Rune

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Scholarly term, taken from Danish in the seventeenth century, denoting the written symbols of the Germanic tribes that were used before the introduction of and, then concurrently with, the Latin writing system. Runes appear to have served magic and profane purposes. While their origins are unclear, it is believed that they developed from a mixed North Etruscan and Latin alphabet. Every rune represents a particular phone that is called by the first letter of its name, but also has a conceptual value (related to its use in magical contexts), cf. g ‘gift,’ n ‘need,’ s ‘sun.’ The earliest attested runes come from Scandinavia (beginning of the second century AD). Some 5,000 inscriptions (3,000 of them in Sweden alone) are known today. ( also writing)

Antonsen, E. 1975. A concise grammar of the older Runic inscriptions. Tübingen.

Arntz, H. 1935. Handbuch der Runenkunde. Halle. (4th edn 1944.)

Duwel, K.

1968. Runenkunde. Stuttgart.

Elliott, R.W.V. 1989. Runes: an introduction. 2nd edn.Manchester and New York.

Krause, W. 1970. Runen. Berlin.

Krause, W. and H.Jankuhn. 1966. Die RunenInschriften im älteren Futhark, 2 vols. Göttingen.

Musset, L. 1965. Introduction a la runologie. Paris.

Runebibliografi. 1990–1991. NRun 5 and 6.

writing

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