So Wayland, when one wants to use the alphabet (i've used the Germanic/Anglo one's a bit interchangeably) and you're short letters for a straight transfer of letters into english are there some traditional runes to use or do people just make them up?
for example, there's no q, v, z etc (I used to use the u rune interchangeably)
Hope that all makes sense
When transliterating into or out of runes it is important to remember that standardised spelling is a much later invention.
Runes are a phonetic system so it is the
sound of the rune that is important.
Most book publishers that have limited understanding of the runes can't stand the idea that they cannot lay down a simple substitution set for the alphabet, so they fill the gaps by suggesting that the Viking rune for
k can be simply be substituted for our
c for example.
That sounds reasonable enough if you are inscribing the word "
cat" >
kat but consider the word "
cir
cle", it doesn't make sense as >
kir
kle does it? A better substitution would be
s for the first
c and
k for the second
c.
> sir
kle
With the letters above, it would all depend on the way they sound according to their use in the word you are transliterating.
Btw. The term "Alphabet" should not really be applied to the runes as it is specific to letter systems which start with
A "Alpha" and
B "Beta" hence "Alphabeta" shortened to just alphabet in common usage.
I would have thought if the letters were missing then they were not required by that people in their everyday life. One thing that may be interesting is (correct me if I am wrong) but we do not know if they used different pronounciations based on those letters to get another. These wouldn't be written down.
What is there to say that all the letters have been found, what if one piece of stone was broken off which was the letter Q?
The pronunciations have changed over the years as can be seen from words in our own language that are now pronounced in ways that bear no relation to the standard spellings frozen in time when laid down by Samuel Johnson's dictionary in 1755. Languages evolve quickly, spelling much more slowly.
Notice the Early Germanic
a and the Viking
o, same rune, different sound.
As for all the letters being found, the futhark, futhorc and futhork have all been found in multiple inscriptions so we can be reasonably confident that they have survived complete and intact.
Thanks for the pics, Wayland - and the info. The ones I have seen most are the early germanic ones (I think). None of the alphabets seem too difficult to make stamps from - just got to find the time...
As far as stamps go you should only need a short and a long bar to make any of the runes in theory. I make any inscriptions on my silverwork with just two chisels.
