Runeindskrifterne fra Illerup mose

                         The Runic Inscriptions from Illerup River Valley The shield handle In 1977, whilst the finds from Illerup river valley were being cleaned at the laboratory at Moesgård, a runic inscription was discovered on a mounting for a shield handle. This mounting is archaeologically dated by Jørgen Ilkjær and Jørn Lønstrup to c. 200 AD at the latest. The inscription, Swarta ("Black"), must be interpreted as the name of the owner. The fact that the last rune, a, is added beneath the first five runes and perpendicular to them shows that the carver wished to omit nothing. Metalsmiths, who were usually illiterate, did not care whether they stopped in the middle of an inscription when there was no more space. Therefore the carver of the name in this case was probably not an armourer but the owner himself. The lance heads In 1980, at the conservation department of the Forhistorisk Museum, Moesgård, it was noticed that two lance heads bore two tiny nearly identical runic inscriptions (c. 11-13 mm long, rune height 4.5-7.5 mm). It is noteworthy that the runes of one inscription, Illerup 1 (1880/IMZ) are in relief, whereas Illerup lance head 2 ( 1880/INL) had the runes incised into the surface. The inscription in relief must have been stamped, indicating that it represents the name of the smith or the workshop, the maker's mark as a guarantee. The zig-zag ornamentation of the lance heads seems to have been stamped in after the runic inscriptions, as some of the ornamental lines overlap the rune frame. The armourer seems to have misunderstood his original model, as there is something wrong with the inscriptions. The rune at the far right is problematic. On the Grumpan bracteate this rune shape signifies ng (compare the Køng bronze figure and the Slemminge scraper). But as the basic shape must be assumed to be ◊, lacking a stem and smaller than the other runes (compare the k-rune), it does not seem likely that this typologically late shape in full height would appear c. 200 on the Illerup lances. As for the interpretative possibilities of ng - (i)ngagnijo, read from right to left as indicated by rune 2 from the right; or, if this rune is considered to be a turning rune, read from left to right, ojingang -both must be considered as linguistically improbable (however, compare Slemminge, witrng). It seems most logical to interpret the rune at the far right as a misunderstood t or z from the source model. The reading tagnijo (feminine!) seems unlikely. The reading is therefore from left to right, with the a-rune as a turning rune (compare Kylver), from the socket towards the head as on the other runic lance heads: ojingaz, which may be interpreted as a man's name in the nominative with a familiar second element while the first element is an unknown one. A comparison with the West Nordic dwarf name óinn ought to be rejected. The use of n + g for ng speaks for a rejection of the interpretation of the final rune as ng and shows moreover a remarkable similarity with the iuþingaz of the Reistad stone. We do not know why one inscription is stamped and the other carved. We suggest that the stamped one (perhaps due to the inverted a rune?) is the oldest. The stamp may have been lost, so that the other lance head had to be signed with good old-fashioned carving. Presumably, the lances belonged to the defeated enemy. In the opinion of Ilkjær and Lønstrup, both the Illerup and the Vimose finds testify to internal Scandinavian conflicts. After new study of the Vimose and Thorsbjerg finds, they believe that the runic objects from both of these finds belong to the Late Roman Iron Age, archaeologically termed C 1 b, but at Thorsbjerg the ferrule and the shield boss, to judge by the fibula types in the find, belonged to an army coming from the region between the Elbe and the Rhine. This implies that, contrary to earlier assumptions, there were runes in the West Germanic region already about the year 200. The question is when did the primary Germanic language divide into East Germanic, North Germanic (Primitive Norse) and West Germanic? East Germanic separated itself early. We know this mainly from Wulfila's translation of the Bible (4th century), (Gothic gasts - common Germanic gastiz). Primitive Norse is known from a considerable number of runic inscriptions in Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. The oldest inscriptions seem to retain a purely primary Germanic phase with the conservation of thematic vowels and endings. Up to and including the bracteate period, the runic orthography is curiously constant. The Stentoften-Björketorp group, c. 550-750, is the first to indicate that the language had indeed changed. Until now, West Germanic (which includes Anglo-Saxon -Frisian, Old High German, and Old Dutch) could be dated at the earliest to the 5th century on the basis of the oldest inscriptions so far known. At this time, West Germanic shows the disappearance of, for example, the terminal ɀ in the nominative (common Germanic, Nordic stainaɀ, Gothic stains Anglo-Saxon stan). Epigraphically, a distinction has been made between a West Germanic h-rune with two cross lines and a Nordic-East Germanic with only one cross line. If the inscription on the Torsbjerg ferrule, owlþewaz / / niwajemariz with the preserved -aɀ and -iɀ, and the aisg(z)h from the Thorsbjerg shield boss with the one-lined h-rune is from the West Germanic region, then these West Germanic inscriptions do not differ from the North Germanic, c. 200. This also means that the question of the provenience of the English inscription with "Primitive Norse" runes from Caistor-by-Norwich ought to be studied. Regarding the question of the origin of the runes, it is not important whether the Thorsbjerg inscriptions are West Germanic. The fact remains that most of the early runic inscriptions have been found in Scandinavia, especially in Denmark. The plane On the plane from Illerup river valley found in 1981 we can read from left to right: afi(l)aiki. Of rune 4, only the stem is preserved, but as the following rune is a, the only possibility of reconstruction is 1 (t would have left a trace of the side stroke at the left). Runes 6-7-8 apparently ought to be read iki (not wi, pi, or ri, d or m), as indicated by microscopic analysis. The k-rune has the rare shape with the point uppermost (compare bracteate 61, Zealand-2). Part of the inscription may have been lost with the missing part of the plane, so we can add runes to make it afilaikiz, and consider it a man's name in the nominative, although admittedly an unknown name with regard to both the first and last elements. The Norwegian Kjølevik stone displays the man's name hadulaikaz, possibly the same suffix as on the Illerup plane but with aɀ (compare Ellestad, sigimAraz: the Torsbjerg chape, mariz). The a- and i- themes may have existed side by side. As long as the Primitive Norse material is so meagre, it would be best to remain humble regarding forms, stems, and endings. If the inscription includes a man's name, it is most likely that of the owner. The runic inscription of the Vimose plane gives us the name of the tool, talijo. But the rest of it has not been interpreted and appears meaningless. The question arises whether a woodworker ignorant of runes misunderstood his source model in the same way as the goldsmiths of the bracteates. Erik Moltke, Marie Stoklun