Talk:Rune

Nasal a

However, the first A in the fuþark was nasal, hence originally close to an o.

Hi, what is the above supposed to mean? Nasality of vowels can be independent from vowel quality (in terms of formant frequencies). --Kjoonlee 16:45, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

I guess it means that the original sound, which was a nasal a, turned into an o-phoneme in Anglo-Saxon.--Berig (talk) 17:22, 9 March 2008 (UTC)

this is difficult. The /a/ itself wasn't nasal, the /a/ in the word *ansuz just became nasal because of the following /n/. But the association of the a rune with its name ansuz > áss appears to have been so strong that the letter value itself has assumed nasality, so that both in the younger and the Anglo-Saxon row, a new rune for /a/ proper was needed. dab (𒁳) 09:50, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Individual letter articles

The discussion was moved to the runic studies talk page on 22 May 2008.

there is some discussion on what to do with the articles on the individual runes. Many of them are certainly stubby and need attention. Although it is better to have an informative stub than a rambling page of nonsense. [[::User:Bloodofox|Bloodofox]] ([[::User talk:Bloodofox|talk]] · [[::Special:Contributions/Bloodofox|contribs]]) thinks they are a "mess" in need of standardization. See here and here. We are looking at the following issues:

• this is clearly an article series, tied together by the {{Runes}} navbox. However the nature of the various articles isn't uniform. Some runes are attested in all rows without complications (Fehu), some are in all rows but have a complicated history (Ansuz). Some are not in the Younger Futhark and hence best known from Anglo-Saxon (Gyfu). Some are not in the Elder Futhark (Yr rune, Ear rune).
• due to this heterogenous situation, it is difficult to pick the best article title per WP:NAME. Bloodofox recently moved all Elder Futhark rune articles the Proto-Germanic name, including the asterisk (*Fehu). In the case of thej rune, he chose the stem (because of an uncertainty of reconstruction), *Jēra-, but in other cases of uncertainty, he just chose one possibility, as in *Ûruz (rune) (why the disambiguating "(rune)" I'm not sure. I have reverted these moves as undiscussed, but I recognize we can discuss this. I do not think it makes sense to stick to a <a class="inlineAdmedialink" href="#"><a class="inlineAdmedialink" href="#">single</a></a> over-arching naming principle, because of the complicated situation of these names. For example, Peorð is an Elder Futhark rune, but it is pointless to move it to a Common Germanic title (with or without asterisk), because such a name simply isn't known. The Anglo-Saxon name Peorð is arguable, but perhaps the simple title P rune would be more satisfactory. In fact, a system if F rune, U rune etc. would be the only "unified" approach that I can see as making sense. But do we want that?
• the asterisk in reconstructed article titles (Wodanaz, Perkwunos etc.) is an independent question. I am clearly opposed to it. I don't think it will fly, at all, with WP:NAME. Technical special characters should be avoided in article titles if possible. For this, look to mathematics topics: we have Chi-squared test, not χ² test, for good reasons. If the mathematicians can title that article "Chi-squared test", we certainly can do with Jēran or even Jeran over *Jēra- and Perkwunos over *Perkʷunos.

anyway, informed third opinions are welcome. I am presenting the question here (as boo should have done) to allow centralized discussion between interested parties. I would certainly welcome further expansion and cleanup of the rune articles as long as it happens with expertise and circumspection. If there is an interest in "standardization" of these articles, I refer to the thought I have put into "infoboxes" further up on this page (February 2006). this arrangement is flexible enough to capture the key data of each rune (with some fields remaining empty depending on the situation). I'll try to implement this in a {{runic letter}} template. dab (𒁳) 09:50, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

I gave it a try, but I think it will probably be quicker to do the 30 or so tables manually than to come up with the complicated template code required to automatize this... The disadvantag being, of course, that 30 templates will be more tedious to maintain than a single template however complicated. So, I've installed an example "infobox" at Fehu (see Template:Fehu infobox), along the lines I suggested back in February 06, and I'll wait for comments before I go any further with this. dab (𒁳) 10:45, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

A few responses to questions raised by Dab at my article moves - some of the articles had names such as "runename (rune)" and "runename rune" so I just standardized them into "runename (rune)". For others, I just asterisked their commonly known Elder Futhark variant and moved on (though I could have potentially have chosen other <a class="inlineAdmedialink" href="#">options</a>). Since this is standard practice and ought to be done whenever the names are written to show that they're unattested reconstructions, I figured it wouldn't be a problem and just went ahead and did it but Dab has given me some resistance about it. Anyway, outside of my asterisks-in-title proposal, here's a few points:

1. Standardization. I think it's possible to <a class="inlineAdmedialink" href="#">work</a> out a sort of standardized format of these articles and that it would be the best option for them. For example, many of the introductions don't require much variance in their development history from one another. Most of the articles can have a standardized body reflecting the development of the rune. Of course, runes such as *perþ- will require extra explanation as to why there's so much confusion surrounding them.
2. References. These articles are badly in need of references and need badly need pruning. I've done this over the last few years but haven't focused heavily on bringing these articles up to standard in some time - having a system in place would be helpful. Recently, I've been heavily editing and attempting to bring this article, the Runic alphabet article, up to snuff and will continue to do so.
3. I think the box would be helpful, though the "position" might need some clarification if it's to be used. For example, "futhark and futhorc position" would be more helpful - most people will have no idea what you mean.:bloodofox: (talk) 11:22, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

0. "runename (rune)" -- a bad idea. I've had this discussion on Talk:Ogham (in an Ogham context, obviously). The idea is based on a misunderstanding of WP:DAB.

1. standardisation is a good thing as long as it doesn't become an end unto itself (ask User:Reddi[1]). The case at Ansuz (rune) (lots of evolution) will necessarily be much more involved than at Fehu (no evolution whatsoever).

2. references are welcome of course, although the present articles can easily be summarily referenced to a standard introduction such as Düwel (2001). I don't know about "pruning". But I appreciate your attack of the Rune poems content that I agree has been in disarray for some time now (still, I object to the "mess". I didn't bother to do this prettily, but I submit it is better to have the basic information than nothing at all. As it stands, we've had the basic information on wiki since late 2004, which was certainly preferable to waiting until 2008 for somebody to do this "properly".)

3. -- granted, you are welcome to fiddle with it. I am trying to keep the table as concise but informative as possible.

I am not trying to keep you from improving the articles, boo. Straightforward cleanup work such as Holt's is certainly welcome. This is different from questions of actual scholarly content, notation, reconstruction etc., which are very easy to get wrong.

dab (𒁳) 13:19, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Regarding the "runename (rune)" setup, it wasn't my idea, I was standardizing them when moving them. Regarding references, these articles shouldn't have references as some sort of bonus - they need to be entirely referenced and lock-solidly or they can simply be removed by anyone around and, in many cases, should be. It's good that we have a framework to work with, I suppose, but without references it can be worse than nothing. :bloodofox: (talk) 17:39, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

no problem. I never objected to your adding references. But when information is completely undisputed and is confirmed in any primer on the subject, referencing can be looser than in cases of arcane or disputed topics. It seems you are not always sure which case applies, as showcased e.g. here. This is an example of what we certainly do not want. You show similar lack of judgement here where you tag {{fact}} to a verbatim quote of a statement from a source that was explicitly stated. You just seemed to think it necessary that each and every sentence in a paragraph must have a footnote. I'll be the first to admit that you have learned much about Germanic topics since you first came here in December 2005, and you may be a living proof that Wikipedia can function as "the university that anyone can edit" for those willing to participate, but you still show some erratic behaviour when it comes to distinguishing exceptional claims from mere standard handbook stuff.

anyway, I created a Category:Rune infoboxes and intend to fill it with these infobox templates over the next days. You are most welcome to help. dab (𒁳) 07:02, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

You're a funny guy, Dab. First of all, I didn't put any of those references there on the Óðr page in the edit you show - I simply restored it after you mass removed it in the wake of a better write up. You removed them all again and so it's since been pulled by myself in hopes of a better write up. If anyone here has a problem understanding that material must be referenced, I'm afraid it's you (as these runic articles attest). Secondly, regarding the McNallen quote (where I moved the reference to directly attribute the quote) if I tagged it originally, I'm not sure why. Still, I think anyone who goes through my edit history can well see I'm very familiar and very solid with my sources - unlike yourself.

In fact, with the Óðr article, I'm responsible for almost all of what is there and solidly referenced at the moment. My contributions there are completely in line with WP:GA standards, something I strive for in all of my edits.

Look, Dab, I know you're still angry with me about my involvement in your Arbcom (that didn't go so well for you) but you really ought to get over it and show some civility - which is policy, by the way. For example, there's no need to make claims about my knowledge of Germanic paganism in comparison to your own in some petty attempt at belittlement, and this business about "the University that anyone can edit" - How absolutely absurd. Save me the personal attacks. Comments like these are absolutely not necessary: you know nothing about me outside of my edit history, which you seem very fond of pulling "examples" out of that are, at times, over two years old. How is that necessary or constructive? :bloodofox: (talk) 12:07, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I have not wasted a thought on that case in recent weeks. This wasn't your fault. I am perfectly civil, and I have no idea why you are linking to the WP:CIVIL page for my benefit. Any particular passage you'd like to point out? I am commenting on the quality of your edits. You have a long history of well-meaning but uninformed editing. I am not referring to the instances of your ideological pov pushing, they have nothing to do with this. Ok, so you tried to hitch a ride on a completely unrelated arbcom case in an attempt to shoot me down. To the extent that this does reveal something of your personality -- I am happy to ignore that in the interest of keeping this completely non-personal: I really don't care who you are or what you believe in, I am commenting on the quality of your edits. I am prepared to admit that the quality of your edits has generally improved, but I must say that you still tend to create a cost for others with your ill-advised "cleanup" campaigns. No problem, there are many editors who do much worse. If you cannot accept partial praise, forget I tried to give you partial praise. As for "adding references", why haven't you done that for the rune article instead of wasting your breath about it? Just slap Düwel on each article for a start. I agree this would be an improvement. It is really beyond me why you indulge in second-guessing my "understanding" of WP:CITE instead of just going in there and adding the bleeding references. dab (𒁳) 12:36, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

If that was praise, I'd hate to see your criticism! Further, if that "cost for others" is to get them to reference their contributions, that is policy. I don't believe there was any reason for me not to be involved in your Arbcom - it was open to anyone and I felt it was necessary. Regarding referencing, I'll start by referencing the names and meanings of the individual Elder Futhark runes when I get a chance - I generally feel responding to people is more pressing. Also, I'm curious about this "ideological POV pushing" - can you be more specific? :bloodofox: (talk) 12:52, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

whatever. No, I will not discuss our past ideological exchanges on this page. Yes, you are welcome to cleaning up the "mess" at rune poem and to "referencing the names and meanings of the individual Elder Futhark runes" (as long as this doesn't result articles littered with footnotes Óðr-style. dab (𒁳) 13:07, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

The discussion was moved to the runic studies talk page on 22 May 2008.

Standard Outline

The discussion was moved to the runic studies talk page on 21 May 2008.

Though this topic is something I wanted to tackle as part of a coordinated Ancient Germanic studies project, it seems that important decisions are being made now. I would like to come back to a point raised earlier: a 'standardized' outline. Do either of you have any concrete ideas here? I was thinking something like the following:

Lead

(ToC)

Etymology

History (incl. Developmental theories, e.g. Mees (Celtic), Taylor (Greek), Vennemann (Phoenician), etc.; and developmentally antecedent/subsequent runes)

Usage

Phonetic value

Rune Poems

Pop Culture (?)

Criticism is expected - but so are concrete alternative proposals. Ideas? —Aryaman (Enlist!) 11:49, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

This sounds perfectly acceptable to me. This is exactly the sort of thing I had in mind. I guess the question is how exactly should we propose the lead? I think they can be largely standardized, maybe something like this for most of them:

*Runename is the reconstructed Proto-Germanic name for the (letter value)-rune in the Elder Futhark meaning "meaning, meaning, meaning".(ref) This reconstruction is based off of the attested (poem rune), (poem rune), (poem rune), and is related to (gothic letter name).

Of course, considering certain runes have a more problematic reconstruction than others, we ought to figure in what to be written in this circumstance for the lead. :bloodofox: (talk) 12:11, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

A very constructive contribution, Varoon. Standardization will massively improve the overall standard of the separate rune articles, and we won't get deficient and untidy articles like for example the Gyfu page. Since the rune poems are essential to the understanding of the meaning of the rune names, I think it would be more natural to move the "Rune Poems" section further up, by making it a sub-section of "Etymology" (assuming the etymologic section will deal with the meaning of the name, correct me if I'm wrong). I realize the rune poem tables I have made the last couple of days may lead to some aesthetic flaws due to the space they take, but so far this solution for the rune poems is better than how it was earlier, in my opinion. The last section called "Pop culture" should perhaps have a more neutral name like "Modern usage", and an "Ancient usage" section can be added as a counterpart, as in the current Tiwaz rune article. The "Phonetic value" section is superfluous if we are going to keep the rune infoboxes Dab has been adding lately. So to sum it up, here's the slightly altered version that I have in mind:

Lead (with the rune infobox)

(ToC)

Etymology

Rune Poems

History (incl. Developmental theories, e.g. Mees (Celtic), Taylor (Greek), Vennemann (Phoenician), etc.; and developmentally antecedent/subsequent runes)

Usage

Ancient usage (if there is anything noteworthy)

Modern usage (same as above)

Bloodofox' lead section suggestion sounds good to me. --Holt (talk) 13:28, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

As for a standard outline for the rune article names (discussed above), I think the reconstructed Proto-Germanic name without any special characters or asterixes is fitting. Adding "rune" (no parentheses) after the Proto-Germanic name can also ward off any disambiguation problems, and clears up confusion - most people know the runes by other names, most likely the Younger Futhark ones. Where there are several reconstructions (as with *Laguz/Laukaz), the most plausible and commonly accepted term is a natural choice (*Laguz in this case), but when there are two equally accepted conflicting names (as with *Ūruz/Ûram), what is the solution here? It would be wise to have a standard template, to prevent unpleasant situations ([2] - [3]). When it comes to implementing these standardizations, I suppose we'll handle that under controlled circumstances as a part of the Ancient Germanic studies project. --Holt (talk) 14:14, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

Re: Naming conventions: This is inherently tricky territory, as equally qualified experts are frequently at variance with one another and often give little to no reasoning behind their reconstructions. Case in point: Düwel (2001) has *Laguz, Haarmann (1998) has *Laukaz. Neither give good reasons for their choice, and I don't think we are going to find any sources that can decide the matter conclusively (even Düwel is undecided on a few, giving both *Īsaz/Īsan, *Haglaz/Haglan and *Ōþalan/Ōþilan. I suggest that we gather our sources and then simply decide upon one or the other convention based upon frequency of occurrence and consistency and then apply that standard universally. —Aryaman (Enlist!) 14:46, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

I see. I support your suggestion. --Holt (talk) 16:52, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

I would advise against artificial standardization of article names. WP:NAME tells us to pick the most common name for the topic. For a well-attested rune like the g rune, this may well be gyfu, while for an obscure rune like p, this may indeed be "p rune". Runes that survive both in Anglo-Saxon and Younger Futhark rows, the runes will be known by at least two names, depending on context (strictly speaking, an Anglo-Saxon f rune is not the "same" letter as a YF f rune, but not even Unicode makes this distinction). WP:UCS on a case by case basis will be needed there. dab (𒁳) 18:52, 14 May 2008 (UTC)

The discussion was moved to the runic studies talk page on 21 May 2008.

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Link to alfatruin.msk.ru

I deleted this following the guidance at WP:EL and [4] which says:

Webpages in English are highly preferred. Linking to non-English pages may still be useful for readers in the following cases:

when the website is the subject of the article
when linking to pages with maps, diagrams, photos, tables (explain the key terms with the link, so that people who do not know the language can interpret them)
when the webpage contains key or authoritative information found on no English-language site and is used as a citation (or when translations on English-language sites are not authoritative).

Particularly we already have slightly more links than we should have, I'd like to know the rationale for having this one. Dougweller (talk) 11:02, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't approve of deleting links just because there isn't enough English on them, particularly when they are related to linguistics. Having said that, I'm not fighting for this, though I think content on the link in question was interesting. -- Evertype·✆ 08:08, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

this isn't about the Russian bits at all. The question is, should we link to Jon Olafsson of Grunnavik's MS. Runologia. This seems to be a notable early (18th century) work on runology. As long as we keep a separate runology article discussing the history of research, this manuscript should probably be discussed there. Better yet, we need an English equivalent of the is:Jón Grunnvíkingur article. Just linking to an 18th century treatise on runology without comment isn't very helpul. --dab (𒁳) 08:58, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

I note we have a redlink to Jón Ólafsson (runologist) at Jón Ólafsson. This is the article we should develop, and the alfatruin.msk.ru link would properly be placed there. --dab (𒁳) 09:01, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Old Turkic Script?

It is claimed here[5] that the Runnic scripts and the ancient Turkic (Gokturk) scripts may have some relation between each other. Has any further search done about this yet? Some signs/letters in Gokturk Runes look really similar, especially a, i, u etc.. Yasakresim (talk) 22:34, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

The relation between individual similar letters considering sound value seems close to zero. Apparently, most alphabets carved on wood etc. tend to look similar. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 23:04, 10 December 2010 (UTC)

You didn't read the resource, did you? Even you don't bother to read, do you? They can read the Runic script in ancient Gokturk language: http://www.antalya-ws.com/futhark/FUTHP3E.HTM 88.241.162.147 (talk) 22:18, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I know just about nothing of Turkish historical linguistics, but the technique used on the article seems to be based on connecting different runes based on external appearance, and then sort of interpret anything out of the result that roughly looks like Old Turkish and roughly makes sense. Looks extremely speculative. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 00:36, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Viewing / Display

Even if the instructions found on the linked page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Help:Special_characters the runic characters are still not displayed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.249.184.65 (talk) 11:44, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Significance of punctuation

The article mentions three punctuation marks for Runic. From what I can discern from my copy of the Hobbit (yes, an original runic source! :) ), it seems that the single punctuation was used instead of a space, and the multiple punctuation instead of a full-stop, but I'm unable to find anything concerning the use of the cross punctuation. Would anyone like to amend the article to fix this? -- TimNelson (talk) 04:06, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Do you have a reliable source that says this? I'm seeing reliable sources mention the three punctuation marks in the Unicode standard, but none about punctuation marks being used in runic alphabets. If some runic alphabets do use punctuation, it would need to be clarified which ones, but using a copy of the Hobbit to draw that conclusion is original research, and would need to be verified with a reliable source.

"runot"

Unlike mentioned in the text, "runot" means "poems" not "song" in Finnish language. (84.248.114.173 (talk) 00:18, 8 April 2012 (UTC))

2nd-century-BC runes

Whilst translating an academic book from the Spanish I have just come across a silver Roman denarius dated at the second century BC. This coin has six runic characters making a word on the reverse. I am attempting to identify the head of which Emperor appears on the face. If confirmed it will shift the date of the first known runic script back by three centuries. Geoffreybrooks (talk) 14:14, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

unicode characters

How do I get the intext runic to display on my computere. on every lemma about rune's I only get squares when ever there is a unicode rune used.

via the special character help page I changed my settings utf8 and sett my lettertype to a Unicode one. but for both Chrome and IE this does not do the trick.

Ian Splinter (talk) 10:06, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

I have the same problem with Safari and Firefox (for Mac). Where does one get the font set to be able to see these characters in the article? --VanBurenen (talk) 11:18, 26 July 2012 (UTC)