Eight Years After The Last Jedi, Star Wars Finally Reveals How Luke Skywalker Found the First Jedi Temple

Star Wars: The Last Jedi finally revealed the first Jedi Temple on Ahch-To, but it left so many more questions than answers. Hidden deep in the Unknown Regions, the oceanic world of Ahch-To had been looked after by a race known as the Caretakers for millennia. Even the Jedi had lost the knowledge of Ahch-To’s location, presumably long before Yoda himself was born, meaning Luke Skywalker will have been the first Jedi to explore that ancient temple in perhaps a millennium or more. Luke had traveled there seeking secrets of the Jedi, but how did he find Ahch-To?

Official tie-ins confirmed that Luke used something called a “Star Compass,” a device similar to the Sith Wayfinder seen in Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. This had apparently been found by Palpatine, and stored in one of his hidden Observatories until it was retrieved by Luke. It took Luke decades to unravel the secrets of the Star Compass, but he eventually succeeded, abandoning the galaxy and travelling to Ahch-To after his failure with Ben Solo. But now, eight years after The Last Jedi, Star Wars has finally explained the origin of the Star Compass.

The Star Compass Was Originally Found on Naboo

The Star Compasses were used by ancient Jedi explorers, who combined their basic hyperspace maps with Force navigation techniques that allowed them to travel the stars and find planets rich in the Force. Luke has theorized that the Star Compasses (and the Sith equivalent, Wayfinders) are actually primitive Holocron technology, containing vast data stories in such a small device. Prototype Star Compasses are seen in Star Wars: The Bad Batch, where Clone Force 99 discovered one that apparently predated the Jedi Order itself, so the Jedi seem to have repurposed a technology that existed 25,000 years ago.

Star Wars: Young Jedi Adventures Season 3 has just released on Disney+, and it reveals the origin of Luke’s Star Compass. This device was originally used by a ship called the Twilight Explorer, which traveled the galaxy seeking out planets rich in the Force. According to episode 3, “Journey to the Bottom of Naboo,” the Twilight Explorer crashed on the oceanic planet Naboo long ago. It was lost in Naboo’s ocean trenches, only discovered during the High Republic Era, and the Jedi successfully retrieved the Star Compass.

We now have a full timeline of the Star Compass. The Jedi must have studied it for centuries, never quite unlocking all its secrets, with Palpatine taking possession of it after Order 66 and the sacking of the Jedi Temple; we already know he stole countless Jedi treasures during the Purge. But Palpatine would never have been able to use the Star Compass, because this device requires the power of the light side. He had presumably taken it just as a way of feeling superior to the Jedi, only for Luke to eventually find it on Palpatine’s hidden base on Pillio.

How the Star Compass Works

Young Jedi Adventures actually shows us how the Star Compass works. When activated, it generates a holographic image representing its last journey, adjusting itself for galactic drift. Attentive viewers will notice that the Jedi Compass works in a strikingly similar way to the ancient starmap seen in Ahsoka, which makes sense; the starmap originated from a vast intergalactic empire that predated the Republic, so may well have been the original source of this technology.

If this is correct, it’s possible to figure out the entire history of this tech. We know the original Wayfinders were one of the oldest dark side technology, and – according to 2024 edition of the Star Wars Encyclopedia – these were based on purrgils. It would, therefore, be logical to tie the earliest Wayfinders in to this intergalactic empire, who literally rode the space whales across the intergalactic void. The Jedi must have reverse-engineered the technology to create their own Star Compasses, with the Sith then returning to the original templates.

This also explains why the Jedi never managed to find Ahch-To. Ahsoka‘s starmap showed a route between two given destinations, and only made sense when you were at one end of the journey. The Jedi would need to recreate every route the Twilight Explorer had taken, and presumably that’s what Luke eventually did, finding his way to Ahch-To at last.

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