John Griogair Bell – Arlecchino Malbenvolio

Learning the runes

Futhark and Runes

I created some PDFs with which to learn the shapes, meanings and names of the elder futhark. One is large, the other is 4-up so that it can be cut into a little pocket reference:

Runatal 1up (PDF)

Runatal 4up (PDF)

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Here's a gratuitous image, linked to a larger version of itself, of Odin on the high seat, with ravens (thought & memory) and the hounds (tomorrow & yesterday):

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Bind-runes

Runes can be combined into what are called bind-runes. For example, there are some bind-runes I created for various things:

Bind-rune for Lugh's Feast

Witchy crop circle bind-rune

Witchy crop circle bind-rune. welded

Witchy crop circle bind-rune, with stick people highlighted

and, an idea I had for a "mascot" on the Olypagans website:

Oly the Ghost, a bind-rune for an Olympia, WA pagan website.

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Bibliography

Thorsson, E. (1983). Futhark: A handbook of Rune Magic. Weiser.

Thorsson, E. (1987). Runelore: A Handbook of Esoteric Runology. Weiser.

Thorsson, E. (1999). Witchdom of the True. Runa-Raven Press.

Paxson, D. L. (2005). Taking up the runes A complete guide to using runes in spalls, rituals, divination, and magic. Weiser.

Von List, G. (1988). The Secret of the Runes. Inner Traditions.

Mist, S. & Brazaitis, J. (2006). The Witches' Ring. Workshop. BC Witchcamp 2006.

Hollander, L. M. (1986). The Poetic Edda. Unversity of Texas.

Davidson, H. R. E. (1985). Gods and Myths of Northern Europe. Penguin.

Davidson, H. R. E. (1985). Myths and Symbols in Pagan Europe: Early Scandanavian and Celtic Religions. Syracuse University Press.

Gunndarsson, K. (2007). Our Troth: Volume 1: History and Lore. BookSurge.

Sturlson, S. (1995). Edda. Everyman Paperback.

Paxson, D. L. (). The Wolf and the Raven.

Gaiman, N. (). American Gods.

Mystical Detective Loki Ragnarok [DVD]

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Colophon

In the rune study sheets, I have used the font Gullhornet to display the runes. Gullhornet is available as freeware for academic and non-commercial use in both TrueType and Postscript formats:

"The font Gullhornet contains 109 characters from the older rune alphabet, both common Germanic runes and Anglo-Saxon and Frisian ones. In addition to the approx. 40 standard characters in these futharks there are approx. 60 variants and 9 signs for punctuation and diacritical marks.

Gullhornet contains all characters of the older rune alphabet included in Unicode Runic 16A0-16FF, in addition to a large number of variants."

To download the font, go to the Gullhornet rune font page.

In the Bind-rune for Lugh's Feast, the font used for the text is "Wolves and Ravens" designed by the all-around awesome S. John Ross and is available at no cost from his website.

To gander at all the interesting fonts by S. John Ross, go to The Cumberland Fontworks page.

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