change to Black-Briar Meadery, the shadowmark becomes a Fence mark and the shelves fill with 250-odd bottles of Black-Briar mead, though some Honningbrew mead still lingers in the barrels outside the boilery. If you are on the Thieves Guild path, players advise not wandering in before you are sent, as it may cause problems with the questline.
Good to know
“Honning” means honey in Norwegian and Danish. Torvar of the Companions sometimes mentions heading down to the meadery because he can smell the honey on the wind – a man of priorities.
Nearby
Closest places covered on TamrielSaga: Chillfurrow Farm, White River Watch, Pelagia Farm, Battle-Born Farm, Whiterun Stables.
Location data (hold, map position, editor ID) read from the Skyrim game files; details checked against community wiki articles and summarised in our own words.
