A single rune, cleanly lasered into slate or wood, is a strong motif: minimal, ancient, full of history. But which one? We go through the most popular signs and check what their names mean according to the three medieval rune poems, where the poems contradict each other, which interpretations only the modern age invented and which signs are politically tainted. That way you choose with open eyes, without magic promises and without esoteric froth.
Before we turn to individual signs, it is worth looking at what runes were in the everyday life of the Vikings and their ancestors. The oldest securely dated runic inscription is on a comb from the Danish bog of Vimose, made about AD 160, and reads harja, taken as a name, an epithet or simply the word for “comb”. It is no spell. Around 400 came the golden horns of Gallehus with the inscription ek hlewagastiR holtijaR horna tawido, “I, Hlewagast, son of Holt (or: of Holt's family), made the horn” (more in our piece on the golden horns of Gallehus). And the Kylver stone from Gotland, also around 400, carries the whole rune row, the “futhark”, named after its first six signs F, U, Þ, A, R, K.
Runes thus served first to record names, ownership, makers' marks and words of remembrance. That some inscriptions have a magical character is also documented, for example the word alu on several finds, the bindrunes on the amulet from Lindholm in Scania, or curse formulas on later rune stones. But that is a small part. The great majority of inscriptions are sober, and the runes from the harbour quarter of Bryggen in Bergen, where over 600 inscriptions, mostly on wooden sticks, have been found since the 1950s, show that people wrote trade notes, names and greetings with them. Runes were a working script.
On the Continent too, people carved runes. The Nordendorf brooch near Augsburg, made around 600, names Wodan and Wigithonar, an epithet of Donar, in its inscription. How exactly the line is to be read, as an invocation, a list of names or part of a dedication, is still disputed among runologists. All that is certain: names of gods stood on a piece of jewellery, in runes, in the sixth or seventh century. On the gods themselves see Wodan, Donar, Ziu.
So anyone choosing a rune first chooses a letter with a history. That history is rich enough without inventing magical power for it. How the signs arose in detail is covered in our overview of the runes and their history; the scholarly side is in the piece on rune research.
Before you decide on a rune, it should be clear which row it comes from, because the rows differ.
This is no hair-splitting. Someone who wants “Viking” but has Wunjo engraved has picked a sign that no longer stood in the row in the Viking Age. That is not an error as long as one knows it. We come back to it below, including for names. The rows are compared in detail in the piece Futhark compared.
We know the names and core meanings of the runes from three sources: the Old English, the Norwegian and the Icelandic rune poem. Each gives a short mnemonic verse for every rune. Added to that is an early witness to the names, the Abecedarium Nordmannicum of the ninth century (Codex Sangallensis 878, abbey of St Gall), which lists names but gives no explanations.
How reliable are these poems? Less than one might think. The Old English rune poem was probably composed in the seventh or eighth century, but it survives only in a tenth-century manuscript (Cotton Otho B.x) that burned in 1731 in the fire of the Cotton library in London. We know the text only because George Hickes printed it in 1705, and all later editions rest on that printing. The Norwegian rune poem is preserved in a seventeenth-century copy of a lost thirteenth-century manuscript. The Icelandic one stands in four manuscripts, the oldest from about 1500 and damaged, so that some readings are guesswork.
And one more thing stands out: the poems are Christian-influenced or at least from Christian times, and they do not agree. The meaning of a rune depends on which poem one reads. That is why with every rune we say which source its interpretation comes from.
Fehu (ᚠ) stands at the head of the row. The name means “cattle” and so movable property, wealth. But the poems are ambivalent: the Old English poem calls wealth a comfort to every man, though everyone should share it freely if he wants honour before God. The Norwegian poem says briefly that wealth causes strife among kinsmen (Fé vældr frænda róge), and the Icelandic one says much the same: wealth is “discord among kinsmen”. Fehu is therefore not simply “prosperity”. It is the rune of property with all its double meanings.
“Wealth is a comfort to all men; yet must every man bestow it freely, if he wish to gain honour in the sight of the Lord.”Old English rune poem, stanza on feoh (Fehu), after the usual translations, public domain
Uruz (ᚢ) means “aurochs”, so in the Elder Futhark and in the Old English poem, which describes the ur as a fierce beast with horns that fights bravely. In the Younger Futhark the meaning shifts: the Norwegian and Icelandic poems read the sign as úr, “rain”, “shower” or “dross”, and the Icelandic poem calls it the “lamentation of the clouds”. The rune of raw strength thus belongs to the older sign set, not to the Viking Age.
Thurisaz (ᚦ) means “giant” (þurs) in the Scandinavian poems: in the Icelandic one “torture of women, dweller of cliffs and husband of a giantess”. In the Old English poem the same sign is thorn, very sharp and evil for anyone who touches it. A link with Thor is widespread but not documented in the poems. It stems from the similarity of the names and from modern rune literature. Whoever has Thurisaz engraved chooses a rune that in the sources is more dangerous than protective.
Ansuz (ᚨ) means “god”, more precisely “Áss”, in the Younger Futhark óss. The Icelandic poem reads it as Odin: “aged Gautr, prince of Asgard, lord of Valhalla”. The Old English poem, which changes the sound value, reads the sign as Latin os, “mouth”, and praises the source of all speech and the support of wisdom. Presumably a Christian author replaced the heathen god with the identically sounding Latin word. The link of Ansuz with speech and wisdom therefore has a medieval share too.
Raido (ᚱ), “ride” or “journey”, is by contrast unambiguous. The Old English poem says riding is easy for the warrior in the hall but hard for him who travels the long roads on the back of a strong horse. The Icelandic poem calls it “joy of those who sit, a swift journey and toil of the steed”. The idea of travel and way carries, with its effort included.
Kaunan (ᚲ) is often translated “torch” today, and indeed in the Old English poem the sign is cen, “torch”, burning where nobles sit. In Scandinavia, though, the rune is kaun, “ulcer”. The Icelandic poem calls it “the woe of children”, and the Norwegian one says an ulcer is deadly to children. The reconstruction of the Proto-Germanic name therefore stays uncertain. Anyone choosing “light and insight” follows the English tradition and not the Norse one.
Gebo (ᚷ), “gift”, stands in the Elder Futhark and the Anglo-Saxon futhorc (gyfu) but is absent from the Younger Futhark. Whoever has a gift engraved can sensibly read the sign as a gift. It is easy to recognise as a plain X.
Wunjo (ᚹ), “joy” or “delight”, is likewise in the Elder Futhark and the futhorc (wynn), where the poem says that he enjoys bliss who knows no suffering, sorrow or anxiety. The Younger Futhark has no sign for it any more. As a rune of joy it is well attested, only not in the Viking Age.
Algiz (ᛉ) is probably the rune most often asked about, usually with the wish “protection”. Here one has to be honest: the original name of the rune is unknown. The reconstruction *algiz rests on a corrupted form in the Anglo-Saxon tradition, where the sign is called eolh or eolhx. The poem describes a plant, the eolh-secg, the marsh sedge, which grows in the fen and “wounds grimly” whoever grasps it. This is partly linked with “elk”, partly read as reed grass. No protective meaning stands in any of the three poems. In the Younger Futhark the form ᛉ carries a different value and name.
The reading as a protective sign is modern and rests essentially on the shape, which recalls a raised hand or antlers, and on a word relationship some scholars propose: the word *alhs means “temple, sanctuary” in Gothic, and some derive from it a sense like “protection”. That is not certain. Whoever chooses Algiz chooses a symbol that has grown in the present. That is permitted; one should just not sell it as ancient tradition. In addition, Algiz shares its shape with the “life rune” used under National Socialism (see below).
Sowilo (ᛊ), the sun, is well attested. The Old English poem says the sun is always a hope to seafarers when they travel over the bath of the fishes until the sea-horse brings them to land. The Icelandic one calls it “shield of the clouds, shining ray, destroyer of ice”. A fine choice, with one warning: two Sowilo runes side by side in the pointed form (ᛊᛊ) make the double sig-rune of the SS and should never be set that way.
Tiwaz (ᛏ) is the rune of the god Tiu or Tyr. The Norwegian poem says Tyr is the one-handed among the Aesir, the Icelandic one “one-handed Áss, leavings of the wolf and prince of temples”. That alludes to the story in which Tyr puts his hand in Fenrir's jaws so that the gods can bind the wolf. In the Old English poem, however, tir is a guiding sign or guiding star that keeps faith with nobles and never fails. Both readings fit courage and reliability. More in our pieces on Tyr and Tiwaz.
Berkano (ᛒ) is the birch. The Old English poem describes a tree that bears shoots without seed, tall and splendid; the Icelandic one calls the birch a “leafy twig, a little tree and a young shrub”. Surprisingly, the Norwegian poem brings in Loki, who “was lucky in his deceit”. The link with birth and new beginning is an interpretation that starts from the growth and freshness of the tree. It is plausible, but not handed down.
Othala (ᛟ) means “inherited estate”, “ancestral home”. The Old English poem says an estate is very dear to every man if he can enjoy right and custom in his house there. The Scandinavians no longer have the sign in the Younger Futhark. Because of the meaning “inherited farm”, völkisch groups in the twentieth century took the sign up, called it the Odal rune and tied it to “blood and soil”. The 7th SS Volunteer Mountain Division “Prinz Eugen” used the Odal rune as its badge, and it appears to this day in far-right contexts. Historically Othala is a rune of inheritance; whoever engraves it must know the context and choose it deliberately.
Three more signs are often requested and are well attested. Jera (ᛃ), “year” or “harvest”, is called ár in the Icelandic poem, “boon to men, good summer, thriving field”, and ger in the Old English one: the year is a hope of men when God lets the earth give its fruits. Mannaz (ᛗ), “man”, is in the Icelandic poem “delight of man, augmentation of the earth and adorner of ships”. Dagaz (ᛞ), “day”, stands in the Elder Futhark and the futhorc, where the poem praises the day as the Lord's messenger and light of the Creation. They are less well known but good choices when the theme is season, humanity or a fresh start.
If you want to give a rune as a present, the simplest question is not “which is the prettiest” but “what should it say”. The pairings below are suggestions based on the names and poems, not handed-down custom:
For wishes of protection the rule is: an engraving can be a sign that recalls a person, no more. We cannot and do not wish to promise any protective effect. Our pieces on runes for protection, for love and for success go deeper into the question of wish and rune.
Not everyone wants a symbol; many want a name. That is possible, but not the way one might think. Runes are a phonetic script, and a name is transferred not letter by letter but by sound. In the Younger Futhark with only 16 signs, several sounds shared one sign: the i sign also covered e, and voiced and unvoiced consonants were not distinguished. Writers avoided carving the same sign twice in a row for the same sound. A properly transcribed name therefore looks different from a mechanical sign-for-sign swap, and it looks more genuine.
Then there is the question of the row. A name in the Elder Futhark reads differently from one in the Younger or in the Anglo-Saxon futhorc. For a name engraving it should therefore be settled beforehand which period is wanted. How Old Norse names were built, with given name, patronymic and byname, is shown in the piece on Viking names and their meaning; suggestions for first names are in the piece on Nordic first names.
To try things out there is our rune oracle and the engraving configurator, where you can set runes and names and see how they look on the plate. If it should get truly personal, we engrave your own motif through the custom engraving service in slate, wood or glass. The rune oracle is a play-and-interpretation system of the present, expressly not a historical divination practice.
A bindrune merges two or more runes into one sign by sharing staves. They are historically attested, already in the Elder Futhark, mostly as space-saving spellings or abbreviations for names, occasionally in a magical setting such as on the Lindholm amulet. As a personal monogram of initials they work well, aesthetically and historically. The idea of a freely invented “wish bindrune” with guaranteed effect, however, is modern and backed by no source.
The idea of using runes for divination has a long but patchy history. The Roman author Tacitus describes in the Germania (ch. 10), around the year 98, a lot-casting practice of the Germanic peoples: they cut a branch from a fruit-bearing tree into pieces, mark them with certain signs and scatter them on a white cloth; the priest or head of the household picks up one piece three times and interprets it. Whether the “signs” (notae) were runes is disputed. The poet Venantius Fortunatus mentions in the sixth century that the “barbarian rune” is painted on ash tablets. More on such practices in the piece on Germanic oracles.
A finished rune divination with fixed meanings the sources do not know. It came later. The Austrian mystic Guido von List created the 18 “Armanen runes” in 1902 and described them in 1908 in the book Das Geheimnis der Runen. The first 16 follow the Younger Futhark, two signs he added, one of them without historical model. The system shaped German occultism and was taken up by völkisch groups and later the SS. The American Ralph Blum finally made the rune oracle popular in 1982 with The Book of Runes, including a blank rune that has no counterpart in the historical futhark. Anyone using such systems uses modern creations.
Some runes and rune combinations were politically occupied in the twentieth century. That applies to the Odal rune (Othala), to the double sig-rune of the SS, to the so-called “life rune” (in the form of Algiz) and to the “death rune”. In Germany the use of individual signs can be a criminal offence in certain contexts (§ 86a of the Criminal Code, symbols of unconstitutional organisations), above all the double sig-rune. If in doubt, inform yourself before giving one as a present. That is not legal advice, but it is a recommendation: anyone looking for a rune will find plenty of untainted alternatives among the signs named here.
We promise no magic, no luck at the push of a button and no protection from a laser. What an engraved rune can do is something else, and it is a lot: it is beautiful, it is minimal, and it carries over a thousand years of writing and cultural history with it. A sign you choose deliberately and whose origin you know means more to its wearer than an interchangeable fashion motif. The value lies in the personal, not the supernatural. Whoever knows this can enjoy both: the documented history and one's own interpretation, as long as one does not confuse them.
An entry to further background is the overview of rune lore. Anyone who wants to know how runes stood in the life of the Vikings can read the piece on the Rúnatal.
Which rune stands for protection? Algiz (ᛉ) is most often read that way. That is a modern interpretation: the original name of the rune is unknown, and none of the rune poems gives it a protective meaning. Thurisaz is linked with Thor but means “giant” or “thorn” in the poems.
Can I combine several runes? Yes, as a bindrune sharing staves. Historically they are attested as abbreviations and monograms. We promise no effect from it.
Are rune meanings historically attested? Partly. The names and core meanings come from the rune poems and from linguistics; the interpretive systems of modern rune oracles are modern.
Which futhark should I choose? The Elder Futhark (24 signs) is best known and offers the most signs; the Younger (16) is the script of the Viking Age. Whoever wants historical fidelity picks the Younger, whoever wants a particular sign the Elder.
Can I have my name written in runes? Yes. It is written by sound, not letter by letter, and the period of the rune row is chosen beforehand.
Which runes should I avoid? Those occupied politically in the twentieth century: especially the double sig-rune of the SS, also the Odal rune and the “life” and “death” runes, where they are set in the corresponding context. If in doubt, take an untainted sign.
For courage. For remembrance. For legends that live on.
Runes & their meaning · Viking names & their meaning · Vegvísir & Ægishjálmr · Norse symbols: real or invented? · Slate, Wood or Glass?.
All Runes & Writing articles →
Leifr Eiríksson, Guðrún Ósvífrsdóttir, Ragnar Loðbrók: names from the North sound like little stories – and that is …
Read more →England, the year 1073 – seven years after the Norman Conquest. In the margin of a Christian manuscript someone carves …
Read more →On the Danish island of Funen stands the Glavendrup stone – it bears the longest runic inscription in Denmark, along …
Read more →Most runestones honour lords and warriors. The Danish Hørning stone, however, gives space to a very different voice …
Read more →