#anglo saxon futhorc

[gifts-of-heimdall-runes]

The Runes

by Ingrid Kincaid

Source

[poeticnorth]

Northumbrian Rune Poems is now officially available for purchase. Digital and physical copies available here.

Inspired by the Old English Rune Poem, Northumbrian Rune Poems centres its focus on the Early Medieval English Futhorc runerows with additional attention paid to the four runes that were in use in Northumrbia. Mixing free verse poetry with kennings found within Old Norse and Old English poetry, Northumbrian Rune Poems is a magical read that breathes new life into an otherwise neglected runerow. Alongside each poem is an Old English adaptation written in a Northumbrian dialect using Old English alliterative style to capture the spirit of the poems in a new light.

[theherbwitchshoppe]

A repurposed wooden spoon with sweet cicely, yellow sweet clover, red clover and red roses. It bears a futhorc ( English rune) bindrune which is the combination of wynn ( joy and bliss) and gyfu ( gift, generosity)

[renegade-hierophant]

ᚻᛖᚱ ᛒᛁᚦ ᚠᛇᚻ ᛚᚫᚾᛖ ᚻᛖᚱ ᛒᛁᚦ ᚠᚱᛇᚾᛞ ᛚᚫᚾᛖ ᚻᛖᚱ ᛒᛁᚦ ᛗᚩᚾ ᛚᚫᚾᛖ ᚻᛖᚱ ᛒᛁᚦ ᛗᚫᚷ ᛚᚫᚾᛖ ᛠᛚ ᚦᛁᛋ ᛇᚱᚦᚪᚾ ᚷᛖᛋᛏᛠᛚ ᛁᛞᛖᛚ ᚹᛇᚱᚦᛖᚦ

Hér bið feoh lǽne, hér bið fréond lǽne, hér bið mon lǽne, hér bið mæġ lǽne, eal þis eorþan ġesteal ídel weorþeð!

Here money is fleeting, here friend is fleeting, here man is fleeting, here kinsman is fleeting, all the foundation of this world turns to waste!

(sang by Gealdýr) (full text of The Wanderer)

[hesy-bes]

gonna offer some readings using the anglo-saxon futhorc.

i will not do relationship/love related readings, as a preface.

i will take up to 5 requests, first come first serve by ask.

they’re free, though if you want to leave a tip my ko-fi is linked on my page.

[wishful-seeker]

Why does wishful seeker use Futhorc runes, is she a norse pagan??

NOPE

I use these runes because when I was 7 years old I found a dragonlogy book at the flee market for 5 dollars that had the Futhorc runes translated in it because they claimed it was dragon language and your girl fucking loves dragons and kid like nostalgia. So here we are.

[simpledutchpagan]

Ellen..this is the word written in anglo Saxon runes in my neck. Ellen, Anglo Saxon , Anglo Frisian, middle germanic known for courage strength,bravery strife! In old Saxon known as Ellan. In proto germanic eljan in Icelandic known as elja. The Danes used this word as well. All they mean about the same. “”Go for it!”” Yess go for it do as you want do what must be done. Show them! Show the word around you that you do what has to be done. Win from yourself. Show the gods! Show that you are more then just a sack of meat. Never be ashamed of who you are and what you can do. You are who you are and you can rock that!

[tomriddleslove]

What’s left of me?

✩Mattheo Riddle x Reader

Summary: The one where your pursuit for excellence leads you down a path of self destruction, and you’re slowly loosing yourself. You didn’t expect a certain boy in your year would be your saving grace. Alternatively: Mattheo makes you realise you’re more than what you think you are.

A/N: I guess this could very easily be like a prequel to the other mattheo one shot ‘i’m here’. This is definitely a bit self indulgent but we all have our things 😻😻

Warnings: Allusions to overdosing (brief), mentions of not eating.

Songs: Nothings New - Rio Romeo

18 days.

18 days till you would be finished with all of this.

Technically, it would actually be 408 days till you finished school and graduated from this godforsaken place, but 18 more till you finished with exams.

You weren’t sure how many more hours you could spend hunched over indecipherable handwriting, pouring over text till your eyes stung and your back ached. Surrounded by a stack of books and rolls of parchment, you couldn’t even begin to figure out where you ended and the library began. You had taken up a huge table (that could seat at least 4) for the better part of 17 hours, sat on the same chair since 6:00 am.

You stifle a small groan of pain as you roll your wrist, stiff and sore from the hell that was ancient runes.

There are ink splotches all over your skin, and you’re sure the amount of work you were pouring into this stopped being effective nearly 5 hours ago.

Your eyes flicker up and scan over the once-packed library that had slowly dwindled down to a few students, half of whom were in the same boat as you.

To you, being the last person in the library was a huge sign of success. It meant you were more dedicated and more hard-working.

In reality, the truth couldn’t be any further from that, but in your mind, if you weren’t milking yourself over every last piece of work it simply wasn’t being done right.

The hushed murmurs and sounds of parchment being unfurled fade into the background as your quill scratches furiously against the parchment, mind running at a million miles an hour.

You ignore the pang in your stomach as you work; you haven’t eaten today. You didn’t want to get up at any point to get food, for fear of your place being taken.

Now, you didn’t want to get up for another reason. It was well past the library's open hours and Madame Pince was angrily fussing about, bustling around everyone as she got them to leave. A testament to how long you had been there, she didn’t even seem to notice you, and you were worried getting up and walking about would break this sort of invisibility shield you had going on.

Come to think of it, you hadn’t really drunk any water either. You brought your bottle with you but had forgotten to fill it up. It was fine though, the human body could last for 3 days without water - it could wait. Your upcoming exams were far more important.

In Scandinavia, the Elder Futhark remained in use until some time around the eighth century (the time of the Eddas), when drastic changes in the Old Norse language occurred, and corresponding changes in the runic alphabet were made to accommodate the new sounds. However, unlike the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc, the Younger Futhark (as it is now called) reduced the number of runes from 24 to 16, and several runes came to represent multiple sounds. The forms of the runes were also changed and simplified.

Gods, you couldn't take this anymore. You felt sick and exhausted. You ignore the hunger that gnaws at your stomach, rubbing a hand over your face as you contemplate finishing off and going to bed.

But every time you think of stopping a horrible feeling emerges in your stomach, consuming you with anxiety. The weight of impending exams and the fear of not doing well gnawing at your determination. You glance at the clock, realizing it's well past midnight, and the library is now completely empty except for you.

Madame Pince, finally noticing your presence, approaches with a disapproving look. "You know, the library does close at a certain hour. I can't have students staying here all night," she scolds, but her tone softens as she sees the exhaustion in your eyes.

“Sorry. I lost track of time” You mumble, haphazardly cramming your stuff into your bag. You get up, and the room spins for a second. You stumble but manage to catch yourself, holding onto the table as Madam Pince reaches out a hand to help you recover.

“You need to take care of yourself. No exam is worth this much stress,” She says, eyeing you with concern. If only she knew how far that was from the truth. You felt as though you had so little to your name. Performing well, overachieing. That was what you were known for. It was the only thing you felt was yours. Everyone else had character, they were distinctly themselves. They had hobbies, interests, and friendships that defined them. But for you, it was always about excelling academically. Without that, you became nobody. You were no more than the number on your papers, and the reminder weighed down on you like an unrelenting burden.

By some miracle you manage to stumble down the empty halls of the castle into the Slytherin common room, which seemed paradoxically warm considering its grandiose stone structure and dark, moody lighting. You carelessly drop your bag onto a table closest to the fireplace, trudging up to your room as you battle the sleep that threatens to consume you.

It's dark, and your roommates have long gone to bed.

“Lumos” You murmur, hiding the blinding light that emerges from the tip of your wand with the lining of your school robes, dimming it slightly. You grope blindly at your bedside drawer, stopping when you feel the familiar smooth glass bottle, that fits perfectly in your palm. You slip it into the pocket of your robes, slowly shutting the drawer as you make your way back down to the common room. You dismiss the light that shines from your wand, tossing it onto the sofa as you take a seat on the floor, in front of the low table. You read the instructions on the back of the small bottle as if you hadn’t been consuming this religiously for the past month.

Wideye potion User Guidance:

Take no more than one teaspoon every 6 hours. Effects will last for up to 8 hours. Excessive use of this potion may lead to adverse effects, and in rare cases, severe bodily harm. Users are advised not to use the maximum dosage for a consecutive 72 hours.

You’ve read it so many times, you were sure you could recite it by heart. Choosing not to heed any warnings, you pop open the cork and down the whole bottle in one go. The rancid taste of the potion burns, eliciting a shudder down your spine as you swallow down the bile that threatens to emerge. Pocketing the empty glass bottle, you stretch your arms before retrieving your books, ready to continue working.

If you were lucky, the potion might give you a boost of energy for about 3 hours or so. You had been taking it so much you had developed a sort of immunity to it, and the effects were not as potent as they used to be. The sacrifice of your well-being for the sake of productivity had become a routine, a desperate attempt to squeeze every ounce of time and focus out of your exhausted mind and body.

You have attempted to brew a stronger concoction, in the misplaced hopes that increasing the potency would counteract the effect of the immunity. However, the violent cramps and palpitations it had given you very quickly told you that wouldn't work.

You knew it was bad. It was causing irreversible damage to your body, killing you at worst. It simply wasn't sustainable. But you couldn't drag yourself out of that mindset.

Failure. Nobody.

You gritted your teeth and carried on working.

You managed to get through another potions essay, and the time on your watch read 1:00 am.

You could carry on for longer, right?

You zone out for a second, staring off at the orange embers that emerged from the fireplace, shining bright for what seemed like a millisecond before falling to the floor, turning into nothing but ash.

The orange embers flicker, and for a moment, you see yourself in them – a fleeting brightness that threatens to be extinguished. The battle between ambition and self-preservation rages on as you grit your teeth and carry on working, oblivious to the embers slowly falling into nothingness, much like your own fading sense of self.

“Why on earth are you up at this hour doing work?” A voice calls from behind you, and the momentary intrusion shocks you, sending a burst of energy through you as you spin around.

Flopping down onto the sofa next to you, leaning back with his legs lazily outstretched, was none other than Mattheo Riddle. Clad in a plain grey sweatshirt and black jeans, he eyes you with curiosity, smelling distinctively of smoke. He had most likely been out, as he so usually was at this hour. You shrug, turning back to your work.

��Exams. Need to revise” You mumble, voice cracking. You swallow, massaging your dry throat as you grimace, trying to get back to your writing.

“Revise? Merlin, you're the smartest person in our year. You don't need to be revising” Matthep leans forward, plucking a piece of parchment from your pile and examining it with a raised eyebrow.

You snatch it back, a protective instinct kicking in despite the fatigue. You hated that sentiment. Despised it, even. People always assumed your performance came naturally. That you were simply born with the ability to do well. No one seemed to consider what you had to do to get to that point, how you wore yourself down, day in and day out, till you either passed out from exhaustion or pain, neglecting your most basic needs.

"I might be the 'smartest' person, but that doesn't mean I can afford to slack off," you reply, a hint of frustration in your voice. The adrenaline from the sudden interruption starts to ebb away, leaving you feeling even more drained.

Mattheo leans back, momentarily caught off guard by your defensiveness. He had never seen you this on edge. He was so accustomed to seeing you as this familiar presence during the school day his partner for the many lessons that he didn’t have his friends in. The two of you would work together and on rare occasions, hang out with one another in the common room as well. It was a rather unlikely duo, the king of Slytherin and the academic prodigy. Yet, More often than not Mattheo found himself seeking out your presence. He never admitted it outright, but he hugely admired you. Your intelligence, your drive, it all captivated him. There were times when he hoped he could be only half the person you were.

How funny it was, for you felt the very same thing when you saw him. He seemed content. Happy. He was loved by nearly everyone. Popular, with a fun social life. He had everything you wanted without putting in any of the work.

You wanted to be like him. But you weren’t. And if you wanted anything like what he had, you had to work damn hard for it. So that's what you did. With a small sigh, you turn back to your work.

“Hey,” He says gently, his voice softening slightly. "I’m sorry. I say stupid things sometimes.” He apologies, brows furrowed as he looks at your back facing him.

“It's fine. I should be saying sorry. You didn't say anything, I just…. I’m just a bit tired, that's all.” You mumble, apologising as you get up. You stretch, a yawn escaping your lips as you wearily rub your eyes.

“I'm gonna run up to my room and grab some more parchment. I’ll be down in a second,” You say, shrugging off your school robe as you turn to walk away. You ascend the stairs leading to your dorm, tossing your robe onto the sofa next to Mattheo as you do so.

Your robe slides off the sofa and hits the floor, a faint clinking sound echoing through the empty room as you disappear.

Curious, Mattheo looks down at your carelessly discarded robe. He reaches down, picking it up. It weighs heavier than it should be, and Mattheo can't help but feel a twinge of curiosity, He eyes the now empty staircase before reaching into your pocket, fingers brushing against a smooth glass vial.

Not just one, but a few.

Frowning, he turns out your pocket, and four identical glass vials tumble into his lap. Picking one up, his frown only deepens as he reads the label.

“Wideye potion?” He mutters to himself, the confusion on his face morphing into something else as the pieces fit in place.

He had admired you for your intelligence and drive, and now he was confronted with the reality of your struggles. The contrast between your achievements and the seemingly carefree moments he sought with you becomes stark. He berates himself for not having noticed early, for having let you fall down such a destructive path.

Jaw clenched, he gazes at the piles of books you had been working through, rolling the empty vials between his fingers as the sound of your approaching footsteps snaps him out of his thoughts.

You pause in confusion, noticing the scrutinising depression plastered on his face as he looks up at you, rolls of parchment bundled in your hands.

"What's the Wideye potion for?" Mattheo questions, his voice cutting through the silence with an uncomfortable heaviness. He holds up the empty vials as evidence, his gaze piercing through the exhaustion in your eyes.

Caught off guard by the confrontation, you glance down at the vials and then meet Mattheo's eyes. A brief moment of silence hangs in the air, the crackling embers of the fireplace filling the empty silence.

“Research. For uh, potions.” You respond, internally berating yourself for coming up with such a weak excuse.

Mattheo's expression remains stern, a mix of frustration and genuine concern etched on his face.

"Don't bullshit me," he says, his tone direct and uncompromising. "I found these in your pocket, and 'potions research' is a shit excuse. I’m going to ask you again. What’s the wideye potion for?"

You shift uncomfortably, feeling small under his scrutinising gaze You clear your throat, speaking.

"It's just to stay awake, you know? To keep going. I only take it in extreme circumstances" you explain, your voice betraying the exhaustion that has settled in.

Mattheos jaw clenches, his tongue poking the inside of his cheek as he looks to the side with a sigh, visibly frustrated.

“Extreme? And what would that be, hmm? Because right now I'm looking at four empty bottles, and God knows how many more you’ve thrown away.” He snaps, his expression softening as he looks at you.

You feel a lump forming in your throat as you struggle to find the right words. Why on earth were you close to tears? Why did you feel like crying?

“I-” You start, trailing off as you stare at the floor.

Mattheo cuts through the silence, his tone still stern but laced with concern. "This isn't okay. You're smart, and you know better. You can't keep doing this to yourself. What if something happens? What if you collapse or get seriously sick? It's not worth it."

After a moment, Mattheo's expression softens, and he exhales deeply. "When was the last time you ate?" he asks, the concern evident in his voice.

Shit.

You pause, hesitating before admitting quietly, "Breakfast...yesterday."

Mattheo's features tighten at your admission, his eyes reflecting a mixture of frustration, anger, and genuine worry. He rises from his seat and strides towards you, his footsteps echoing in the otherwise silent room.

"Yesterday? Are you serious?" he says sharply, his voice carrying a weight of both concern and disbelief.

You remain silent, unable to meet his eyes, feeling the shame and vulnerability washing over you.

“Seriously? Fuck, what’s wrong with you? Why would you do that to yourself?” He chastises you, and you snap.

“I have to! You don't fucking get it, do you? I don't have anything else to fall back on.” You start, dropping the parchment onto the table in front of you.

Mattheo's expression shifts from concern to confusion as you lash out. "What are you talking about? You have plenty more than just academics. You're talented, you're smart, and people care about you. Why are you reducing yourself to just grades?"

You scoff, a bitter smile playing on your lips. "Talented? Smart? What does that even mean? It's just a facade, a cover-up for the fact that without these achievements, I'm nothing. I don't have friends; I don't have hobbies or interests. What am I without my grades?"

Mattheo tries to interject, "You're a person with-"

But you cut him off, "No, you don't get it! I'm just a number, a ranking, a test score. Everything I am is tied to how well I perform academically. Do you know what it's like to feel like the only thing you're good at is studying, and even that's slipping away?" You snap anger evident in your tone as you spin around to face him, your weary eyes meeting his.

“It’s the same thing every single day. I wake up, bury myself in books, and push myself to the brink just to feel like I matter. I don't eat, I don't sleep, I don't talk to anyone. I’ve spent my whole life isolating myself and neglecting my most basic needs for this! If I stop now, then what's left of me?”

Tears start to well up in your eyes, and you hate yourself for showing such vulnerability. Mattheo's stern demeanour softens as he watches you unravel.

"I can't stop, Mattheo. I can't afford to. Because if I do, what's left of me?" Your voice trembles.

Mattheo's heart drops at your words, guilt and hurt clawing at his insides. He can’t fathom the idea of you suffering so much, and him being blind to it. How could you not notice how incredible of a person you are beyond all of this? He’d give anything in the world for you to see yourself through his eyes. For you to feel the way he feels when he's with you, even for a second. To know that he’d do anything you asked him to because he cared for you. Not the one who gets outstanding on all their tests.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Mattheo finally speaks, his voice softer, genuine concern written across his face.

You shake your head, a mix of frustration and desperation in your eyes. “Because you wouldn’t understand. No one does. They just see the grades, the perfect student. They don’t see the mess behind it all. And I can’t let them. I can’t let anyone see me like this.”

Mattheo moves closer, his expression shifting. “You’re wrong. I do understand. Maybe not completely, but I want to. You don’t have to face this alone.”

You scoff, wiping away a tear. “Why? What do you care? You have everything, popularity, friends, a life. I’m just the study partner, the smart one. I can’t burden you with this.”

Mattheo remains silent for a second, before he speaks.

“Every other Sunday, you go down to Hogsmesde and buy a hamper of sweets form Honeydukes. You take it to the children’s school and volunteer there for an hour. Everytime you visit, you make their day.” He starts.

"You're not just grades," he says, his voice gentle. "You have quirks that make you who you are. Like the way you absentmindedly tap your foot when you're deep in thought. Or how you always carry a small notebook, and I bet it's filled with more than just class notes. I've seen you doodle in the margins."

He continues, "You have a wicked sense of humor, even if you don't show it to everyone. I've heard you snort-laugh during our study sessions. And don't even get me started on your taste in music.How you call that dastardly jazz music, i’ll never understand, but you can’t resist humming along to the tunes of the Wizarding Wireless Network when you're studying. Your fondness for Chocolate Frogs and your inexplicable aversion to pumpkin juice.”

Mattheo's eyes light up, a small smile tugging at his lips as he recalls more details. "Remember that time in Charms class when you made your quill dance across the room just to see if you could do it? Or when you brewed a prank potion that turned the water in the Prefects' bathroom blue for a week? You have a mischievous side that not many people get to see." He continues, looking down at you sincerely. He remains silent for a second, eyes scanning over your face before he steps back, sighing.

“I don’t know how to do this emotional, sappy bullshit. I don’t do it. But with you, I do. I want to. Other people want to. That’s what you do.” He says, voice quiet.

You remain rooted to your spot, somewhere between disbelief and gratitude as you stare up at Mattheo. How did he know all that? Why did he know all that?

“You noticed?” You speak up, voice alarmingly quiet.

He looks at you as though you’ve just asked him whether the sky is blue.

“Of course i’ve noticed. It’s impossible not to.” He murmurs, and you know he’s being honest.

Tears prick in your eyes again, and it’s as though all that exhaustion and neglect has come crashing back down on you tenfold after Mattheo had called you out. You try blink them away but alas, you simply couldn’t. Before you can even say anything, Mattheo steps forward, pulling you into his chest as he wraps his arms around you in a tight embrace. He holds you tightly, not even entertaining the thought of letting go as your tears soak his sweatshirt, tentatively accepting his embrace. His heart clenches at every tear that falls from your eyes, and he can’t tell if he’s horrified or accepting of the fact that he’d give up everything to relieve you of your burdens, even if only for a day.

He rubs your back soothingly, and you can’t help but let it all out.

It’s rather cathartic, really, because you've held onto this weight for so long, and now, in Mattheo's arms, it feels like a moment of release.

As your tears eventually subside, you pull back, both embarrassed and utterly shattered. You look down, sniffling as you wipe away your tear stained eyes when Mattheo hooks a finger under your chin, tilting your head up to look at him.

People often said that the eyes were a window to the soul. You never really understood that, but in this moment, you felt as though you were gazing into the very depths of Mattheos being.

With a tenderness that betrays the boundaries of ‘just friends’ , he wipes away your tears with his thumb, looking down at you.

“Come on. Let’s get you up to rest, yeah?” He hums, quietly. You nod, having to tear yourself away from his touch.

He leans down to pack away your stuff, not letting you handle a thing as he throws your stuff over his shoulder.

“You can stay in my room, if you’d like. Theodore’s out for the night so I can take his bed.” Mattheo says.

You consider it for a second. You didn’t particularly fancy heading up to your room with Mattheo, for fear of your roommate awakening to see you in such a state. You nod, speaking.

“Yes please.” You say, voice embarrassingly hoarse from having cried so much. You pray Mattheo didn’t notice.

Of course he did. But, he chose not to draw attention to it, instead resolving to run down to the kitchen to get you a cup of tea.

You follow Mattheo into his room, which you were no stranger to. Having projects together meant endless hours of collaborating, and opting to avoid being pestered by your roommate and her friends (who had a rather amusing infatuation with Mattheo), you worked in his room instead.

“Help yourself to some clothes if you’d like. They’re on the right.” He says, carefully draping your school bag and robe onto one of the desks. You thank him, smiling softly as he cleans the mess he had left.

“Go lie down. I’ll be back in a second” He says, turning away as he exits his room. Swiftly walking down to the kitchen, his head is reeling with thoughts of you.

He chose not to confront the feeling gnawing at him in light of your breakdown. He didn’t want to deal with that just yet. In no less than 10 minutes he’s carefully treading up the stairs to the dorms once more, a cup of chamomile tea in one hand and some small crackers in the other.

You hadn’t been eating, nor drinking, and the idea of you neglecting yourself so much sent Mattheo into an uncomfortable state where he found himself riddled with anxiety.

Just friends, right?

He clicks open the door to his room with his elbow, precariously walking over with the tea and crackers in hand as he goes to set them down on his bedside table. His eyes flicker over to you, and a small smile tugs at his lips as he sees you already fast asleep, curled up under the covers. The sight of your slumber brings a warmth to Mattheo's heart. He watches you for a moment, taking in the soft rise and fall of your breath, the delicate features that are usually tense with stress now softened in sleep.

The sight brings him more peace than he wishes to admit, and the looming reality that he had to eventually confront only pressed down on him further.

But for now, he didn’t care.

Because in your peace, he found happiness. And he’s sure he’d never find anything else more beautiful.

Possessed by a wave of sentiment that betrays his usual self, he can’t resist reaching out to tuck a stand of misplaced hair behind your ear. Before he can even comprehend what he’s doing, he leans down and presses a soft , brief kiss to your forehead.

He pulls back and finds himself slightly taken aback by his own actions. The quiet room, filled only with the soft sounds of your sleep, almost seems to amplify the beating of his heart.

Mattheo stands there for a moment, looking at you with a mix of tenderness and confusion. Then, shaking off the unexpected surge of emotions, he retreats to Theodores bed , slipping out of his clothes as he goes to lay down. He had to resist the urge to turn around and catch a glimpse of you once again, and lets out a small sigh as he shuts his eyes.

Mattheo Riddle was not a man of sentiment. He was not soft, and he most certainly did not go out of his way for others.

You had changed that. And he couldn’t figure out whether the prospect was one he was ready to welcome.

[blogquantumreality]

FMA, Slayers, and Alphabets, Oh My!

So I've been watching Slayers along with @ayalaatreides (Using Syncplay!) and I've started noticing some interesting elements that ring a bell from when I watched FMA: Brotherhood.

Now, since FMA came out as a manga in 2001 and the anime for Brotherhood in 2009, while Slayers came out in 1989, it's clear that FMA was inspired by elements of Slayers.

For example, this stylized symbol (upon which Saillune/Seyruun is based in its design) shows clear similarities to FMA's famous transmutation circles, and while I'll discuss this more fully later, you can see both Hebrew and other alphabets used here; I can spot the Latin and what looks like either a runic-inspired or Greek-inspired alphabet (or a mixture of the two) outside the Star of David and in between the concentric circles.

Furthermore, the large door that Edward Elric possesses was clearly inspired by these elements in Slayers, as it also has Hebrew letters carved into it. See below:

In these disparate elements of the Demon's Blood, Ruby Eye, Dark Star, Chaotic Blue, and Death Fog contain lettering with a clearly Hebrew-inspired alphabet as well as what are unquestionably runic-derived letters.

I won't transliterate the runes in this post, but what's really intriguing is that in terms of worldbuilding and canon, there is evidence that writing systems were different in the past compared to the present-day of the 'verse we see in the anime. In particular, a couple of things stood out to me when I found out that Shabranigdo/Shabranigdu had a canonically spelled runic name: ᛋᚼᚾᛒᛦᛅᛁᚷᛞᚢ

If you parse this version of his name very carefully, first of all it appears that the actual alphabet may be drawn from either the Anglo-Saxon futhorc or a mixture of the futhorc with the Elder futhark. Further, the letter that expresses the /r/ sound in Shabranigdo's name is written using ᛦ which originally meant the /z/ sound in proto-Norse (arguably the very earliest runes could be a form of proto-Germanic, but the sparsness of such early rune finds makes it hard to decide firmly one way or the other, so I'll go with proto-Norse) and which turned into an /r/ sound later on, which is why words like *gastiz became gestr.

It is very tempting to hypothesize that a very early stage of the language spoken by the people who now inhabit Saillune/Seyruun and other neighboring countries had a /z/ sound which underwent rhotacism to /r/ (which happened in English as well, incidentally - this explains the origin of "was" vs "were") but for which the early runic writing system didn't adjust (analogously to the proto-Norse runes and later younger futhark and the futhorc) to reflect the sound change.

(Alternatively, in-verse, it could simply be that ᛦ always meant /r/ and was never a /z/, and by Occam's razor this does fit the known facts a bit better, but meta wouldn't be fun without all the extra meanderings, yes? :P )

Also, a fascinating final note is that the last picture shows two circles in which are clearly perpendicular wave-patterns, which to any student of physics is evocative of electromagnetism in the electric (traditionally drawn as a sine wave in the same plane as the page, shown on the left) and magnetic (traditionally drawn as a sine wave perpendicular to the page, shown on the right) fields propagating each other to transmit electromagnetic radiation.

[joannechocolat]

Dear Mr X...

It’s hard to give up a relationship, even when it has become toxic. Even when it brings you no joy, it’s hard to accept the fact that you’re better off without it. To look at the time you spent building it, to write off those years and start again can feel like jumping off a cliff into a bottomless precipice. You start to think of all the things you’ll lose if the relationship ends; the good times, the shared friends, the laughter and the memories. Your heart sinks at the thought of trying to rebuild all that from scratch. The time. The work. The energy. It feels like a bereavement.

I feel like that about Twitter now. A relationship that began fifteen years ago, when I was someone different, and the platform was new and hopeful and designed for communication, rather than spreading division. Sometimes I still find myself mourning that time; the friends I made; the stories I wrote, the thousands of incarnations of the Shed. Some of my friends have been left there for good, their Twitter accounts frozen in time; their words all that remains of them. Perhaps that’s why I’m reluctant to leave, even though the bluebirds have flown, and even the logo is changing to something that looks to me a lot like a modified swastika – an apt comparison, given the way in which certain voices and political views have been given unasked-for prominence, while others seem to have vanished altogether from my feed. Feed someone garbage for long enough, and they start to sicken and die. That’s what happening via this site. I have watched it happening ever since Elon Musk arrived - a man so cartoonishly self-obsessed that it’s hard to even believe he’s real, except that no writer of fiction or game designer would dream of creating such a crass and substandard character.

X. What a choice of symbol.

X marks the spot for pirates in search of buried treasure. X is the mark of a person who is unable to write their name. X is the identity of someone who needs to stay anonymous. It’s a voter’s mark; an erasure; a mystery; a chromosome.

And it’s also an occult symbol, a rune: the rune Gyfu according to the Old English Futhorc, and Gebo in the Elder Futhark; both of which translate as “gift”.

The Anglo-Saxon rune poem that accompanies it goes like this:

ᚷ Gẏfu gumena bẏþ gleng and herenẏs, ƿraþu and ƿẏrþscẏpe and ƿræcna gehƿam ar and ætƿist, ðe bẏþ oþra leas.

which translates as follows:

Generosity brings credit and honour, which support one's dignity; it furnishes help and subsistence to all broken men who are devoid of aught else.

At first glance, this seems the opposite of what Elon Musk has done for the world. A man who sees social media as his own personal platform; a man who sees the cosmos as his own personal joy-ride.

The mistake we made was believing that Twitter was our playground. Elon Musk has made it his, and is currently in the process of breaking the toys, chopping down the trees and nuking the site from orbit, just to prove that play is overrated, and that only money counts. I can’t help feeling sorry for the little boy he must have been, and to wonder what he might have been like if he’d actually had any friends. But it’s time: and the change of branding makes it even easier to step away.

So maybe this is a kind of gift to the ones of us leaving Twitter. Misinformation, misogyny, transphobia, conspiracy theories and other kinds of social media poison have already made it increasingly difficult to feel safe there. (And fun fact, the word Gift in German happens to mean “poison”.) Perhaps the ultimate gift of X is the freedom from the toxicity that has built up in this most volatile of media; the gift of better mental health; of greater connection to our world; an escape from a toxic fantasy back into the open air.

I won’t leave altogether – Threads still isn’t open to Europe, and the jury’s still out on Bluesky - but I don’t want to give any more of my content to a man who values power and money over human connection. I’m @joannechocolat across all my social media - that’s Threads, Bluesky, Tumblr and Instagram – and I’ll still be posting stories on my ko-fi account at: https://ko-fi.com/story. But if you want to know what I’m doing, then sign up to my free newsletter on my website at joanne-harris.co.uk. I’m coming to believe that social media as I once knew it may have run its course for me: I won’t leave it altogether, but from now on I plan to invest more of my time and energy elsewhere.

And as for Mr X - I doubt you’ll be around forever. But while you are, my gift to you is this final story: written live on Twitter, as was, for all the little bluebirds.

There once was a boy who had no friends. His father gave him everything money can buy: toy cars, model aeroplanes, even rockets that really flew, but friends were impossible to buy, and the boy was lonely, angry, and bored. 

One day, when he was playing alone with one of his expensive toys, he saw a group of children playing in a nearby park. They sounded so merry and carefree that the boy was jealous. 

“Why don’t I have friends?” he cried. “I shall buy the park, and then everyone will notice me.”

And so the boy asked his father to buy him the park for his very own; and he settled there with his expensive toys, and put a notice on the gate, saying: Entrance fee, 8 shillings.

The children of the neighbourhood looked enviously at the empty park. Some of the wealthier ones paid the entry fee, but many of the children did not; instead, they waited outside the gates, and looked into the place where once they had all played together.

But still the boy was not content. None of the new children played with him. Instead they played their own games, and climbed trees, or played hide and seek, or lay on the grass watching the clouds. None of this served the boy at all, and he was sulky and discontent.

“If I have all the trees cut down, then maybe the others will notice me,” he thought.

And so he ordered his servants to cut down all the trees in the park. But apart from a few toadies and flatterers, the children still did not play with him, but mocked him secretly from afar, and fell silent whenever he passed by.

“How ungrateful these children are,” said the boy, getting angry. “I bought this park for them, and still they refuse to play with me! Very well, I shall cease to pay the groundsmen and the gardeners. The park will be overrun with weeds. Wild animals will roam there.”

And so the boy did as he had promised, and the park became a wilderness. No-one wanted to pay for it, and even the toadies and flatterers and children of wealthy families went elsewhere to see their friends.

The boy was very angry at this, but there was no-one to be angry with. All the other children had gone. And so he took out his rage on the deer who had begun to roam in the park, shooting them with his toy crossbow, and became known throughout the land as a mighty hunter.

[gifts-of-heimdall-runes]

Posted by Freya Diana Wotan via Viking Mythology Group [Facebook]

[theherbwitchshoppe]

ᚦᛖ ᚻᛖᚱᛒ ᚹᛁᚦᚳᚻ ᛋᚻᛟᛈᛈᛖ

Here to serve you! Wes Hal ᚹᛖᛋ ᚻᚪᛚ !

[pericleslindblom]

“Fate and Blood. First is an unseen power, the second is a force of nature in which we find fate. Only thanks to it can we comprehensibly understand the essence of blood. Blood without fate is like an uncharged battery, a magnet without attraction. Purity and breed of blood, quality of its mixing have no meaning whatsoever without a great destiny. It is like a touchstone that is used to test the value of blood.[…]Blood is that fuel that feeds the metaphysical flame of fate.”

Ernst Jünger, Interwar Articles

A pencil drawing of a dagger and a ᛟ Odal rune.

Othala (ᛟ), also known as ēðel and odal, is a rune that represents the o and œ phonemes in the Elder Futhark and the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc writing systems respectively. Its name is derived from the reconstructed Proto-Germanic *ōþala- “heritage; inheritance, inherited estate”. As it does not occur in Younger Futhark, it disappears from the Scandinavian record around the 8th century, however its usage continued in England into the 11th century, where it was sometimes further used in manuscripts as a shorthand for the word ēðel (“homeland”), similar to how other runes were sometimes used at the time.

The Odal rune was also used as the insIgnia of ethnic Germans (Volksdeutsche) of the 7th ΣΣ Volunteer Mountain Division Prinz Eugen. The unit was given the title Prinz Eugen after Prince Eugene of Savoy, an outstanding military leader of the Habsburg Empire who liberated the Banat and Belgrade from the Ottoman Empire in the Austro-Turkish War of 1716–18.

Othala is a rune of heritage, homeland and family.

Limited edition prints available, 48cm x 33cm, 100 copies, all numbered and hand signed, FREE SHIPPING WORLDWIDE

© 2024 P-S Lindblom

[wolfalder]

hi hi hi!! your acc seems cool but I'm mainly making this ask cuz I'm curious abt the title of your blog..? those runes translate to "ulfr" and I feel like that's not what was intended 😅

here's "Alder" in Anglo Saxon/Futhorc runes: ᚪᛚᛞᛖᚱ

anyways, the "runic alphabet" everyone thinks of is actually like several different Old Norse alphabet variations with slightly different letters that developed throughout early Scandinavian history (Anglo-Saxon/Futhorc; Elder Futhark; Younger Futhark; Long Branch; Short Twig.... there's too many tbh), so this sheet doesn't account for every letter version that's out there, but it works pretty well and it's what I use most of the time.

Hope this helps! I love spotting runes in the wild. Being able to write/translate them is a fun skill to flex. (Though I'm not an expert, just had a hyperfixation once lmao)

Hello! And thank you!

But yes I do know that. I also have them tattooed on my hand. I am very aware of their translation but thank you for the info anyway 🐾

[alwaysthecleric]

I started playing D&D with a friend a little over a year ago, and one of the things that we wanted to do with the campaign was to be able to see both our cultures and other cultures represented in the fantasy world that we would be playing in, because, frankly, a lot of the fantasy media we grew up with was pretty dang white. I’ve ended up pulling parts of Vietnamese culture, because I’m Vietnamese, he’s pulled from his culture, and that’s been really fun to see.

Anyway, my character, Keri, is a dwarf, and is a character I had previously played in a campaign with mostly white friends, where we weren’t thinking about including our cultures in this way. And as I was doing some prep and thinking about aspects of dwarven culture for this current campaign, I decided that instead of basing the dwarven writing system on runes, which is what Tolkien's and D&D's dwarven writing system is based on, dwarves in this setting would have a writing system inspired by cuneiform, which is a writing system from ancient Mesopotamia.

[image description: A chart which shows 30 Anglo-Saxon "futhorc" runes. It shows their names, transliteration characters, and the meanings of their names.]

[image description: a Sumero-Akkadian cuneiform syllabary, used by early Akkadian rulers. It is a grid that has English letters on the top and left axis and shows the corresponding cuneiform characters]

I liked the visual similarities—both runes and cuneiform have very geometric, angular characters; both are written on materials that have been preserved really well—but then I wanted to make a reference sheet for myself, so I didn't have to keep on going to D&D Beyond to look up information. So I went on Canva and looked for a sufficiently angular and blocky font until I found a font called Obra Letra and made my reference sheet.

[image description: The first page of my reference sheet. It has brown angular text on a parchment background. The text has information from Tasha's Cauldron of Everything about the Artficer D&D class]

And then I got annoyed with Canva, switched to the Affinity suite of design programs, and Googled Obra Letra to see if I would be able to buy the font. And then I found out that it was inspired by vintage Filipino typography! Which is super cool!

[image description: Text over an image of a bay in the Philippines. The text reads "Obra Letra Display Typeface by Lorenzo Martinez; a modern take on filipino vintage typography"]

And I currently have this document of of spells that my character can pick from, but I've been debating whether or not I use Obra Letra as the only font for all of it, or if I should find a different one for the body text and just use Obra Letra as like the font for like the spell names and stuff.

[image description: The first page of my spell description document. There is brown angular text over a parchment background. The text includes the spell information for the spells "Prestidigitation" and "Mage Hand"]

So I Googled Filipino inspired fonts, just going off of the description of Obra Letra, and found an article from Canva of Filipino inspired fonts! And then I was like, “Well, these are all like, display fonts and not quite what I'm looking for…What if I google Vietnamese inspired fonts!” And I found a website called vietnamesetypography.com that lists recommendations for fonts that can accommodate all of the tonal markings that Vietnamese has as well as resources for designing fonts with those markings in mind and a brief history of writing in Vietnam! Which is so cool!!

There’s probably a deeper conversation about Asian diaspora and being a second gen immigrant engaging with my family’s culture to be had here, but I’m just so dang excited that:

1. There’s no “right”way to worldbuild. Tolkien was a language nerd, so he built Middle Earth and all the cultures within to house the conlangs he was making. If you happen to be stuck with worldbuilding, start from the place that makes you excited to go down Wikipedia rabbit holes. I love calligraphy and typography, so that’s where I started.

2. That what you, or I create, or anyone creates will always have a part of them in it. And that when you’re able to bring all of yourself—your culture, your experience, your interests—what you create becomes even richer

[spineless-lobster]

what's elder futhark?

*cracks knuckles* Well

Elder futhark (or elder fuþark) is a proto-norse writing system that consists of 24 different runes corresponding to a letter and different meanings

Because it’s so old a lot of the information surrounding it is fuzzy but I’ll try my best to explain a few things.

First, it was not used by Vikings. Vikings used younger futhark as their written language. Elder futhark is the oldest runic language and was used by Northwest Germanic peoples from the 1st to 8th centuries. It evolved into other runic languages like younger futhark (duh) and anglo-saxon futhorc.

It was also often used in rituals as they were thought to have magical properties, and many practicing pagans/witches/wiccans/etc. still use them in their practices (mainly for divination) today.

The reason why it can be seen as problematic is because many white supremacist and neo-nazi groups use those different symbols (and other nordic symbols) in their imagery. Admittedly, I don’t know why, but it probably has something to do with the “aryan” race or some bullshit like that.

Additionally, the sōwilō rune (specifically the second one on that chart) was used by nazi SS officers on their uniforms. But I think it’s well known that they stole many cultural symbols such as the swastika and so on.

So yeah regarding that post that’s the reason why I’m a little hesitant to use it at times, I’d hate to accidentally use a dog whistle that didn’t know about or something. Thankfully there are people out there who appreciate the history behind it and are genuinely good people.