The Hogganvik runestone is a fifth-century
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 da ...
, bearing an
Elder Futhark
The Elder Futhark (or Fuþark), also known as the Older Futhark, Old Futhark, or Germanic Futhark, is the oldest form of the runic alphabets. It was a writing system used by Germanic peoples for Northwest Germanic dialects in the Migration Peri ...
inscription, that was discovered in September 2009 by Arnfinn Henriksen, a resident of Hogganvik, in the Sånum-Lundevik area of
Mandal
A tehsil (, also known as tahsil, taluka, or taluk) is a local unit of administrative division in some countries of South Asia. It is a subdistrict of the area within a district including the designated populated place that serves as its administr ...
,
Vest-Agder
Vest-Agder (; "West Agder") was one of 18 counties (''fylker'') in Norway up until 1 January 2020, when it was merged with Aust-Agder to form Agder county. In 2016, there were 182,701 inhabitants, around 3.5% of the total population of Norway. I ...
,
Norway
Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...
, while working in the garden.
Description
The Hogganvik runestone is a stone slab of about , weighing approximately . It was lying face down and 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 El ...
is therefore well preserved. The inscription, which is in
Proto-Norse
Proto-Norse (also called Ancient Nordic, Ancient Scandinavian, Ancient Norse, Primitive Norse, Proto-Nordic, Proto-Scandinavian and Proto-North Germanic) was an Indo-European language spoken in Scandinavia that is thought to have evolved as a ...
, can be approximately dated to between 350 and 500
CE and consists of 62 characters, one a
bind-rune. This is an exceptionally long text for the early period, either the second longest after that of the
Tune stone
The Tune stone is an important runestone from about 200–450 AD. It bears runes of the Elder Futhark, and the language is Proto-Norse. It was discovered in 1627 in the church yard wall of the church in Tune, Østfold, Norway. Today it is house ...
(known since 1627), or possibly the third; the inscription on the
Rö stone has missing and illegible runes.
A report was issued in October 2009 by
runologist
Runology is the study of the Runic alphabets, Runic inscriptions and their history. Runology forms a specialized branch of Germanic linguistics.
History
Runology was initiated by Johannes Bureus (1568–1652), who was very interested in the lingu ...
James E. Knirk,
and provides a transliteration of the inscription.
Text
;Original runes
#
#
#
# //()
;Raw transliteration
#
#
#
# //()
Interpretation
# Skelba-þewaz’s
Shaking-servant’s" (personal name)stone
(grave) monumentaaasrpkf (a meaningless sequence of letters used as an incantation).
# I
the rune carver m calledNaudigastiz
"Need-guest" (personal name) (name of the Runecarver)
# I,
icknamedthe Wolverine.
# aarpaa (a non meaningful sequence of letters used as an incantation) ?Within/From within the ?wheel-nave/?cabin-corner
r: ?needle (Place)
The stone is a memorial. The meaningless sequences, with the repeated ''a'' runes, may be alphabet magic. The fourth line is hard to interpret. The middle two lines name the carver of the runes.
Archaeological investigation
In May 2010 an archaeological investigation was carried out. The face of the stone with the inscription was shown to be more weathered than the underside, indicating it had been raised over a grave, and a large
Iron Age
The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age (Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age (Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostly appl ...
burial was found under the site, but was not excavated.
See also
*
List of runestones
There are about 3,000 runestones in Scandinavia (out of a total of about 6,000 runic inscriptions). p. 38.
The runestones are unevenly distributed in Scandinavia:
The majority is found in Sweden, estimated at between 1,700 and 2,500 (depending o ...
References
Further reading
*
*
*
External links
*
*
{{Coord, 58, 2, 15.187, N, 7, 21, 53.856, E, region:NO-10_type:landmark, display=title
Mandal, Norway
5th-century inscriptions
Runestones in Norway
Proto-Norse language
2009 archaeological discoveries
Elder Futhark inscriptions