The runic alphabets
A western branch of the runic tradition, expanded to represent the changing sounds of Old English and Old Frisian and preserved on stones, weapons, jewellery, coins, and carved objects.
When the older 24-sign tradition changed, Scandinavia reduced its row to 16 signs. In Frisia and England, writers instead added signs. The resulting futhorc—named for a shifted sound sequence in its opening runes—grew to 28 signs in earlier forms and sometimes more than 30.
Runes reached Britain by about the fifth century and were adapted to sounds not adequately represented by the older row. They remained in use alongside the Latin alphabet introduced through Christian missions. Common use declined, but knowledge of runes continued in manuscripts and learned contexts after the eighth century.
The British Museum records Anglo-Saxon runic inscriptions from the fifth through eleventh centuries on memorial stones, coins, weapons, wood, and jewellery. The late Anglo-Saxon Thames seax carries the only surviving epigraphic futhorc sequence from England, while the eighth-century Franks Casket surrounds carved scenes with long runic texts.
The Old English Rune Poem preserves rune names and associated verses. The medieval manuscript itself was destroyed in the 1731 Cotton Library fire, but an antiquarian copy printed in 1705 survives. It is essential evidence for the names and cultural associations that later scholars use when reconstructing earlier rune names.
Research trail
The inscribed futhorc and its archaeological context
Eighth-century carved casket with runic texts
Chronology, development, and bibliography
Public-domain 1705 copy of the lost manuscript
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