Runes

Elder Futhark

Also known as: runesrunic alphabetfutharkGermanic runes

The Elder Futhark is the oldest runic alphabet: 24 signs in three groups of eight, used by Germanic peoples roughly from the 2nd to the 8th century.

The Elder Futhark is the oldest known runic alphabet. It is named after its first six signs: f, u, þ, a, r, k. It has 24 runes arranged in three groups of eight, called ættir (singular ætt). The group names — Freyr's ætt, Hagal's ætt and Tyr's ætt — come from later Icelandic tradition, but the division into three eights can already be seen in the oldest records.

Runes were written roughly from the 2nd to the 8th century: on weapons, jewellery, stones and wood. The oldest complete record of the order of the signs is the Kylver stone on Gotland, dated to around the year 400. Later, the Younger Futhark of 16 signs developed in Scandinavia, and the Anglo-Saxon futhorc of 29 in England.

We do not know the names of the Elder Futhark runes from their own time. They are reconstructions by linguists — for example *fehu, "cattle, wealth" — based on later texts. The most important of these are the rune poems: the Old English one (known from a copy made in 1705, since the manuscript burned in 1731) and the Norwegian and Icelandic ones, which describe the Younger Futhark. For one rune, written with the letter z, even the reconstructed name is uncertain.

Divination with runes as practised today is a modern practice. Tacitus describes lots drawn from twigs marked with signs, but we do not know whether these were runes. Reversed runes and the "blank rune" appeared only in the 20th century — the blank rune was introduced by R. Blum's book of 1982. That is why AstroSensus has neither reversed runes nor a blank rune.

Some runes, above all Sowilo, Othala, Algiz and Tiwaz, were taken over by the Nazis in the 20th century and are still used by extremists today; in Germany some such signs are banned. The atlas says so plainly under each of them. For many people runes are also part of a living religion — modern Germanic paganism — and deserve respect.

In AstroSensus runes are a tool for reflection, not a prediction. The rune of the day appears in Cards of the day, a spread of three or five runes in the Runes tab of the Tarot page, and any rune can become an avatar with a short line for your bio. The meanings are a modern interpretation, and the historical notes say what we know from the inscriptions and the poems.