Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Runic inscriptions'

The goal of this thesis is the phonological analysis of a corpus of runic inscriptions in order to reconstruct the vocalic system(s) of the West Germanic dialects spoken in the Continental interior between the 5th-7th centuries A.D. The thesis presents a brief outline of the late Proto-Germanic vocalic system and of the principal sound changes involved in the development of the later dialects of the region (Old High German and Old Saxon). The main part of the thesis surveys the data retrievable from the runic inscriptions in an attempt to determine to what extent (if any) these sound changes are in evidence. In many respects, the data are consistent with the anticipated developments attested in OHG and OS; but for some of the sound changes – particularly those affecting the diphthongs – the existing models do not satisfactorily account for the data. There is also some evidence for processes not normally identified in accounts of the phonological background of the later dialects. The project endeavours to be rigorously empirical in approach; to avoid making unnecessary assumptions and prejudgements about the nature and content of the runic texts; and to resist the rejection of an interpretation unless it can be shown to be implausible. From this standpoint, we are confronted with the limited power of any conclusions based on such a small dataset, and with the more general problem of the imperfect correlation between written and spoken forms. If the makers of runic inscriptions cannot be relied on for phonological accuracy or orthographic consistency, to what extent is it possible to make inferences about spoken language from the texts which they created?

The aim of this paper is to examine a group of runic artefacts dated to the Viking Age (800-1050 AD) from a gender perspective. The analysed material consists of 59 runic artefacts from Scandinavia, which differ in regards to base material, context and content. In the analysis, the material is separated, described and classified into different manageable groups of texts and artefacts. Several case studies are presented in the paper, based on information gathered from the inscriptions as well as the archaeological material. The main issue is whether it is possible to attribute runic artefacts to a specific gender by means of a combination of archaeological and philological methods.
Syftet med uppsatsen är att analysera en grupp runristade föremål, daterade till vikingatid (800-1050) ur ett genusperspektiv. Den empiriska studien baseras på en studie av 59 runristade föremål av skiftande karaktär gällande material, kontext samt innehåll. Föremålen separeras och klassificeras enligt ett system uppbyggt av författaren för att belysa de olika förhållanden som existerar mellan inskription och artefakt. En kvantifiering av inskriptionerna samt de arkeologiska föremålen genomförs för att utröna huruvida det är möjligt att attribuera föremålen till ett specifikt vikingatida genus.

Föreliggande avhandling syftar till att utveckla läsningen och tolkningen av inskrifterna på de i dagsläget 46 kända vikingatida runblecken. Målet är att ge en så tydlig bild som möjligt av inskriftsgenren vikingatida runbleck. I detta syfte har upprepade fältundersökningar av runblecken genomförts med stereomikroskop. På grundval av på så vis etablerade nya läsningar föreslås nya tolkningar till de mest problematiska ställena i de tidigare tolkade runblecksinskrifterna. Nya tolkningsförslag ges även för runblecksinskrifter som tidigare har ansetts vara olexikaliska. Utöver nya läsningar och tolkningar resulterar denna studie i en kartläggning av relationen mellan runblecksinskrifternas innehåll och form å den enda sidan och runbleckens fyndmiljöer och utseende å den andra.
The aim of this dissertation is to represent as clearly as possible the genre of Viking-Age runic plates by developing readings and interpretations of the inscriptions on the 46 metal plates with runes from the Viking Age known today. Several investigations of the runic plates have been conducted with a stereomicroscope for this purpose. On the basis of the new readings thus established, new interpretations have been proposed for the most problematic sections of previously interpreted inscriptions. New interpretations are also offered for inscriptions on runic plates which have previously been considered non-lexical. As well as providing new readings and interpretations, this study has resulted in clarification of the relationship between the form and content of the inscriptions on the runic plates on the one hand and on their find circumstances and appearance on the other.

The runic alphabet in the Viking Age (ca. 800-1100) only consisted of 16 characters. These did not cover the Rune-Swedish phoneme system. One of the runes, the so-called os-rune, was used for at least 8 different phonemes. By tradition it has been used to date Viking Age runic inscriptions in the Scandinavian countries. The present work investigates the phonetic and phonemic value of the os-rune in Rune-Swedish inscriptions on stone, altogether 1,745 instances in 961 inscriptions. On the basis of the analysis, the accepted view of the chronological value of the os-rune is assessed, and is found to be non-valid. The regional variations in the use of the os-rune are also studied, particularly in the context of individual rune-carvers, but also to see if any dialectal variation is discernable. It is found that there is a marked consistency in the use of the os-rune for either rounded or unrounded vowels. Inscriptions, where both uses occur, are concentrated to one small geographical area. There are also areas, where the use of the os-rune for rounded vowels is the rule.

Digitaliserad utgåva 2016, kompletterad med en lista över viktigare rättelser

De vikingatida runinskrifternas kronologi

This essay studies the runic inscriptions from the Migration period in Sweden and their connection to central places. The essays main focus is to identify the find location of the runic inscriptions and through that investigate if they appear in or nearby a central place from the same time period. The essay is divided into three different parts, in the first part I locate the runic inscriptions location of discovery. The second part contains locating defined central places or central areas in or nearby the location of the runic inscriptions. In the last part I separate the runic inscriptions and the objects material on which it is found upon, in order to identify if it is the inscription itself, or the object itself, which can be linked to centrality in the landscape. The result of the study shows that 10 % of the treated runic inscriptions are found in a defined central place during the Migration period in Sweden. 67 % of the runic inscriptions has been found in defined central areas, which all together means that 77 % of the treated runic inscriptions are connected to centrality in the landscape during the Migration period in Sweden. Furthermore, 15 % of the inscriptions can possibly be linked to central areas and the last 8 % show no connection to any sort of centrality in the landscape.

The aim of this study is to determine what can be known about the people who were able to write runes during the Viking Age. The investigation is based on the runecarvers’ own statements about themselves and their work, which is normally found in the signature or the carver formula of the inscriptions. The material comprises all carver formulas known from primarily Scandinavian Viking-age runic inscriptions, but since most of the inscriptions are found on rune-stones, there is a focus on runecarvers who worked in this material. In the study the form and content of these carver formulas are closely analyzed in different ways. It can for example be shown that the choice of verbs in a carver formula is primarily determined by chronology, which is also reflected in the geographical distribution of different verbs in the material. The study also shows that the carver formula is normally positioned finally in the text, and that the examples of other positions might be determined by the content of the rest of the inscription. In some cases the runic monument is signed by more than one name, which has been interpreted as indicating the existence of workshops. Even if this is true for parts of the material, many of the co-signed stones seem to be the products of carvers who only worked occasionally. An investigation of the personal names and the use of attributes such as patronymic, titles or bynames, shows no difference from the normal Viking-age population, which indicates that the rune-carvers were not members of a special social class. The latter part of the study deals with the relationships between the rune-carver and the sponsor of the runic monument. Special attention is paid to some local carvers in the Mälar Valley in order to determine their social status and the extent of their production of rune-stones. The study shows that some of these carvers belonged to a wealthy group of land-owners with contacts abroad, and many of them have executed about ten rune-stones, often in the vicinity of their own dwellingplace. In conjunction with this, there is also an attempt to see to what extent the writing habits of these local carvers are influenced by more productive and presumably professional carvers. This investigation leads to a re-evaluation of one of the most famous carvers in the district, Åsmund Kåresson, which also has some implications for the picture of how the rune-stone custom was introduced into central Sweden at the beginning of the 11th century.

Šioje disertacijoje tyrinėjami keltų ir skandinavų kalbų ir kultūriniai kontaktai Vikingų laikotarpiu, atnešę esminių permainų abiems kultūroms. Vikingų epochos Meno salos runų įrašai savo forma, turiniu bei kalbos ypatybėmis skiriasi nuo skandinaviškų runų korpuso. Šios salos runų įrašams įtakos turėjo Ogamo įrašų tradicija, dėl kurios runų tradicija suklestėjo Meno saloje Vikingų laikotarpiu. Vienas iš unikaliausių bruožų yra taip vadinamieji dvikalbiai runakmeniai, kur greta runų įrašo yra Ogamo įrašas, išraižytas ant akmens tuo pat metu kaip ir runos. Svarbus Meno salos runų įrašų skiriamasis bruožas – jų kalbiniai ypatumai. Viena vertus, runose gausu keltiškų vardų, antra vertus, galima pastebėti, jog senosios skandinavų kalbos gramatika gerokai pakitusi. Ištyrus runų įrašus matyti, kaip skandinavų kalbos gramatika keičiasi dvikalbėje visuomenėje. Antroje disertacijos dalyje aptariami keltiški elementai vienintelėje išlikusioje norn kalba užrašytoje „Baladėje apie Hildiną“, kuri buvo sukurta nuolat besikeičiančioje kalbinėje, socialinėje ir kultūrinėje aplinkoje. Jūrinės Šetlando ir Orknio salų visuomenės generavo įvairius pasakojimus, kurių motyvai ir elementai atkeliaudavo iš įvairių kraštų. „Baladė apie Hildiną“ yra neabejotinai vakarų skandinavų kilmės, tačiau joje aptinkama keltiškų motyvų. Baladės teksto analizė rodo, jog pasakojimo lygmenyje ji yra nemažai pasiskolinusi iš keltų pasakojamosios tradicijos. Ypač ryški „karaliaus ir deivės tema“. Tačiau jei ir būta... [toliau žr. visą tekstą]
This dissertation deals with Viking Age Celtic and Scandinavian language and cultural contacts which resulted in profound changes in both societies. Viking Age rune-stones found in the Isle of Man contain some exceptional features and in many ways diverge from the rest of the Scandinavian runic corpus. Presence of the Ogam tradition in the Isle of Man might have been one of the factors why rune-stones were so well accepted and flourished in the isle during the Viking Age. One of the most unique features is the presence of bilingual runic-Ogam inscriptions which were carved at the same time as runic inscriptions and not earlier. Linguistic research of the Manx rune-inscriptions revealed the influence of Celtic upon Scandinavian language. First of all, rune-inscriptions contain a lot of Celtic personal names. Besides, there are many cases of inflectional confusion that is likely to arise in a bilingual society. The second part of the dissertation discusses Celtic elements in the only surviving ballad in Norn language Hildinavisen, which seems to have been created in continually changing linguistic, social and cultural conditions. The marine societies of Shetland and Orkney Islands generated various stories, where motifs and elements traveled from various directions. Hildinavisen is certainly of West Scandinavian origin, but it contains or rather is adorned with Celtic motifs. The analysis of the text of Hildinavisen seems to indicate that in the level of the story Hildinavisen... [to full text]

The Viking Age rune-carvers and their readers used runes as a semiotic resource to convey and structure the messages on rune-stones. An analysis of the ways in which this resource is used together with other resources gives us a deeper insight into the relationship between writers and readers and into the written culture in which the rune-stones were produced. The present study treats runic carvings as multimodal texts in which different semiotic modes produce meaning by visual and verbal means. The roles played by runes in such texts are studied from three different perspectives. The empirical study in chapter 3 investigates how the verbal messages of the inscriptions interrelate with ornamental compositions. The most important convention found is that runic inscriptions usually start in the lower left part of the ornamental band in which they are inscribed. A second result is that there is a certain correlation between the visual and syntactic structure of runic texts. In chapter 4, Södermanlandic inscriptions employing more than one writing system are investigated. These carvings can be tied to a context of high social ambition in which at least two different, socially stratified discourses are expressed by means of the runes as a visual semiotic mode. Chapter 5 is devoted to non-lexical inscriptions, showing that such carvings are indeed runic texts despite their lack of verbal message. Different types of readers can use runic resources in different ways. Firstly, runes carry meaning independent of any verbal message, giving them significance even to illiterate readers. Secondly, literate readers can appreciate certain conventions of runic composition and, thirdly, one and the same runic text can be part of different discourses and hence be aimed at different kinds of readers.

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