24Current opinion in insect navigation assumes that animals need to align with the goal 25 direction to recognise familiar views and approach it. Yet, ants sometimes drag 26 heavy food items backward to the nest and it is still unclear to what extent they rely 27 on visual memories while doing so. In this study displacement experiments and 28 alterations of the visual scenery reveal that ants do indeed recognise and use the 29 learnt visual scenery to guide their path while walking backward. In addition, the 30 results show that backward homing ants estimate their directional certainty by 31 combining visual familiarity with other cues such as their path integrator and the time 32 spent backward. A simple model that combines path integration with repulsive and 33 attractive visual memories captures the results. 34 35