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Othala (), also known as ēðel and odal, is a
rune Runes are the letters in a set of related alphabets, known as runic rows, runic alphabets or futharks (also, see '' futhark'' vs ''runic alphabet''), native to the Germanic peoples. Runes were primarily used to represent a sound value (a ...
that represents the ''o'' and ''œ'' phonemes in the
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 Per ...
and the
Anglo-Saxon Futhorc Anglo-Saxon runes or Anglo-Frisian runes are runes that were used by the Anglo-Saxons and Medieval Frisians (collectively called Anglo-Frisians) as an alphabet in their native writing system, recording both Old English and Old Frisian (, ᚱ ...
writing systems respectively. Its name is derived from the reconstructed
Proto-Germanic Proto-Germanic (abbreviated PGmc; also called Common Germanic) is the linguistic reconstruction, reconstructed proto-language of the Germanic languages, Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages. Proto-Germanic eventually developed from ...
*''ōþala-'' "heritage; inheritance, inherited estate". As it does not occur in Younger Futhark, it disappears from the Scandinavian record around the 8th century, but its usage continued in England into the 11th century, where it was sometimes further used in manuscripts as a shorthand for the word ("homeland"), similarly to how other runes were sometimes used at the time. As with other symbols used historically in Europe such as the
swastika The swastika (卐 or 卍, ) is a symbol used in various Eurasian religions and cultures, as well as a few Indigenous peoples of Africa, African and Indigenous peoples of the Americas, American cultures. In the Western world, it is widely rec ...
and
Celtic cross upright 0.75 , A Celtic cross symbol The Celtic cross is a form of ringed cross, a Christian cross featuring a nimbus or ring, that emerged in the British Isles and Western Europe in the Early Middle Ages. It became widespread through its u ...
, othala has been appropriated by far-right groups such as the
Nazi party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor ...
and neo-Nazis, who have used it to represent ideas like Aryan heritage, a usage that is wholly modern and not attested in any ancient or medieval source. The rune also continues to be used in non-racist contexts, both in Heathenry and in wider popular culture such as the works of J.R.R. Tolkien and video games.


Name and etymology

The sole attested name of the rune is , meaning "homeland". Based on this, and cognates in other
Germanic languages The Germanic languages are a branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family spoken natively by a population of about 515 million people mainly in Europe, North America, Oceania, and Southern Africa. The most widely spoke ...
such as and , the can be reconstructed, meaning "ancestral land", "the land owned by one's kin", and by extension "property" or "inheritance". is in turn derived from , meaning "nobility" and "disposition". Terms derived from are formative elements in some
Germanic name Germanic given names are traditionally dithematic; that is, they are formed from two elements ( stems), by joining a prefix and a suffix. For example, King Æþelred's name was derived from ', meaning "noble", and ', meaning "counsel". The i ...
s, notably ''
Ulrich Ulrich () is a Germanic given name derived from Old High German ''Uodalrich'', ''Odalric''. It is composed of the elements ''Othala rune, uodal-'' meaning "heritage" and ''-rih'' meaning "king, ruler". Attested from the 8th century as the name of Al ...
''. The term "odal" () refers to Scandinavian laws of inheritance which established land rights for families that had owned that parcel of land over a number of generations, restricting its sale to others. Among other aspects, this protected the inheritance rights of daughters against males from outside the immediate family. Some of these laws remain in effect today in Norway as the '' Odelsrett'' ( allodial right). The tradition of Udal law found in
Shetland Shetland (until 1975 spelled Zetland), also called the Shetland Islands, is an archipelago in Scotland lying between Orkney, the Faroe Islands, and Norway, marking the northernmost region of the United Kingdom. The islands lie about to the ...
,
Orkney Orkney (), also known as the Orkney Islands, is an archipelago off the north coast of mainland Scotland. The plural name the Orkneys is also sometimes used, but locals now consider it outdated. Part of the Northern Isles along with Shetland, ...
, and the
Isle of Man The Isle of Man ( , also ), or Mann ( ), is a self-governing British Crown Dependency in the Irish Sea, between Great Britain and Ireland. As head of state, Charles III holds the title Lord of Mann and is represented by a Lieutenant Govern ...
, is from the same origin.


Elder Futhark ''o''-rune

The ''o''-rune is attested early, in inscriptions from the 3rd century, such as the Thorsberg chape
DR7
and the Vimose planer (''Vimose-Høvelen''
DR 206
. The corresponding Gothic letter is (derived from Greek Ω), which had the name ''oþal''. The othala rune is found in some transitional inscriptions of the 6th or 7th century, such as the Gummarp, Björketorp and Stentoften runestones, but it disappears from the Scandinavian record by the 8th century. The
Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...
''o'' phoneme at this time becomes written in Younger Futhark in the same way as the ''u'' phoneme, with the Ur rune. It has been suggested that the othala rune on the Ring of Pietroassa is used to represent the word "*oþal", referencing the ring as hereditary treasure. Similarly, Wolfgang Krause speculated that the ''o'' rune is used as an ideograph denoting possession in the Thorsberg chape inscription, reading the inscription ''owlþuþewaz'' as ''O ila- W þu-þewaz'' "inherited property - the servant of Wulþuz".


Anglo-Saxon ''œ''-rune


Usage and shape

The
Anglo-Saxon runes Anglo-Saxon runes or Anglo-Frisian runes are runes that were used by the Anglo-Saxons and Medieval Frisians (collectively called Anglo-Frisians) as an alphabet in their native writing system, recording both Old English and Old Frisian (, ᚱ ...
preserve the full set of 24 Elder Futhark runes (as well as introducing innovations), but in some cases these runes are given new sound values due to Anglo-Frisian sound changes. The othala rune is such a case: the ''o'' sound in the Anglo-Saxon system is now expressed by ''ōs'' ᚩ, a derivation of the old Ansuz rune; the othala rune is known in
Old English Old English ( or , or ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...
as ''ēðel'' (with umlaut due to the form ''ōþila-'') and is used to express an ''œ'' sound, but is attested only rarely in epigraphy (outside of simply appearing in a futhark row). In some runic inscriptions, such as on the Seax of Beagnoth, and more commonly in manuscripts, othala is written with a single vertical line instead of the two diagonal legs, perhaps due to its simpler form. The rune is also used as a shorthand for the word or ("ancestral property or land") in texts such as ''
Beowulf ''Beowulf'' (; ) is an Old English poetry, Old English poem, an Epic poetry, epic in the tradition of Germanic heroic legend consisting of 3,182 Alliterative verse, alliterative lines. It is one of the most important and List of translat ...
'', '' Waldere'' and the Old English translation of Orosius' '' Historiae adversus paganos''. This is similar to wider practices of the time, in which runes such as , and were also used as shorthands to write the name of the rune.


Notable attestations

Epigraphical attestations include: *the Frisian Westeremden yew-stick, possibly as part of a given name ''Ƿimod'' (''Ƿimœd'') *the Harford (Norfolk) brooch, dated c. 650, in a finite verb form: ''luda:gibœtæsigilæ'' "Luda repaired the brooch" *the left panel of the Franks Casket, twice: '' tƿœgen gibroþær afœddæ hiæ ƿylif'' "two brothers (scil.
Romulus and Remus In Roman mythology, Romulus and (, ) are twins in mythology, twin brothers whose story tells of the events that led to the Founding of Rome, founding of the History of Rome, city of Rome and the Roman Kingdom by Romulus, following his frat ...
), a she-wolf nourished them".


Rune poem

The Anglo-Saxon rune poem preserves the meaning "an inherited estate" for the rune name:


Modern use


Far-right iconography

The othala rune, like some other runes, was adopted as an occult symbol by German Nazi occultists and thereof in the 1930s, later being adopted by the German
Schutzstaffel The ''Schutzstaffel'' (; ; SS; also stylised with SS runes as ''ᛋᛋ'') was a major paramilitary organisation under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany, and later throughout German-occupied Europe during World War II. It beg ...
(SS) as an SS-rune to symbolise kinship, family and blood ties within the
Aryan race The Aryan race is a pseudoscientific historical race concepts, historical race concept that emerged in the late-19th century to describe people who descend from the Proto-Indo-Europeans as a Race (human categorization), racial grouping. The ter ...
. The SS modified the symbol with serifs, also called "feet" or "wings", subsequently being nicknamed "Winged Othala" and thereof in modern times. It was subsequently used by various military divisions within the German Army during World War II and also became the badge of the SS Race and Settlement Main Office, which was responsible for maintaining the racial purity of the SS. After World War II, this symbol has seen continued by Neo-Nazis and similar far-right collectives. White supremacists who use the rune often claim it symbolises the heritage or land of "
white White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...
" or " Aryan" people which should be free from foreigners. Usages such as these are not attested in any source from before the modern period, being invented by members of these groups.


Popular culture

Othala is widely used in popular culture, including by J.R.R. Tolkien along with other historical runes in The Hobbit, as seen on Thror's map of Erebor. These further form the base for the dwarvish
Cirth The Cirth (, meaning "runes"; sg. certh ) is a semi‑artificial script, based on real‑life runic alphabets, one of Tolkien's scripts, several scripts invented by J. R. R. Tolkien for the constructed languages he devised and used in his wor ...
writing systems used in
The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an Epic (genre), epic high fantasy novel written by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's book ''The Hobbit'' but eventually d ...
and described in Tolkien's Legendarium. The rune is also used as the symbol for the "Lore" resource in Northgard, released in 2018, and in
Stargate SG-1 ''Stargate SG-1'' (often stylized in all caps, or abbreviated ''SG-1'') is a military science fiction Adventure fiction, adventure television series within Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's Stargate, ''Stargate'' franchise. The show, created by Brad Wrig ...
, Othala is a world in the Ida Galaxy where the Asgard had lived. The Anti-Defamation League notes that because it is part of the runic alphabet, the othala rune is often used in non-racist manners, such as these, and should be interpreted in conjunction with its context.


Heathenry

Othala, along with other runes more widely, often feature prominently in the practices of Heathens, and are commonly used to decorate items and in tattoos. The use of runes such as othala by far-right groups has been strongly condemned by some Heathen groups, including Asatru UK which released a public statement that " tis categorically opposed to fascist movements, or any movements, using the symbols of our faith for hate".


See also

* Troll cross – A symbol which resembles the rune


References


Bibliography


Primary

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Secondary

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External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Odal (Rune) Fascist symbols Heraldic charges Nazi symbolism Runes Symbols