General information about runes

There are several different types of runerows or futharks as we call them today. During the Viking Age Period four different types of futharks were used. The reason why the runerows are called futharks is because the common 16 signs runerows begins with the runes f u th a r k. Here you are; futhark.

The most common futhark is the 16 signs danish runes/common futhark. Most of the runestones are written with this futhark. Further on there was a problem to choose a rune for a specific sound in the language with only 16 runes. To make it even worse there were two runes for the letter A and two runes for the letter R of this 16 runes. To solve the problem some dots were added to some runes just to make them stand for different sounds in the language. You can read more about under common runes below.

Even the Vikings seemed to have had a need for a type of short hand writing. The Swedo-Norwegian runes/Short-twig runes were mostly used for carving runes into other materials than stones. However there are some runestones with this type of futhark. The most extreme futhark of them all is the Special Shorthand runes from Sweden. This is a rather unusual type of rune and there are just a couple of runestones with this runes on them. There is just a small similarity with the common runes and they really look like modern shorthand writing. Perhaps that's just exactly what they were used for. Below is a list of different futharks that have been used during the years. If you want to see how they look like, please click on futharks button on the menu above.

24 signs old futhark

16 signs younger futhark; Common or Danish runes

16 signs younger futhark; Short-twig or Swedo-Norwegian runes

16 signs younger futhark; Special shorthand runes from Sweden

The Anglo-Saxon futhork

Middle Age runes

Runes from the landscape Dalarna in Sweden, 16:th century

Runes from the landscape Dalarna in Sweden; 18:th century

The first runes

From where the runes originate and when they first appeared isn't known for sure. There are many different theories and there is an on going fight between experts and runologists. However many theories mean that the runes showed up in the Mediterranian Sea area at the end of the first century. The runes have much in common with the Roman letters and the Greece alfabeth so probably these letters had a great influence on the design of the runes. On the fringes of the Imperial Rome lived many barbarian tribes which all spoke some kind of Gemanic languages. These tribes understood how powerful the written word was (and still is) and so they did a type of alfabeth of their own, inspirated by the Roman and Greece letters. The runes spread over the Germanic world and were soon used in many parts of Europe, especially in WestEurope. In some regions the script continued to be in use throughout the Middle Ages and into modern times.

Today it's easy to say that the runes strongest region came to be the Scandinavian countries, especially Sweden and Norway. The first runic inscription from Scandinavia are date back to 200 AD. There are a lot of inscriptions found in Denmark in boglands. The first runes was scratched on weapons and wood artefacts. The inscriptions are rather short and many inscriptions seems to be the name of the guy who did or owned the artefact. Much later there are longer runic inscriptions and the one's that are left are almost ever on stone.

There was no common runerow in all the Germanic world in that time so the first runerows that appeared are not quit the same. One of the first complete runerows of the older futhark was found in Kylver in Sweden and date back to first part of 400 AD. Another complete runerow from that time (450-550 AD) comes from Vadstena in Sweden. These runes are on a bracteate that is a one-sided thin gold disc usually used as a jewel. These two runerows look almost the same but there are some differences between them.

New times, new runes

Between 600 - 700 AD the language in the old Germanic world changed and so did the runes. Each rune have a name and the first letter of that name almost ever began with the sound that the rune represented. For example the runerepresenting the letter i is called Isa or ice in English. For some runes there was no word that had the sound that the rune represented in the beginning of a word, for example the sound ng . That one was called Ing. When the language changed, some the name of the runes had no meaning, and there must have been a serious problem for the runewriter to choose the right rune for each sound in the language. The solution was not a runrow with more runes represanting more sounds in the language, no it was a runerow with less runes. That means that each rune represanting several different letters in the Roman alfabeth. The writer had solved his problem because he or she didn't has to analyze each sound in the language. But for sure it became much harder to read it! From a linguistic point of view you can complain about these changes. There are many sounds in early Norse and the languages in Scandinavia today for which there is no specific rune. The choice of which runes to retain does not seem a sensible one for us today.

Well the runes evolved over time so at the end of the Viking Age it became common to put a dot in some of the runes to symbolize different sounds in the languages. It was for sure necessity. An example is the rune that represents the sound g . This rune first represented both the sound of g and k, but when you put a dot into it , it became the represention of the sound g. The rune without a dot was now only representing the sound k.

Times Goes On, More Runes

In theMiddle Age there was a new futhark with a lot of runes that represented the new sounds in the language. No more runestone were raised but the runes still were in use among common people for a long time. In the first place the roman letters were used only by kings, pops and the nobility. You write Roman letters on paper and paper was something that was extremly expensive in that time. For the runes you could use bone or a piece of wood and that was easy to find and it didn't cost you a fortune! So there are many founds of artefacts with runic inscriptions from the Middle Age.

Still in the 17th century the runes were in use more or less in almost every part of Sweden, but after 1650 AD the runes were not so common anymore. The roman letters were more and more used even among common people. But in some regions of Sweden (Dalarna and Gotland) and even some regions of Norway the runes were still in use. There are several different runerows younger that 1650 AD. The last one that was used was created at the end of 1800 AD.

The Form Of The Runes

The runes were designed for incising in wood so thats why the runes eschew curves, which are hard to cut in such a grainy material. The runes were made up of vertical strokes, cut at right angles to the grain, and of slanting strokes which stood distinct from it. Horizontal strokes, which would mingle with the grain and be hard do distinguish, were avoided. Most runes have a single vertical stroke to one or both sides of the horizontal strokes. If you look at the runes you can see that many runes are simulair with the Roman letters but the sound they representing are not necessary the sound that we are used to hear today. It seems like the guys who invented the runes just took the forms of some Roman letters but, in most case, used them for other sounds in the language.