300px, The Fyrby Runestone from Södermanland, Sweden. The Fyrby Runestone, which is designated as Sö 56 in the Rundata catalog, is a

Viking Age The Viking Age () was the period during the Middle Ages when Norsemen known as Vikings undertook large-scale raiding, colonizing, conquest, and trading throughout Europe and reached North America. It followed the Migration Period and the Germ ...

memorial

runestone A runestone is typically a raised stone with a runic inscription, but the term can also be applied to inscriptions on boulders and on bedrock. The tradition began in the 4th century and lasted into the 12th century, but most of the runestones d ...

located in Fyrby, which is about 15 kilometers south of

Flen Flen (local pronunciation ''Flén'') is a locality and the seat of Flen Municipality, Södermanland County, Sweden with 6,229 inhabitants in 2010. Flen evolved as a railway junction and got the title of a city in 1949. Since 1971 it is the seat o ...

Södermanland County Södermanland County ( sv, Södermanlands län) is a county or ''län'' on the southeast coast of Sweden. In the local Sörmlandic dialects it is virtually universally shortened and pronounced as Sörmlands län, or simply Sörmland, which is th ...

, Sweden, and in the historic province of

Södermanland Södermanland ( or ), locally Sörmland, sometimes referred to under its Latin form ''Sudermannia'' or ''Sudermania'', is a historical province or ''landskap'' on the south eastern coast of Sweden. It borders Östergötland, Närke, Västman ...

Description

The

runic inscription A runic inscription is an inscription made in one of the various runic alphabets. They generally contained practical information or memorials instead of magic or mythic stories. The body of runic inscriptions falls into the three categories of E ...

on the Fyrby Runestone consists of runic text within a band that curves along the face of the north side of a granite boulder that is two meters in height. The runic inscription is classified as being carved in

runestone style :''The term "runestone style" in the singular may refer to the Urnes style.'' The style or design of runestones varied during the Viking Age. The early runestones were simple in design, but towards the end of the runestone era they became increa ...

RAK. RAK is the classification for the oldest style where the ends of the runic bands are straight and there are no animal designs. The inscription is considered somewhat enigmatic due to its use of the pronoun "I" at the beginning of the runic text, which might even refer to the stone itself speaking to the reader. p. 471-472. This runestone is notable for its reference to

Midgard In Germanic cosmology, Midgard (an anglicised form of Old Norse ; Old English , Old Saxon , Old High German , and Gothic ''Midjun-gards''; "middle yard", "middle enclosure") is the name for Earth (equivalent in meaning to the Greek term , "inhab ...

("Middle Earth"), which was one of the nine worlds of

Norse cosmology Norse cosmology is the study of the cosmos (cosmology) as perceived by the ancient North Germanic peoples. The topic encompasses concepts from Norse mythology, such as notions of time and space, cosmogony, personifications, anthropogeny, and e ...

and the home of humans. The period that proposed for the RAK style was 990-1010 AD. The runic text indicates that the inscription is a memorial to a father from his two sons which also boasts of the skills of the sons in rune-making, claiming that the brothers were the most skilled in runes in ''Miðgarði'' or "Middle Earth". One personal name in the inscription contains the name of the

Norse pagan Old Norse religion, also known as Norse paganism, is the most common name for a branch of Germanic religion which developed during the Proto-Norse period, when the North Germanic peoples separated into a distinct branch of the Germanic people ...

god

Freyr Freyr (Old Norse: 'Lord'), sometimes anglicized as Frey, is a widely attested god in Norse mythology, associated with kingship, fertility, peace, and weather. Freyr, sometimes referred to as Yngvi-Freyr, was especially associated with Sweden an ...

as a

theophoric name A theophoric name (from Greek: , ''theophoros'', literally "bearing or carrying a god") embeds the word equivalent of 'god' or God's name in a person's name, reflecting something about the character of the person so named in relation to that dei ...

element. The father's name, Freysteinn, means "Freyr's Stone." In addition, the ''Hár'' or "High" in the name Hásteinn, which means "High Stone", may refer to the

byname An epithet (, ), also byname, is a descriptive term (word or phrase) known for accompanying or occurring in place of a name and having entered common usage. It has various shades of meaning when applied to seemingly real or fictitious people, di ...

Hár of the god Odin. The names in the Fyrby Runestone inscription also reflect a common practice of that time in Scandinavia of repeating an element in a parent's name in the names of the children. p. 750. Here the ''steinn'' from the father's name, Freystein, is repeated in the names of the two sons, Hásteinn and Holmsteinn, to show the family relationship. The statement that the sons placed ''stafa marga'' or "many staffs" in memory of their father may refer to the staves of the runes in the text. Two other inscriptions, DR 40 in Randbøl and Sm 16 in Nöbbele, make explicit use of the word "staff" to refer to runes. Other inscriptions which use the word in reference to the raising of a staff as a monument include Sö 196 in Kolsundet, Vs 1 in Stora Ryttern, U 226 in Bällsta, the now-lost U 332 in Vreta, and the now-lost U 849 in Balingsta.

Inscription

In Unicode

:ᛁᛅᚴ᛫ᚢᛅᛁᛏ᛬ᚼᛅᛋᛏᛅᛁᚾ᛬ᚦᛅ᛬ᚼᚢᛚᛘᛋᛏᛅᛁᚾ᛬ᛒᚱᚢᚦᚱ᛫ᛘᛂᚾᚱ᛬ᚱᚢᚾᛅᛋᛏᛅ᛬ᛅ᛬ᛘᛁᚦᚴᛅᚱᚦᛁ᛬ᛋᛂᛏᚢ᛬ᛋᛏᛅᛁᚾ᛬ᛅᚢᚴ᛬ᛋᛏᛅᚠᛅ᛬ᛘᛅᚱᚵᛅ ¶ ᛂᚠᛐᛁᛦ᛫ᚠᚱᛅᚤᛋᛏᛅᛁᚾ᛬ᚠᛅᚦᚢᚱ᛫ᛋᛁᚾ

Transliteration of the runes into Latin characters

250px, Detail showing the runes a : miþkarþi for ''á Miðgarði'', "in Middle Earth." :iak · uait : hastain : þa : hulmstain : bryþr · menr : rynasta : a : miþkarþi : setu : stain : auk : stafa : marga ¶ eftiʀ · fraystain · faþur · sin ·Project Samnordisk Runtextdatabas Svensk
- Rundata entry for Sö 56.

Transcription

Old West Norse

:Ek veit Hástein þá Holmstein brœðr menn rýnasta á Miðgarði, settu stein ok stafa marga eptir Freystein, fǫður sinn.

Runic Swedish

:Iak væit Hāstæin þā Holmstæin brø̄ðr mænnr rȳnasta ā Miðgarði, sattu stæin ok stafa marga æftiʀ Frøystæin, faður sinn.

Translation in English

:I know Hásteinn and Holmsteinn, the most rune-skilled brothers in

(Middle-yard), placed many a stone and staff in memory of Freysteinn, their father.

Alliterative verse

It has been noted that the inscription on the Fyrby Runestone can be read as an

alliterative verse In prosody, alliterative verse is a form of verse that uses alliteration as the principal ornamental device to help indicate the underlying metrical structure, as opposed to other devices such as rhyme. The most commonly studied traditions of ...

, specifically in

fornyrðislag In prosody, alliterative verse is a form of verse that uses alliteration as the principal ornamental device to help indicate the underlying metrical structure, as opposed to other devices such as rhyme. The most commonly studied traditions of ...

metre The metre (British spelling) or meter (American spelling; see spelling differences) (from the French unit , from the Greek noun , "measure"), symbol m, is the primary unit of length in the International System of Units (SI), though its prefi ...

: ::

References

External links

Photograph of Sö 56
in 1985 - Swedish National Heritage Board {{runestones Runestones in Södermanland 10th-century inscriptions 11th-century inscriptions