--- In norse_course@yahoogroups.com, Lance <lance_mcclure@...> wrote:

>
> Heill,
>
> I wonder if there is a word similar to "solitude" in Old Norse.

Heill Lance!

If you mean similar in meaning: einman (neuter).

> I'm also searching for runic fonts. Would Younger Fuþark be the

best to use writing Old Norse? And if anyone knows, which is the best
set to learn (from which period)? It seems there is plenty available
for Elder Fuþark but would this be of use? I had thought it was used
to write Proto-Germanic and Proto-Norse.


Various forms of the Younger Futhark were used in the Viking period
and later (eventually supplemented by the dotted runes), although the
Rök stone (Sweden, c. 900 according to Gordon's Introduction to Old
Norse, or perhaps a bit earlier according to others) uses both Younger
and the Elder Futhark for different parts of the inscription. I don't
know enough to say which is best to use, but you could maybe look at
medieval insriptions from the West Norse speaking areas--Norway,
Iceland, Greenland, the Faroes--from the time that Old Norse was being
written in manuscripts.

There is some debate among scholars over what to call the language of
the earliest Scandinavian inscriptions, c. 150-550, which is written
exclusively in the Elder Futhark. This language is very archaic and
some have classified it as Northwest Germanic (the common ancestor of
the North and West Germanic languages). But not everyone agrees with
that. Others call it simply Old Runic, making no judgement about its
position within the Germanic family. Another name I've seen used is
Ancient Nordic, i.e. effectively Proto-Norse. I don't think any
inscriptions survive which are old enough to be classified as
Proto-Germanic (except possibly that of the Negau helmet which uses a
North Italian alphabet, rather than runes as such).

Llama Nom