Jack the Sword, Sumarbrander
I once again stumbled upon some fanart of the sword Jack from the Magnus chase trilogy and now that I have this blog, I have to say something.
This is a mess tbh, it’s complete illiterate nonsense, but there are some interesting (read: weird) choices that I can point out here.
If I were to write this out in the Latin alphabet, it’d look something like; æeaeib
The thing that makes this interesting is that these specific runes are from the Anglo-Saxon futhorc, which was a reorganised version made by rune users from England and Frisia in the 7th-8th centuries, contrasting with the older futhark runes which is the one I use on this blog. The older futhark has 24 runes (though I only use 23 of them since ᛉ is too specifically designed for the pre-old-Norse language) and was in use through the 2nd-7th centuries while the Anglo-Saxon futhorc has 28 (a few Northumbrian inscriptions have three more runes).
If you’re familiar with the Viking age, you’ll know that it lasted between 793-1066. So the ASf version was in use right before and during the very beginning of the Viking age.
HOWEVER, there’s one little anomaly here. The first four are from the ASf (with the first and third coming straight from the older futhark unchanged), but the last one is not.
The last rune used is from the younger futhark (which is the direct descendant of the older futhark, unlike ASf which is an offshoot), not only that, it’s the short-twig version. As the older futhark started adapting in the 7th century, it was simplified from 24 runes to just 16. They were also simplified in shape (at least here around Norway and Sweden).
The short-twig younger futhark b rune has some variation, but the standard one that I’ve seen is the vertical line with the two upwards pointing diagonal lines on the right side. I have also seen one where the diagonal lines are pointing downwards on the left side instead.
Admittedly, because the younger futhark is so much more compressed, ᛒ is used for both b and p, so the latinised version of Jack’s runes could also be: æeaeip.
As much as I would’ve loved to see more attention taken to the rune choice, I don’t blame the artist or Riordan (especially since he never even specified which exact runes are on the blade in the books) for not doing so and defaulting to aesthetics.
There is one more version of Jack though. I’m gonna try my best on this one.
d ijinorodz lcjwfŋljla… (4 more but I can’t read them)
prjkrasnaja frjia zdorowiji da… (the last one on this row is either i or n, I can’t tell since it’s cut off)
The lower row is okay I guess, but the upper row… some of the runes are just straight up flipped, some vertically and others horizontally, and the blur isn’t helping either.
Anyway, it’s gibberish, thanks for coming to my ted talk, I’m going to bed now…
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