Rune

Rune (pronounced roon)

(1) Any of the characters of certain ancient Germanic alphabets (derived from the Roman alphabet), as of a script used for writing the Germanic languages, especially of Scandinavia and Britain, circa 200-1200 AD, or a script used for inscriptions in a Turkic language between the sixth and eighth centuries from the area near the Orkhon River in Mongolia.  Each character was ascribed some magical significance.

(2) Something written or inscribed in such characters.

(3) An aphorism, poem, or saying with mystical meaning or for use in casting a spell; any obscure piece of writing using mysterious symbols; a spell or incantation.

(4) In literary use, a poem, song, or verse.

(5) A Finnish or Scandinavian epic poem, or a division of one, especially a division of the Kalevala.

(6) A roun (secret or mystery) (obsolete).

(7) In computing, in the Go programming language, a Unicode code point.

1675–1685: From the Old Norse rūn & rún (a secret, writing, runic character), cognate with the Old English rūn, the Middle English rune, the obsolete English roun and the Finnish runo (poem, canto).  All were related to the Old Saxon, Old High German and Gothic runa which, like the Old Norse rūn & rún is from the Proto-Germanic rūnō (letter, literature, secret), which is borrowed from either the Proto-Celtic rūnā or from its source.  Rune, runecraft, runology, runographer, runographic, runography, runologist, runester, runesong, runestaff, runmaster, runemistress, runecarver, runecast, runecaster, runecasting, runestone, runesmith & runework are nouns, runic, runed, runeless, runelike & runish are adjectives and runically is an adverb; the noun plural is runes.

Of the Runic

Runologists squabble over details of the historical origins of runic writing but there’s a general consensus runes were derived from one of the many Old Italic alphabets in use among the Mediterranean peoples of the first century AD, those who lived to the south of the Germanic tribes.  Earlier Germanic sacred symbols, such as those preserved in northern European rock carvings, also may have influenced the development of the script.  The transmission of writing from southern to northern Europe appears to have been spread by Germanic military formations which would have encountered Italic writing during campaigns amongst their southerly neighbours.  This hypothesis is supported by the association runes have always had with the god Odin, who, in the Proto-Germanic period (under his original name Woðanaz), was the divine model of the warrior leader. The Roman historian Tacitus noted Odin (Mercury in the interpretatio romana) was already established as the dominant god in the pantheons of many Germanic tribes by the first century AD although whether the runes and the cult of Odin arose together or one predated the other remains in dispute.  In Norse mythology however, the runes came from nothing as mundane as an old alphabet.  The runes were never invented or a product of evolution but are eternal, pre-existent forces Odin himself discovered by undergoing a tremendous ordeal.

The Hávamál

The Hávamál (Sayings of Hár, Sayings of the high one) is one of the poems of the Poetic Edda.  A kind of survival guide to for those seeking to live a good life, the form of verse varies, the most notable being where the text shifts to discuss how Odin (Odhins) gained the secret of the magical runes and came to learn the spells.  A work thus both pragmatic and philosophical, the poem’s only known source the Codex Regius, thought to date from circa 800.

The Rúnatal (Rúnatáls-tháttr-Odhins or Odins Rune Song) contains the stanzas in which Odin reveals the secret of the Runes.

I know that I hung on a windy tree

nine long nights,

Wounded with a spear, dedicated to Odin,

myself to myself,

on that tree of which no man knows

from where its roots run.

No bread did they give me nor a drink from a horn,

downwards I peered;

I took up the runes, screaming I took them,

then I fell back from there.

The Hávamál concludes with the mystical Ljóðatal, which dwells on knowledge and the knowing of the Odinic mysteries.  A kind of dictionary which lists and provides a legend creating keys to a sequenced number of runic charms, there are linkages with the Sigrdrífumál (known often as Brynhildarljóð, a section of the Poetic Edda text in Codex Regius) in which the valkyrie Sigrdrífa details a number of the runes at her command.  In stanza 151, there’s an allusion to the sending of a tree root carved with runes, a noted motif in Norse mythology and the cause of death of Grettir the Strong.

I know a sixth one if a man wounds me

with the roots of the sap-filled wood:

and that man who conjured to harm me,

the evil consumes him, not me.

The runic-themed imagery used for the cover art of Lindsay Lohan's A Little More Personal (Raw) (2005).

Historians and archivists have devoted much attention to the Codex Regius, reconstructing its timeline from the many fragmentary sources.  The earliest writings appear to have been collections of proverbs, sayings and advice attributed to Othin, probably in the manner so much in the Bible is said to have been the words of Solomon; other dubious claims of connection exist in the texts of the Buddha, Confucius, the Prophet Muhammad and others where the documentary record can never be conclusive.  The collection was thus, probably from its earliest times, elastic in content though always known as "The High One's Words", others taking advantage of the authority Othin’s imprimatur conferred to add such poems or other sayings of wisdom they thought appropriate.  In the nature of such things, the style of writing displays a consistency, important when seeking to imply that the speaker was Othin, a process which is something of a gray area in the history of literary forgery, the later authors perhaps assured what they were adding was what Othin might have said or with which he would anyway have concurred.  So, a catalogue of runes, or charms, was later bolted-on, along with new sets of proverbs, differing in content but not in style from those in the original document.  There are some stylistic variations in form in that some verses verge upon the narrative but the structure of the whole is loose, accommodating the odd innovation without jarring effect.  It’s agreed that structurally the text exists in five parts:

(1) The Hovamol proper (stanzas 1-80): The sayings and proverbs to guide the living of life, a kind of early self-help manual.

(2) The Loddfafnismol (stanzas 111-138): Another collection similar to the first, but these more a discourse on ethics and morality and addressed specifically to a young man known as Loddfafnir.

(3) The Ljothatal (stanzas 147-165): A listing of charms.

(4) The love-story of Othin and Billing's daughter (stanzas 96-102): The love story is something of a cautionary tale, beginning as it does with a dissertation on the faithlessness and general unreliability of women (stanzas 81-95).  Scholars suggest the warning words were the first written with the rest of the poem created as an apt illustration.

(5) This is the story of how Othin got the mead of poetry, the draft document which delivered to him the gift of tongues, an indulgence from the maiden Gunnloth (stanzas 103-110).  Added to this (and obviously later) is the brief passage (stanzas 139 146) recounting Othin’s winning of the runes.  Structurally, the poem needs this section as an introduction to the Ljothatal and any good editor would have insisted on its inclusion.

Of the authorship or even the dates of the accretions, nothing can for sure be known.  All than can be said is that some is very old and some more recent which isn’t a great deal of help but anything else is merely speculative.  The text instead needs to be read as it is: a gnomic collection of the wisdom a violent race living in a brutish world written to help people survive in an unforgiving time when, days when wherever one went, one would be ill-advised to assume one was among friends.  Tellingly, women are not mentioned in the non-narrative sections of the poem, not even a nod to the advantage of having someone to cook and clean for this is very much a work about the world of men on earth, the threats and their consequences.  There’s no discussion of heaven and hell or any after-life, no judgement beyond that of one's fellow men.

Scapulimancy

Scapulimancy (pronounced skap-yuh-luh-man-see)

Divination of the future by observation of the cracking of a mammal's scapula (the shoulder blade, the bone connecting the clavicle to the humerus), sometimes after having been heated by fire or a hot instrument.

1870–1875: The construct was scapul(a) + -i- + -mancy.  Scapula was from the Late Latin scapula (shoulder), from the Classical Latin scapulae (shoulders).  The -mancy suffix was from the Latin -mantīa, ultimately from the Ancient Greek μᾰντείᾱ (manteíā) (divination).  In English it was appended to convey the sense either of (1) divination or (2) in fantasy, varieties of magic, especially those controlling or related to specific elements, substances, or themes.  The synonym is omoplatoscopy and the alternative spelling scapulomancy.  Scapulimancy is a noun, scapulimantic is an adjective and scapulimanticly is an adverb.

Sheep shoulder blades.

Divination was from the Latin divinare (to foresee, foretell or predict; tom make prophesy) and is a general term describing attempts to gain insight into a question or situation by way of an occultic ritual or practice, usually involving either (1) some object or objects in which special qualities are said to be vested, (2) an alleged contact or interaction with supernatural entities or agencies such as spirits, gods, god-like-beings or the other forces “of the universe” or (3) the interpretation of signs or omens, variously defined.  As a cultural practice, divination has been identified in many cultures and at the root of it is probably a desire to have explained what is by all other means available, inexplicable.  That obviously offers some potential for exploitation by those seeking social, political or religious authority but it can also be a business model and between that and religion especially, there’s historically been some overlap, something alive and well today.  The notion of using the shoulder blades of slaughtered animals for this purpose may seem strange but as a method it seems no more or less convincing than instruments such as the tea-leaf, rune stones, Tarot-cards or the movement of objects in the heavens, some billions of miles remote from the apparent randomness of events on Earth.

Butchered & dressed lamb shoulder chops (left) and lamb shoulder chops with garlic and rosemary (right).

Although much-associated with priests, magicians and prophets (again, the overlap not hand to find), divination was practiced also by those for whom religion (in the way the word is conventionally understood) wasn’t a significant force.  The Hun of the Eurasian steppe, best remembered for their fifth century invasion of the Roman Empire, may have Turkic language (though one much infused with words from others), are known to have never developed writing and never seem to have flirted beyond the vaguest with God or gods, the only devotional aspect of their culture a kind of “nature worship”, something which would probably now attract much sympathy.  There may though have been something of a cargo-cult in that various objects seem to have been associated with a kind of veneration, notably swords or weapons linked with military success and generals down the ages, however practical and pragmatic they might have been in other matters, are recorded by historians or in diaries as being fond of consulting soothsayers the night before a battle.  The Huns definitely practiced scapulimancy, the logs of travelers and merchants recording how a shaman-like figure would take from the fire the shoulder blades of the roasted sheep, “reading the patterns” on the surface to make predictions for the days, the foretold omens revealed by pits, stains ridges & hollows which made each bone as unique as a finger-print.  This use for the sheep’s scapula adds another layer to the oft-repeated observation about the reductive efficiency of the steppe peoples in the husbanding of their scare resources: “For some purpose, they used every part of the sheep”.  Because the Huns left no written records, all that is known of their scapulimantic technique comes from third-party observers but as far as is known, their practice was in the “pyromantic” tradition (the “preparing” of the bone by leaving it for a time in the embers of the cooking fire), the “apyromantic” (examination after the flesh had been cut from the bone) method most known in Europe & Northern Africa.  Both these descriptions came from the work of nineteenth century anthropologists.

Lohanic scapulae; a tetrad:  Four photographs of Lindsay Lohan's shoulder blades.

It’s not only in the post-Enlightenment West that divination has (mostly) been dismissed as silly superstition, many thinkers from Antiquity pointing out in their writings the absurdity of the idea and their most effective criticism was probably not the abstract arguments philosophers usually can’t resist but a simple “fact-checking”: comparing predictions with outcomes, the success rate found predictably low.  In the text of one sceptic however, there appears to be the first mention of the efficacy, even in the age of climate change, of one reliable prediction about the weather: “three times out of four, the weather tomorrow will be much the same as today.” (YMMV).  However, despite the two-thousand-odd years of intellectual scorn, the lure of prediction by dubious means remains strong, some otherwise respectable publications regularly including a horoscope, even though there’s nothing to suggest astrology is otherwise taken seriously.  It seems star-sighs exert a special fascination and many identify with their birth sign and read the horoscope, even if usually for amusement.  For some though it’s serious.  Nancy Reagan (1921–2016; US First Lady 1981-1989) regularly consulted an astrologer (on the White House payroll for a reputed US$3000 a month) after one warned her husband Ronald Reagan (1911-2004; US president 1981-1989) would be “in danger” on a certain day; on that day he survived an assassination attempt.

Others couldn’t quite decide.  Being interviewed by a prison psychologist in 1945, Rudolf Hess (1894–1987; Nazi Deputy Führer 1933-1941) claimed he’d made his bizarre attempt to secure a negotiated peace between Germany on the UK (his flight to Scotland in May 1941 on the eve of the Nazi’s invasion of the Soviet Union) because the year before “…one of his astrologers had read in the stars that he was ordained to bring about peace”, adding that both Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Führer (leader) and German head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) and Heinrich Himmler (1900–1945; Reichsführer SS 1929-1945) “…had come to have an abiding belief in astrology.”  It was a claim he would repeat to a journalist in the 1980s.  Despite that, as soon as the news of the flight was brought to Hitler at the Berghof (the Führer’s alpine retreat in the Bavarian Alps) the party hierarchy instantly was summoned from Berlin and the scramble was on to find the most plausible way to spin to the world an explanation why the “second man in the Reich” had delivered himself to the enemy.  In the circumstances, madness probably was the best option and the task was made easier by the British who made no attempt to exploit the defection for propaganda purposes.  Dr Joseph Goebbels (1897-1975; Nazi propaganda minister 1933-1945) put out a statement saying Hess had fallen under the influence “…of soothsayers and fortune-tellers” and had become “...a deluded, deranged and muddled idealist, ridden with hallucinations traceable to World War (ie the 1914-1918 conflict) injuries.”  Immediately, just to make things more plausible still, the state security apparatus (a well-oiled machine) conducted a crackdown on soothsayers and fortune-tellers, locking up many until the scandal had passed which it did remarkable quickly.

All must have been forgiven by 1945 when in the Führerbunker Goebbels, after reminding Hitler of the “miracle of the House of Brandenburg” when the death of a czarina had saved Frederick II (Frederick the Great, 1712–1786, Prussian king 1740-1786) from defeat, consulted two horoscopes kept in the files, one written on 9 November 1918 (the date on which the Weimar Republic (1918-1933) was formed), the other from 30 January 1933 (the date Hitler was appointed chancellor).  According to Goebbels, both documents predicted “…the outbreak of the war in 1939, the victories until 1941, and the subsequent series of reversals, with the hardest blows during the first months of 1945, particularly during the first half of April.  In the second half of April we were to experience a temporary success.  Then there would be stagnation until August and peace that same month.  For the following three years Germany would have a hard time, but starting in 1948 she would rise again.”  Confident that “…according to historical logic and justice things were bound to change”, he must have felt vindicated a few days later when the new broke of the death of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR, 1882–1945, US president 1933-1945); history had given Goebbels his czarina: “Bring out our best champagne!” he commanded, adding “And get me the Fuehrer on the telephone!”  Unfortunately for Goebbels, while he might have felt he wrote his will across the sky, the stars dimmed and fell, the horoscopes no more a reliable predictor of the future than scorched shoulder blades.