Värnamo traces its history back to a village in the medieval age; the first written mention of it stems from the 13th century. It came into existence as a village to the eastern side of a fordable place over the Lagan, a river that for large parts is difficult to travel by. As there are also smaller streams to the south and west of this location, it was considered something of a safeguard, leading to its name being amalgamated from the two Swedish words "värn", which means safeguard, and "mo" which is a geographical location reference describing the kind of land on which the town is situated. The word "mo" actually means that the soil consists of fine sand, sometimes making the land surrounding the river bog or barren.