I've heard it said that the act of writing runes was seen as a magical art in itself. I can't remember if this was from a good source or a bad one, so I take it with a grain of salt, but I always liked to interpret it like you said. The runes are associated with Óðinn, so learning the use of them might have been a very holy and spiritual practice for the Norse people. That's what I like to believe anyway
Language itself is often considered magical in oral cultures. That's where curses come from. "I'm wishing you all the best" is a modern magical formula. So runes might have been the same. It's not the runes themselves, but the words used and the intent. They are, after all, words, ideas and concepts with a material form, instead of "just" soundwaves lost in the air as soon as they are uttered.
For my part, I think of it as a way of making thought (intention) physical. Speaking aloud and writing something down are both ways to make thoughts (desires, intentions, emotions) "real." It may be something we more or less take for granted now, but in antiquity this would have been something like magic due to the skill, knowledge and effort required.
I take this stance myself. I think it's less about the specific letters/language and more about understanding the true extent to which reality is made of language.
Calling them bindrunes sounds so much more cool than ligatures. Being able to choose when and where to use them without introducing ambiguity could have been a sign of greater literacy as would being able to decipher them smoothly whilst reading. Beautiful location as always, the falling birch leaves are evocative.
@@Asptuber Yes, as someone who's interested in this for the culture and the history I find the obsession many people have with magic, etc., frustrating at best.
@@Asptuber aesir and jotnar are kinda the same thing as the greek pantheon, they are different because the original interpretation got distorted through ages of oral tradition
I'm surprised you omitted the most famous bindrune of all - the one everyone sees every day on their phone - Bluetooth. The logo for the short range wireless protocol is the bindrune Harold Bluetooth used as a signature in runes.
@@Tritium21 I really, really hate to be a spoilsport but the epithets of viking age kings do not date from their own lifetimes. Harald would not have wanted to use a derogatory nickname for himself, and it is only known from the Roskilde Chronicle from 1143. As Jackson Crawford explains, pre-modern bindrunes only share their vertical staves. This one was invented by Intel. I'm so sorry.
The german ß (Esszett), is the result of doing this to latin letters, namely the letters s and z, where german used to have a long s, used within sillables, and a short s at the end of sillables. As the long s became obsolete, the ß became its own letter. Similarly the ä, ö, and ü, whixh are generally considered seperate letters on german originally were the combinations ae, oe and ue, where the e was put on top of the other letters, and over time turned into the dots, due to the manner it used to be written in handwriting.
In times of low literacy, the training of a scribe and that of a stone mason may not have overlapped much. It would be easier for a cleric to do fancy lettering on a manuscript than on wood or stone. He might have had to write out an example on parchment for the carver to copy. There are a few examples of objects, even coins, from around the world where it seems that the carver was illiterate and was just mimicking an inscription with random letters. The general public would not know the difference! That's the same idea as a hedge-priest saying "hocus pocus."
Dr. Crawford, it seems your last few videos have been gaining a good amount of momentum with view counts . This makes me feel glad, and I hope it's bringing a smile to your face as well.
I was waiting for this topic! So happy you are sharing your knowledge. As always, I appreciate your time and energy to educate those wanting to learn. From the newly cloud covered skies of Sacramento, CA, I'm wishing you... All the best.
When I visit our graveyard there's a lilystone from the 1200s that contains a ͡ᚮᚱ bindrune. It feels like medieval rune inscriptions are often spammed with cool bindrunes. I've also seen the church bell that came from Herrljunga kyrka, it says Ave Maria on it in medieval runes, but Ave is one single bindrune, made of ᛆᚢᛅ. That is cool. I love rare complicated bindrunes.
@@liamsludge2659 One easy way is to just copy-paste in the runes from the chart you'll find at the bottom of the english wikipedia page on runes. And "Segoe UI Historic" is the only built-in font in Windows that supports runic characters I think.
@@liamsludge2659 I know this is a year late, but... Most fonts include the runes. If OP was using a custom font, you would not be able to see it, instead you'd only see [] in place of the character
Just awesome - thanks for this! I've been experimenting with bindrunes for a while now and it's amazing to be able to enjoy your insights and historical examples in this format.
Hey Jackson I love your channel. I've noticed the last few videos have a very low volume compared with other channels. I have to turn it up quite a bit to hear.
Thank you, sir! This is fantastic! I've found them fascinating for years but never really liked the fact that the only places that had them were about the "woo-woo" uses. Seriously, thank you.
As a Swede I have always thought of runes as just another alphabet, probably due to having seen quite many rune stones which mostly contain pretty mundane stuff. And bind runes obviously seems like ligatures.
Another practice that is very reminiscent of the bindrune practice of putting all letters of a word on a single stave is the Eastern Roman tradition to make monograms with all the letters of the name of an emperor or empress included like a cypher within a circle. It just looks cool. I remember when I was a bored kid, I often tried figuring out similar "marks" where the letters of my own name was fitted together in a strange geometry. Many Byzantine monograms look *an awful lot* like the vegvísir mark you also talked about.
my good friend jackson. An interesting point to note as a fellow language studier myself: Sanskrit has a large number of consonant conjuncts, I've studied many languages, and of all the scripts these are the only 2 with clear and obvious combinations of letters. "Standard combinations" if you will. There must have been an early writing system, that influenced these 2 systems (the futhark and the devanagari) to have this feature both within indo-european language families. Althouh I agree the split between the indo-iranian branch of language and german is quite some split. But then again we must obviously be missing older examples of german writing so how much older is really the question. Is it not also possible that the celtic script of Ogham used in Ireland around this time did not also breka off from an early branch of this script or influence it?
Love this sub-topic regarding runes and their use in writing and more esoteric uses, same-stave (aka "mast") bindrunes are some of my favorite style/ form.
I have seen one other video that covers this topic. I am interested in Bindrunes. I am creating my shield and would love to learn more about bindrunes so I can put them on my shield
So they seem to function as ligatures in Latin and Greek manuscripts, where the scribe is saving time, or like the very intricate but beautiful Byzantine monograms for emperors or abbreviations for saints or for the titles for Mary and Jesus. Thanks for the vid as always!
Using ligatures extensively in some of my own work, I do have to encourage legibility by only joining letters in a left-to-right fashion, never superimposed over their middles. This is for actual text to be read as captions or dialog, rather than logos or decorations.
This had me thinking about how I like to sign my drawings and paintings. Which has always been an M and a ⭐. I'm sure that seems strange to some people and maybe a bit lazy or worse, self absorbed. I mean who am I to rate myself among the stars. It is a very personal way in which I identify myself, being all and one of many.
I am a huge fan of your work. I am so grateful to get this education without all of the arrogance or even condescension. I am from the U.S. like you except I live in the mountains of New Hampshire. I have been interested in all things of the Old Norse since I served in the US Army Infantry during the entire 2000’s and we were very into the Viking mentality of “Victory or Valhalla” (most likely something we created as a motto). I ordered several books you have translated. The saga of the Volsungs, The Wanderers Havamal as well as your translation of The Poetic Edda. I own another translation of the Prose and Poetic Edda. I can’t wait to get those books in the mail. Thank you Jackson Crawford!
The runes were carved, not written, so it’s only practical that the binding of runes was a thing. Same goes for Ancient Greek carvings. There were no spaces between words. Probably because space on a stone was limited. (Besides the fact that the spacing rule didn’t exist yet)
Great video. I did wonder if there might also have been a request for bindrunes on things like funeral stones to cut down on the cost? If the cutter charged by letter, I suppose there'd have been a discount for combining letters.
What about the Bluetooth symbol Wiki...The Bluetooth logo is a bind rune merging the Younger Futhark runes (Hagall) (ᚼ) and (Bjarkan) (ᛒ), Harald's initials.
If runes had no magical application to the old Norse, why in poems lie the Havamal does Odin sacrifice himself on the world tree to understand their mystical power?
I've wondered the same thing, honestly. If there was nothing inherently magical about them, even to older peoples, then why sacrifice yourself for them? Why hold them in such reverence?
@@bakarderansonumuhlnaz2693 also there are other references in the sources that appear to suggest they were not just a common or garden alphabet, for instance the Norns ( Norse goddesses from fate and destiny) are said to have carved them into Yggdrasil, the world tree. And there are other examples. The Roman historian Tacitus, said that Germanic tribes cut wooden staves, carved symbols on them and cast them as lots to Devine the future. The ancient Norse had a very magical worldview and I am sure they must have have seen them as magical symbols not just letters for mundane writing. Doctor Crawford is brilliant, but like many modern academics probably has a materialistic worldview. He probably finds the view that runes were magical irritating and so is inclined to debunk the idea . That’s fine, is a renowned expert but my gut feeling he is wrong about this one.
@@anthonyhudson3158 I have read about the casting lots, although they did make sure to mention that the Germanic tribes did not use runes for their castings for the future. I do agree, however, that they clearly must have had some magical significance. Ancient peoples tended to have very wildly different worldviews even to most people alive today.
@@anthonyhudson3158 Looking at what people wrote using runes, it's clear that they did NOT revere the runes. People wrote mundane and simple (and often crude sexual) love letters or I-owe-you-so-and-so letters to each other. In all references of runes in the sagas, it's also not clear that it is the runes that are profound - it seems to me that the words that were written in runes were profound. The content of the text, not the alphabet. The reference about Odin could mean the art of writing itself. Without writing, it's hard to store knowledge. And knowledge is what Odin was about. Knowledge is worth sacrificing for. Tacitus never said that the casting of lots involved runes. Just symbols.
@@Smedis this is from Wikipedia as I couldn’t be bothered to write an essay. There is some evidence that, in addition to being a writing system, runes historically served purposes of magic. This is the case from earliest epigraphic evidence of the Roman to Germanic Iron Age, with non-linguistic inscriptions and the alu word. An erilaz appears to have been a person versed in runes, including their magic applications. In medieval sources, notably the Poetic Edda, the Sigrdrífumál mentions "victory runes" to be carved on a sword, "some on the grasp and some on the inlay, and name Tyr twice." I don’t think however we will ever really know.
Imagine how hard it was to carve these things. Of course they would want to save space and effort in carving. I never thought of this until now. Awesome video, thank you
Great video on the topic. Now there has been something i wanted to ask you. The pronunciation of ‘ek’ in Norse probably sounded more like the Islandic modern spoken word. But I think in Rogaland, Norway and a bit further north past bergen we still use “eg/æg” where the g still sounds like soft “k”… what is your thoughts
That seems like it would be perfectly normal for a conservative Norwegian dialect - Norwegian sound changes would have gone through ek -> eg -> ej so seeing 'ej' and 'eg' coexisting in Norwegian dialects is not unusual.
I have revisited this video and a few other text based sites that address the Sønder Kirkeby runestone, and for the LIFE of me, I can NOT find an explanation as to how in the word “rúnaR”, the last two runes = a R ???
I find bindrunes far more helpful when carving them in stone, it's less work and your tool is not eroded as fast, I think it was more on the lines for convenience, they just happened to look good afterward
It occurs to me that since these are letters laboriously carved into rock with a hammer and chisel, binding may simply be a practical way of conveying the message with less effort.
This was very useful, could you do a video/videos showing examples of every attested bindrune. Its very hard to find all of this kind of information on ones own and you have way more experience with it already. Even just knowing them for use in literary conjugation would be useful. Also trying to see them on the runestone can be difficult thank you for highlighting them.
In the «Thor bless runes» example, is it not talking about «Runar» as in the name? Its a male name, and the R-rune at the end would suggest it is the name in this intance.
I feel like these were essentially just the runic form of cursive in some ways. It's just faster to write, and was probably easier given the nature of carving. Though I definitely agree that whoever was writing them in some cases just thought "it looked cooler".
I don't get why some people find this confusing considering that the Latin alphabet has ligatures too. Most people use them in handwriting and they're also in a lot of fonts. In fact, in TH-cam's font, there's a ligature in this comment (in the word "find").
Words are seen as magic in magic in general, vibrational. Think of mantra and sound in other cultures in meditation etc. Concept goes way back. I find shapes such as these often in nature. Wish I could share photos.
In our case Bee, I, Jay, Pee, Queue, Tea, and YoU are the only letters with names that mean a damn thing (for which the word actually contains the letter) to begin with...
In French, the letter V is called “vay” and W is called “doo-bluh-vay”. In the case of a standalone bindrune, is there a convention as to which order they are to be read in, or is it entirely context-dependent?
are they any books that go over the complete norse mythology? if so which ones would be the best. i know a lot about the norse sagas and tales but it is hard to find some of the lesser known ones
I've read that letters in the Latin alphabet connected together are called DIGRAPHS. The Stratford Monument on the wall of Holy Trinity Church -- the Shakespeare one -- has numerous such digraphs on it, even at least one TRIGRAPH. The ampersand symbol [&] is actually a combination of E+T, the Latin word ET ["and"], which is what '&' means. Tolkien formed what is called a MONOGRAPH (I think) out of his initials, J+R+R+T, which I can't reproduce here, of course, but it's on the spines of all his hardcover books, I'm pretty sure. But JRRT isn't a word, mind you; it's just his 4 initials drawn as one figure.
Ideally, it'd be either ᚢᛁᚴᛁᚾᚴᛦ (uikinkR) or ᚢᛁᚴᛁᚴᛦ (uikikR) as N-runes can be omitted before a K-rune. It should be ᛦ rather than ᚱ for any period prior to the R-phonemes merging, but if you look at the rune stone "Sm 10" in Sweden, you'll find the word vikingr written ᚢᛁᚴᛁᚴᚱ (uikikr) so it's not "incorrect" or unattested to write this way
Hello Jackson love the channel speaking of runes. There was a man named Caius Vieovis convicted of the murder of three men he has rune tattoos on his face as far as I can find its spell foad in English but was wondering if you could give him a Google and tell me what they mean.
Thank you sir, so from my take on this lesson, essentially bind runes were like an archaic version of cursive writing, would this be a correct assumption?
So carving my middle name i could use only three runes Ingwaz Mannaz Raidö but i think i should combine Ingwaz with the ice rune since I've sort of made Ice my middle name.
Funny, now that you mentioned it, I don't think I ever considered ruins as "magical", but rather just an old way of writing! As in, that's just the way there "alphabet" was and how they wrote!😜
The use of runes seems like the phenomenon I saw in Europe in the late 80's where the mere appearance of certain words/characters was fashionable. Often, I would laugh to see someone obviously "decked out" wearing a shirt that said something like "Eat at Joe's", likewise my brother often wore a shirt that had a Japanese character but, I have no idea what it was or meant other than looking cool.
I feel like your mild irritation about people thinking runes are magic is very similar to my (I was a planetarium presenter) irritation at people thinking “Mercury in retrograde” means anything magical or beyond us moving past Mercury like a car on the freeway. Haaha.
I had to look up the Bratsberg Brooch, and I understand that the common transliteration EKERILAZ is translated into modern English as "I, Erilaz". But could it be "Ek Er Ilaz" = "I am Ilaz?" Several places in Norway are called Ila, so the thought that Ila/ Ilaz could be a name isn't that far fetched. I know in runes a sentence often starts with I, (insert name here), (insert action). But could it be that in this case it is more of a statement, or that the brooch is saying "I belong to Ila". I might be putting too much of a modern interpretation into it, but I had to throw it out there.
The first person singular of the verb "to be" in Old Norse ("vera") would be "em", so "ek em". I am not sure of the dating of the brooch, but since it's in Elder Futhark it might be worth noting that the reconstructed Proto-Norse word from which "vera" stems would be *wesaną, and the first person singular form would there be *immi. So, "ek immi" is what you might expect during the period Elder Futhark was in use
hi sir jackson im your long time subscriber can you give me an old norse names of animals with english translation of it and give me an old norse dialogue thank you
Their logos are not bind runes in a historical sense, but they are bind runes in the modern conception of what a bind rune is. As bind runes they'd be terrible, since they can't be read and there are far too many runes involved with no clear order. They look more like aesthetically pleasing patterns than any type of ligature, and you wouldn't find any symbols like them in the Viking Age or prior
I hope that with time your experience will lead you to a better understanding and belief in magic. For example have you ever tried your hand at it? There is a saying that most people don't believe in magic because they have never tried it.
I’ve always wondered if the “magic” in the runes is the fact of being able to have a written language.
I've heard it said that the act of writing runes was seen as a magical art in itself. I can't remember if this was from a good source or a bad one, so I take it with a grain of salt, but I always liked to interpret it like you said. The runes are associated with Óðinn, so learning the use of them might have been a very holy and spiritual practice for the Norse people. That's what I like to believe anyway
Language itself is often considered magical in oral cultures. That's where curses come from. "I'm wishing you all the best" is a modern magical formula. So runes might have been the same. It's not the runes themselves, but the words used and the intent. They are, after all, words, ideas and concepts with a material form, instead of "just" soundwaves lost in the air as soon as they are uttered.
Most gods of writing are gods of magic
Just some perspective on how people seen writing
For my part, I think of it as a way of making thought (intention) physical. Speaking aloud and writing something down are both ways to make thoughts (desires, intentions, emotions) "real." It may be something we more or less take for granted now, but in antiquity this would have been something like magic due to the skill, knowledge and effort required.
I take this stance myself. I think it's less about the specific letters/language and more about understanding the true extent to which reality is made of language.
Calling them bindrunes sounds so much more cool than ligatures. Being able to choose when and where to use them without introducing ambiguity could have been a sign of greater literacy as would being able to decipher them smoothly whilst reading.
Beautiful location as always, the falling birch leaves are evocative.
Although they look very much like birches, those are actually Aspen trees.
@@Sindraug25 Thanks, I should have known better.
@@Asptuber Yes, as someone who's interested in this for the culture and the history I find the obsession many people have with magic, etc., frustrating at best.
@@Asptuber aesir and jotnar are kinda the same thing as the greek pantheon, they are different because the original interpretation got distorted through ages of oral tradition
ligatures should be called bindletters simply because it sounds more fun
I have been wanting to learn more about bindrunes for a while, specifically real examples. Thanks, Dr. Crawford!
I'm surprised you omitted the most famous bindrune of all - the one everyone sees every day on their phone - Bluetooth. The logo for the short range wireless protocol is the bindrune Harold Bluetooth used as a signature in runes.
I think he limited himself to pre-modern bindrunes here. :)
I spent the whole video waiting for him to mention the Bluetooth logo.
@@troelspeterroland6998 It is pre-modern. It is the bindrune that Harold Bluetooth used as a signature... that Intel reused as a logo
@@Tritium21 I really, really hate to be a spoilsport but the epithets of viking age kings do not date from their own lifetimes. Harald would not have wanted to use a derogatory nickname for himself, and it is only known from the Roskilde Chronicle from 1143. As Jackson Crawford explains, pre-modern bindrunes only share their vertical staves. This one was invented by Intel. I'm so sorry.
@@troelspeterroland6998 With you on the rest of it, but the modern Bluetooth bindrune IS placed sharing the vertical stave.
The german ß (Esszett), is the result of doing this to latin letters, namely the letters s and z, where german used to have a long s, used within sillables, and a short s at the end of sillables. As the long s became obsolete, the ß became its own letter. Similarly the ä, ö, and ü, whixh are generally considered seperate letters on german originally were the combinations ae, oe and ue, where the e was put on top of the other letters, and over time turned into the dots, due to the manner it used to be written in handwriting.
Spanish ñ and Ñ are also ligatures; the squiggly “tilde” on top is a flat little “n” or “N” in its own right; se Latin “aNNo” => Spanish “aÑo”.
Man, the forest in the background is almost painfully beautiful.
Aspen uplands in Colorado?
I am thinking that carving letters in stone is hard- and the binding may have been simply a matter of economy- to make the carving easier
In times of low literacy, the training of a scribe and that of a stone mason may not have overlapped much. It would be easier for a cleric to do fancy lettering on a manuscript than on wood or stone. He might have had to write out an example on parchment for the carver to copy.
There are a few examples of objects, even coins, from around the world where it seems that the carver was illiterate and was just mimicking an inscription with random letters. The general public would not know the difference! That's the same idea as a hedge-priest saying "hocus pocus."
I love everything you teach us through this platform and your books. Great fan of yours. 💙
Dr. Crawford, it seems your last few videos have been gaining a good amount of momentum with view counts . This makes me feel glad, and I hope it's bringing a smile to your face as well.
I was waiting for this topic! So happy you are sharing your knowledge.
As always, I appreciate your time and energy to educate those wanting to learn. From the newly cloud covered skies of Sacramento, CA, I'm wishing you... All the best.
You can't fool us. We know you're actually a Norse God in today's time educating us. We'll keep it secret though 😉 Great information as always!
Thank you, Dr Crawford
first I was so mesmerized by the beauty of the falling leaves and nature that I had to watch it again from start.
When I visit our graveyard there's a lilystone from the 1200s that contains a ͡ᚮᚱ bindrune. It feels like medieval rune inscriptions are often spammed with cool bindrunes. I've also seen the church bell that came from Herrljunga kyrka, it says Ave Maria on it in medieval runes, but Ave is one single bindrune, made of ᛆᚢᛅ. That is cool. I love rare complicated bindrunes.
How did you get that rune typed out? Do you have a custom font?
@@liamsludge2659 I was going to ask the same question.
@@liamsludge2659 One easy way is to just copy-paste in the runes from the chart you'll find at the bottom of the english wikipedia page on runes.
And "Segoe UI Historic" is the only built-in font in Windows that supports runic characters I think.
@@liamsludge2659 I know this is a year late, but... Most fonts include the runes. If OP was using a custom font, you would not be able to see it, instead you'd only see [] in place of the character
I love the setting on this one!
Just awesome - thanks for this! I've been experimenting with bindrunes for a while now and it's amazing to be able to enjoy your insights and historical examples in this format.
Excellent! You just made may afternoon. Thanks for all you do J. 🍀
Hey Jackson I love your channel. I've noticed the last few videos have a very low volume compared with other channels. I have to turn it up quite a bit to hear.
Bro your camera locations are on point lol. Looks great 👍
Thank you, sir! This is fantastic! I've found them fascinating for years but never really liked the fact that the only places that had them were about the "woo-woo" uses.
Seriously, thank you.
As a Swede I have always thought of runes as just another alphabet, probably due to having seen quite many rune stones which mostly contain pretty mundane stuff. And bind runes obviously seems like ligatures.
Another practice that is very reminiscent of the bindrune practice of putting all letters of a word on a single stave is the Eastern Roman tradition to make monograms with all the letters of the name of an emperor or empress included like a cypher within a circle. It just looks cool. I remember when I was a bored kid, I often tried figuring out similar "marks" where the letters of my own name was fitted together in a strange geometry. Many Byzantine monograms look *an awful lot* like the vegvísir mark you also talked about.
I just received my 2 autographed books from Colorado Book Store...Thanks Dr Crawford!
Never mind the interesting runes (that was pretty cool, especially the vertical sample); where did get that nifty paisley shirt??
my good friend jackson. An interesting point to note as a fellow language studier myself:
Sanskrit has a large number of consonant conjuncts, I've studied many languages, and of all the scripts these are the only 2 with clear and obvious combinations of letters. "Standard combinations" if you will. There must have been an early writing system, that influenced these 2 systems (the futhark and the devanagari) to have this feature both within indo-european language families. Althouh I agree the split between the indo-iranian branch of language and german is quite some split. But then again we must obviously be missing older examples of german writing so how much older is really the question. Is it not also possible that the celtic script of Ogham used in Ireland around this time did not also breka off from an early branch of this script or influence it?
Love this sub-topic regarding runes and their use in writing and more esoteric uses, same-stave (aka "mast") bindrunes are some of my favorite style/ form.
I have seen one other video that covers this topic. I am interested in Bindrunes. I am creating my shield and would love to learn more about bindrunes so I can put them on my shield
That badge or whatever that is on your neck shining is so cinematic xD
Also, you are an absolute chad @Jackson Crawford
looks like sunglasses
@@charliejohanssen7421 Ah I see, yeah
So they seem to function as ligatures in Latin and Greek manuscripts, where the scribe is saving time, or like the very intricate but beautiful Byzantine monograms for emperors or abbreviations for saints or for the titles for Mary and Jesus. Thanks for the vid as always!
Using ligatures extensively in some of my own work, I do have to encourage legibility by only joining letters in a left-to-right fashion, never superimposed over their middles. This is for actual text to be read as captions or dialog, rather than logos or decorations.
Dr Jackson Crawford, Could you do a video about odin's "spells", please?
This had me thinking about how I like to sign my drawings and paintings. Which has always been an M and a ⭐. I'm sure that seems strange to some people and maybe a bit lazy or worse, self absorbed. I mean who am I to rate myself among the stars. It is a very personal way in which I identify myself, being all and one of many.
Hope you're doing okay.
Thank you for the video! :)
I am a huge fan of your work. I am so grateful to get this education without all of the arrogance or even condescension. I am from the U.S. like you except I live in the mountains of New Hampshire. I have been interested in all things of the Old Norse since I served in the US Army Infantry during the entire 2000’s and we were very into the Viking mentality of “Victory or Valhalla” (most likely something we created as a motto). I ordered several books you have translated. The saga of the Volsungs, The Wanderers Havamal as well as your translation of The Poetic Edda. I own another translation of the Prose and Poetic Edda. I can’t wait to get those books in the mail. Thank you Jackson Crawford!
The runes were carved, not written, so it’s only practical that the binding of runes was a thing. Same goes for Ancient Greek carvings. There were no spaces between words. Probably because space on a stone was limited. (Besides the fact that the spacing rule didn’t exist yet)
EXCELLENT video - very informative! Thanks, Dr. Jackson! :)
Great video. I did wonder if there might also have been a request for bindrunes on things like funeral stones to cut down on the cost? If the cutter charged by letter, I suppose there'd have been a discount for combining letters.
What about the Bluetooth symbol Wiki...The Bluetooth logo is a bind rune merging the Younger Futhark runes (Hagall) (ᚼ) and (Bjarkan) (ᛒ), Harald's initials.
A great example is in the Bluetooth icon.
If runes had no magical application to the old Norse, why in poems lie the Havamal does Odin sacrifice himself on the world tree to understand their mystical power?
I've wondered the same thing, honestly. If there was nothing inherently magical about them, even to older peoples, then why sacrifice yourself for them? Why hold them in such reverence?
@@bakarderansonumuhlnaz2693 also there are other references in the sources that appear to suggest they were not just a common or garden alphabet, for instance the Norns ( Norse goddesses from fate and destiny) are said to have carved them into Yggdrasil, the world tree. And there are other examples. The Roman historian Tacitus, said that Germanic tribes cut wooden staves, carved symbols on them and cast them as lots to Devine the future. The ancient Norse had a very magical worldview and I am sure they must have have seen them as magical symbols not just letters for mundane writing.
Doctor Crawford is brilliant, but like many modern academics probably has a materialistic worldview. He probably finds the view that runes were magical irritating and so is inclined to debunk the idea . That’s fine, is a renowned expert but my gut feeling he is wrong about this one.
@@anthonyhudson3158 I have read about the casting lots, although they did make sure to mention that the Germanic tribes did not use runes for their castings for the future.
I do agree, however, that they clearly must have had some magical significance. Ancient peoples tended to have very wildly different worldviews even to most people alive today.
@@anthonyhudson3158 Looking at what people wrote using runes, it's clear that they did NOT revere the runes. People wrote mundane and simple (and often crude sexual) love letters or I-owe-you-so-and-so letters to each other.
In all references of runes in the sagas, it's also not clear that it is the runes that are profound - it seems to me that the words that were written in runes were profound. The content of the text, not the alphabet.
The reference about Odin could mean the art of writing itself. Without writing, it's hard to store knowledge. And knowledge is what Odin was about. Knowledge is worth sacrificing for.
Tacitus never said that the casting of lots involved runes. Just symbols.
@@Smedis this is from Wikipedia as I couldn’t be bothered to write an essay.
There is some evidence that, in addition to being a writing system, runes historically served purposes of magic. This is the case from earliest epigraphic evidence of the Roman to Germanic Iron Age, with non-linguistic inscriptions and the alu word. An erilaz appears to have been a person versed in runes, including their magic applications.
In medieval sources, notably the Poetic Edda, the Sigrdrífumál mentions "victory runes" to be carved on a sword, "some on the grasp and some on the inlay, and name Tyr twice."
I don’t think however we will ever really know.
Imagine how hard it was to carve these things. Of course they would want to save space and effort in carving. I never thought of this until now. Awesome video, thank you
As always, amazing video!! Thank you 🥰
There may not be magic in the runes, but there certainly is magic on this channel. Brilliant as always. 😎
I would argue any alphabet or language is “magic” it’s all about the meaning and power you put into the words and letters.
The letter names in Thai and Lao work like the letter names in Futhark.
Great video on the topic.
Now there has been something i wanted to ask you.
The pronunciation of ‘ek’ in Norse probably sounded more like the Islandic modern spoken word. But I think in Rogaland, Norway and a bit further north past bergen we still use “eg/æg” where the g still sounds like soft “k”… what is your thoughts
That seems like it would be perfectly normal for a conservative Norwegian dialect - Norwegian sound changes would have gone through ek -> eg -> ej so seeing 'ej' and 'eg' coexisting in Norwegian dialects is not unusual.
Modern Icelandic actually diphthongized the e to [jɛ] so the pronunciation is ['jɛɣ], i.e. not particularly close to Old Norse *[ek].
I have revisited this video and a few other text based sites that address the Sønder Kirkeby runestone, and for the LIFE of me, I can NOT find an explanation as to how in the word “rúnaR”, the last two runes = a R ???
Aight I hear what you're saying, but how do I cast a spell to make my Bluetooth work exactly?
In the Czech language we have binded letters too: "CH" which is one letter for us. :-) Thanks for video Jackson!
that’s a digraph, 2 letter meaning one sound; bindrunes are more like 1 letter meaning 2
I find bindrunes far more helpful when carving them in stone, it's less work and your tool is not eroded as fast, I think it was more on the lines for convenience, they just happened to look good afterward
It occurs to me that since these are letters laboriously carved into rock with a hammer and chisel, binding may simply be a practical way of conveying the message with less effort.
I mean that usage for Thoor viigi ruunar sounds like just an acronym/abbeviation and is kinda like the bluetooth logo.
This was very useful, could you do a video/videos showing examples of every attested bindrune. Its very hard to find all of this kind of information on ones own and you have way more experience with it already. Even just knowing them for use in literary conjugation would be useful. Also trying to see them on the runestone can be difficult thank you for highlighting them.
In the «Thor bless runes» example, is it not talking about «Runar» as in the name? Its a male name, and the R-rune at the end would suggest it is the name in this intance.
Hey Crawford, what are some academic books you can recommend on runes/bindrunes?
I hope you're doing okay, Mr. Crawford
Hey man. Have yet to watch the video. I’m just starting with Norse paganism. I was told your a good place to start
Where/are there any bindrunes used in sacrifice? I can’t think of any reason you would use them that way. im doing research for a murd3r case. Thanks!
Fehu upside down on your left collar all video looked like Freya unimpressed. ;)
Isn't the logo for Bluetooth a bindrune as well?
Can you do old Norse rune tattoos
What about RR in a word? Did they repeat the rune? Or make it a bind rune?
Did anyone else notice Josh Barnett in the Grimfrost commercial!? 😮
What about for sounds that developed from clusters of consonants? Were bindrunes of those two letters used to represent those sounds?
Language and Symbolism are Magic
I feel like these were essentially just the runic form of cursive in some ways. It's just faster to write, and was probably easier given the nature of carving. Though I definitely agree that whoever was writing them in some cases just thought "it looked cooler".
I don't get why some people find this confusing considering that the Latin alphabet has ligatures too. Most people use them in handwriting and they're also in a lot of fonts.
In fact, in TH-cam's font, there's a ligature in this comment (in the word "find").
Words are seen as magic in magic in general, vibrational. Think of mantra and sound in other cultures in meditation etc. Concept goes way back. I find shapes such as these often in nature. Wish I could share photos.
Makes sense. Fehu can no more conjure money than A can conjure an apple, or B can conjure a bear.
In our case Bee, I, Jay, Pee, Queue, Tea, and YoU are the only letters with names that mean a damn thing (for which the word actually contains the letter) to begin with...
totally off topic but - happy 6th! a blessed and felicitous to you!
I love that when he sais magical meaning the whole background becomes more magical with those words lol anyone notice that lol
Absolute legend. Thank you.
I think that one rowdy bison at the beginning is like, “Get out of the way, dude, I wanna learn about Old Norse!”
In French, the letter V is called “vay” and W is called “doo-bluh-vay”.
In the case of a standalone bindrune, is there a convention as to which order they are to be read in, or is it entirely context-dependent?
really cool video, I had always wondered what the term bindrune actually meant, thank you :)
This for me is synchronistic/law of attraction since I've been focused on bind runes. Thank you for making and posting this video. Skål!
Like the oe in the French world "coeur"? They seem stuck together.
Thank You! ! !
The fehu remark was good.
Would a Viking into BDSM use binding runes? Just wonering.
Are there any examples of hw, sk, kj, gj, or kw bindrunes?
are they any books that go over the complete norse mythology? if so which ones would be the best. i know a lot about the norse sagas and tales but it is hard to find some of the lesser known ones
The Poetic Edda and the Prose Edda should contain essentially everything
A common ligature in the Latin alfabet is lowercase fi.
So they were a form of runic cursive. Cool!
I've read that letters in the Latin alphabet connected together are called DIGRAPHS. The Stratford Monument on the wall of Holy Trinity Church -- the Shakespeare one -- has numerous such digraphs on it, even at least one TRIGRAPH. The ampersand symbol [&] is actually a combination of E+T, the Latin word ET ["and"], which is what '&' means. Tolkien formed what is called a MONOGRAPH (I think) out of his initials, J+R+R+T, which I can't reproduce here, of course, but it's on the spines of all his hardcover books, I'm pretty sure. But JRRT isn't a word, mind you; it's just his 4 initials drawn as one figure.
Can someone tell me what the word viking is written in runes? Is it ᚢᛁᚴᛁᚴᚱ or ᚢᛁᚴᛁᚾᚴᛦ or maybe this ᚢᛁᚴᛁᚴᛦ or what? :D
Think the viking age was mostly in younger futhark.
Ideally, it'd be either ᚢᛁᚴᛁᚾᚴᛦ (uikinkR) or ᚢᛁᚴᛁᚴᛦ (uikikR) as N-runes can be omitted before a K-rune. It should be ᛦ rather than ᚱ for any period prior to the R-phonemes merging, but if you look at the rune stone "Sm 10" in Sweden, you'll find the word vikingr written ᚢᛁᚴᛁᚴᚱ (uikikr) so it's not "incorrect" or unattested to write this way
@@MandatoryHandle okey thanks for the reply.
I guess younger futhark didn’t use as much bindrunes because they had the short twig system ?
In French "w" is called simply "double vé". Two V's 😀.
Hello Jackson love the channel speaking of runes. There was a man named Caius Vieovis convicted of the murder of three men he has rune tattoos on his face as far as I can find its spell foad in English but was wondering if you could give him a Google and tell me what they mean.
Thank you sir, so from my take on this lesson, essentially bind runes were like an archaic version of cursive writing, would this be a correct assumption?
My thoughts exactly. Wonder if anyone else had this thought?
So carving my middle name i could use only three runes
Ingwaz Mannaz Raidö
but i think i should combine Ingwaz with the ice rune since I've sort of made Ice my middle name.
Funny, now that you mentioned it, I don't think I ever considered ruins as "magical", but rather just an old way of writing! As in, that's just the way there "alphabet" was and how they wrote!😜
so bind runes are a type of cursive
The use of runes seems like the phenomenon I saw in Europe in the late 80's where the mere appearance of certain words/characters was fashionable. Often, I would laugh to see someone obviously "decked out" wearing a shirt that said something like "Eat at Joe's", likewise my brother often wore a shirt that had a Japanese character but, I have no idea what it was or meant other than looking cool.
I feel like your mild irritation about people thinking runes are magic is very similar to my (I was a planetarium presenter) irritation at people thinking “Mercury in retrograde” means anything magical or beyond us moving past Mercury like a car on the freeway. Haaha.
I had to look up the Bratsberg Brooch, and I understand that the common transliteration EKERILAZ is translated into modern English as "I, Erilaz". But could it be "Ek Er Ilaz" = "I am Ilaz?" Several places in Norway are called Ila, so the thought that Ila/ Ilaz could be a name isn't that far fetched.
I know in runes a sentence often starts with I, (insert name here), (insert action).
But could it be that in this case it is more of a statement, or that the brooch is saying "I belong to Ila".
I might be putting too much of a modern interpretation into it, but I had to throw it out there.
The first person singular of the verb "to be" in Old Norse ("vera") would be "em", so "ek em". I am not sure of the dating of the brooch, but since it's in Elder Futhark it might be worth noting that the reconstructed Proto-Norse word from which "vera" stems would be *wesaną, and the first person singular form would there be *immi. So, "ek immi" is what you might expect during the period Elder Futhark was in use
hi sir jackson im your long time subscriber can you give me an old norse names of animals with english translation of it and give me an old norse dialogue thank you
So for groups like Skald and Wardruna, their logos would be considered bind-runes, right? That's where my brain went, sorry 😐.
Their logos are not bind runes in a historical sense, but they are bind runes in the modern conception of what a bind rune is. As bind runes they'd be terrible, since they can't be read and there are far too many runes involved with no clear order. They look more like aesthetically pleasing patterns than any type of ligature, and you wouldn't find any symbols like them in the Viking Age or prior
I hope that with time your experience will lead you to a better understanding and belief in magic. For example have you ever tried your hand at it? There is a saying that most people don't believe in magic because they have never tried it.
No need for mysticism, language is phenomenal on its own.
Thank you for dispelling the mystic b.s.
It's just an alphabet (speaking as a crazed pagan myself).