Skyrim Golden Claw Puzzle: Round Door Solution Guide

To secure the Golden Claw in Skyrim, you must first use it to solve the round door puzzle in Bleak Falls Barrow. It’s part of “The Golden Claw” questline, which, once completed, fills your pockets with a bit of gold and unlocks Camilla Valerius as a romance and marriage option. Here’s how to solve its tricky puzzle!

How to Solve the Golden Claw Puzzle in Skyrim

Although this puzzle looks challenging at first glance, it can be solved fairly easily by matching the images on the rings to the images on your Golden Claw. The Claw will show you the correct order to place the images on the door by spinning the three rings.

Before you can open the door, you’ll actually need the Golden Claw itself, which you should have by this stage of the quest. You find the item by killing the man you freed from the webs earlier in the quest or, alternatively, letting him get himself killed before looting his corpse. Once you have the claw, you can begin rotating the rings on the door.

To know what order the rings need to be, inspect the Golden Claw from your inventory. Open your inventory and look inside the Misc. tab at the very bottom of the list. You’ll find the Golden Claw among the items. You can zoom into the claw by pressing the R-Stick on a controller or using the scroll wheel on your mouse. Use your analog stick or mouse to move the claw around if you need a better view.

On the Claw’s palm, you can find the solution to the round door puzzle: bear, moth, owl. Now, you need to spin the rings on the door to match.

How to Unlock the Golden Claw Puzzle Door

To rotate the rings on the door, hover your cursor over them and then press A on Xbox, X on PlayStation, or E on PC. Each time you activate the ring, it will spin to the next image. So, to get them in the right order, follow these steps:

1. Hover over the outer ring and spin it twice to the bear
2. Hover over the middle ring and spin it twice to the moth
3. Hover over the inner ring and spin it twice to the owl

Now, interact with the round door’s keyhole (using the same control you used to spin the rings: A, X, or E), and place the Golden Claw inside. The door will slowly open downward and allow you to continue inside.

What’s Behind the Golden Claw Puzzle Door?

You can expect big things through this complicated door locked up so tight. Even though it may appear like an ordinary cave at your first step in, it opens up to the main sanctum of the dungeon. Here, you’ll find your first ever Word of Power. This wall is etched in ancient markings that, once you approach it, will grant you a Shout ability. Before you get the chance, however, you’ll need to deal with the Draugr Overlord that protects it.

The Draugr Overlord is out of sight as you approach the Word of Power wall, but as soon as you step foot near the podium, he will emerge from the coffin. The Overlords are much more powerful than ordinary Draugrs. They can use Shouts like the Dragonborn, knocking you off balance and swinging their enchanted weapons at you. Make sure you have plenty of healing available and avoid his attacks as much as possible to defeat him. He’ll also drop the ‘secret’ of Bleak Falls Barrow that this quest requires you to find.

It is only after you find the secret that you can return the Golden Claw to Lucan in Riverwood to finish the quest, making Camilla a marriage prospect and earning yourself some gold from Lucan. With that round, rotating door puzzle out of the way, you’re home-free to do all of the above.

If you’re interested in learning more, consider checking out GameSkinny’s Skyrim guides hub!