The Mysterious Origin of Runes
If you are living in Scandinavia or in the British Isles, you might find some strange figures carved in stone or wood. These figures or shape seem to resemble letters but not the familiar letters that you see on your Latin alphabet. It is not even look Chinese or Japanese characters!
These figures are called runes. Runes, or runic alphabet, are letters formerly used to write Germanic languages before and a little after the introduction of Christianity in Scandinavia and the British Isles. Runes have different names; they are known as Futhark in Scandinavia, Futhorc in Anglo-Saxon.
There was evidence of the use of runes as early as the second century before it was replaced by the Latin alphabet with Christianization. Runes were replaced in central Europe by the eighth century and in Scandinavia by the twelfth century.
In Scandinavia, however, the use of runes was still evident for special purposes, especially in rural Sweden until the twentieth century. During this time, runes were used as decorations. The three most popular runic alphabets are the following: the Elder Futhark, the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc, and the Younger Futhark.
But how did runes start out? Historians and archeologists are still trying to find the answer. Even if the early evidence pointed out the usage of runic alphabet in the eight century, many of the runes of the Elder futhark resemble characters from the Latin alphabet, which means that the latter may even be older than runes.
It could also be that runes originate from Northern Italic, Lepontic, Rhaetic, and Venetic alphabets which were used from the 5th to 1st century BCE. These alphabets were influenced from the Old Italic alphabets. The scripts of these alphabet systems were similar to the Futhark.
Most probably, runes were introduced or were invented by the Germanic people somewhere between the 1st and 2nd century. This was evidenced by the oldest known harja inscription which was found imprinted in an ancient comb that was found in a bog in Vimose, Funen.
This was the late Proto-Germanic or Common Germanic stage. Linguistically, this was an era where the dialects do not have any clear distinction as seen in the later centuries.
Like most other things in pre-history, there are other origins of runes. Many local people embracing old tradition state that runes are either mythological, divine, or magical in origin.
If you become an archeologist, linguist, or historian, you may be the one who will finally discover the true source of this ancient alphabet.
