Hello there, Riddlemaster,

In a word, http://www.arild-hauge.com/eindex.htm

That's probably a good place to start.

> My problem with finding a reliable source is that none of the

sites

> I have found state what runes to use for the accented letters...or
> does that matter? That, and for the letters þ and ð (Ð).

Briefly, there were no accents with runes, and vowel length and
umlauts weren't marked. The þ-rune looks very much like the book-
letter, in all types of runes, but in the Elder Futhark (see below)
there was just one rune for the sounds spelt <ð>, <d>, <nd> and
<dd>. This wasn't such a big deal, as /d/ only occured in certain
positions, like at the start of a word. But in the Younger Futhark
it gets worse: just one rune was used for the sounds spelt <t>,
<tt>, <d> and <dd>! On the other hand, during this era (Viking
times and later), the sound spelt <ð> would be spelt with the þ-
rune -- which wasn't confusing, since now a dental fricative was
always voiceless at the start of a word, and always voiced between
vowels (or at the end of a word after a vowel).

Less briefly (arrrgh!): There are lots of irregularities in runic
spelling, but basically two systems. The Elder Futhark of 24
letters was perfectly suited for writing the earlier stage of the
language, before the Viking Age, when the vowel system was much
simpler. In fact the only thing missing was that it didn't mark
vowel length. Then the language changed and loads of new vowel
sounds appeared. Just as this happened, the rune-writers decided
this would be a good time to streamline their alphabet to what is
called the Younger Futhark, which has only 16 characters. Not only
did they have no accents for length, etc., but now voicing of
consonants wasn't distinguished: the same letter might stand for /t/
or /d/. Not content, they set about inventing cryptic variants,
cyphers, complex poetry...

Later still, though, some people thought better of this and added a
dot to the t-rune and k-rune to indicate voiced sounds.

On the other hand, even the Younger Futhark, in its various forms,
makes some distinctions that have disappeared from Old Norse by the
time the sagas were written, e.g. the nasal áss-rune versus the non-
nasal ár-rune; and by the time people were writing in manuscripts,
the r/R distinction had gone too (In transcriptions of runic
letters, this capital <R> is used for a sound half-way between [r]
and [z], which later became identical with [r]).

But I'm sure Arild Hauge's site explains it much better than I can,
and with pictures!

> Go raibh maith agait (thank you)

Tá fáilte romhat (you're welcome)

Llama Nom


PS. Some other sites that might be of interest, now or later:

Yves Kodratoff: Useful collection of runic inscriptions in Primitive
Norse and Viking Norse, ordered chronologically + interpretations of
Krause, Moltke & Antonsen
http://www.nordic-life.org/nmh/runic.htm

Västra Götalands runstenar (Runestones of Västergötland, Sweden)
http://w1.501.telia.com/~u50102110/

The Rök Stone Inscription (transcription, West Norse & Old Swedish
transliterations, English translation)
http://home.earthlink.net/~norsemyths/wildhunt/rokstone.html

An English Dictionary of Inscriptions in the Younger Futhark (coming
soon...)
http://runicdictionary.nottingham.ac.uk/index.php

Runic Inscriptions from Bryggen in Bergen (database)
http://www.nb.no/baser/runer/eindex.html

Comparative Table of Runes + Gothic Alphabet
http://titus.fkidg1.uni-frankfurt.de/didact/idg/germ/runennam.htm

Runenprojekt Kiel (database of inscriptions in the Eldar Futhark)
http://www.runenprojekt.uni-kiel.de

Nordiskt runnamnslexikon (dictionary of names found in Norse runic
inscriptions)
http://www.sofi.se/SOFIU/runlex/

JH Looijenga: "Runes around the North Sea and on the Continent AD
150-700"
http://www.ub.rug.nl/eldoc/dis/arts/j.h.looijenga/

"Sverges runinskrifter" by Erik Brate, 1922
http://www.runor.se

"Nytt om runer (newsletter on new runic finds)
http://ariadne.uio.no/runenews/








--- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, "riddlemaster99"
<riddlemaster99@...> wrote:

>
> Hello, I just barely joined yahoo a few days ago, wanting to get

to

> this course, and I am very excited...
> But I have a question: Do any of you know of any really good and
> very reliable resource sites on norse runes?, because I want to
> learn those too. I apologize if someone has already asked
> this,...the message board is really a large archive.
> My problem with finding a reliable source is that none of the

sites

> I have found state what runes to use for the accented letters...or
> does that matter? That, and for the letters þ and ð (Ð).
>
> Go raibh maith agait (thank you)