By Bernie Bell

Pics by McB

I like to promote the UHI Archaeology Institute talks and seminars, if I can.  I usually go about this by weaving some words around a link to the information about the talk, or seminar.  This is easy enough when I know something of the subject matter – harder when I have an interest, but very little knowledge.

The next – FREE – on-line seminar, entitled  ‘A great show-off: Carving as an expression of self in the runic inscriptions of Maeshowe’ will be on Friday April the 29^th, when Dr Karen Langsholt Holmqvist will present her research on medieval runic graffiti.

When I saw this I thought – what can I say about Runes? I know what they are, and that there are different kinds, but learning to read them would be too much like hard work!  So, I can’t read runes.  I can, however, read the slightly ‘cod’ dwarfish runes which JRR Tolkien included in  ‘The Hobbit’ – probably where most folk have come across them.  I learnt them when I first read the story more years ago than I care to mention.  A few years ago I wrote them out, with a translation, and sent them to one of my Great- nephews.  The idea was that he and his friends could use them as a ‘secret code’ to write messages to each other which most grown-ups wouldn’t be able to read!

Another, slightly different, example of runes being used for mild subversion, was in March 2019 when there was an anti-Trump demonstration outside St. Magnus Cathedral.  There was a young lad there holding up a placard with runes on it.  Those runes said  “Trump is a moron.”  Rune lore can come in handy!

There are runes carved on a couple of the stones of the Ring of Brodgar …..

……but no-one is sure how old they are – was this a more recent visitor making their mark?

It’s something we like to do, us humans, make our mark –  https://theorkneynews.scot/2020/01/28/making-our-mark/

Just goes to show the different ways that runes can be used to express individual personality or group identity.  Which, as far as I can tell, is what this seminar will be about.

Here are a couple of links to other rune-related items which might be of interest….

And – this might not be factually correct, but I can’t resist it.   At school we had a rhyme….

“Latin is a dead language
As dead as dead can be
It killed the ancient Britons
And now it’s killing me.”

Which could be paraphrased by those studying ancient runes – which can be variable and a bit confusing ……..

“Runic is a dead language
As dead as dead can be
It killed the ancient Pictish
And now it’s killing me.”