Anonymous, The Old English Rune Poem

Susanne Kries

Ed. by Hugh Magennis, Queen's University Belfast
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.01: English Writing and Culture: Old English, 500-1066.
Vol. editors: Richard William Dance (University of Cambridge), Hugh Magennis (Queen's University Belfast)

Dates

First circulation or publication c. 1050

Places

England (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Poetry (any)

Resources

Save to Bookshelf

The Old English

Rune Poem

consists of ninety-four lines, grouped in twenty-nine stanzas of two to five lines each. Each stanza is prefixed by a runic sign in alphabetical order, followed by a description of the object or concept that each of the twenty-nine runic letters signify. While runic symbols occasionally occur in other Old English texts, the closest parallel to the Old English

Rune Poem

is found in two significantly younger poems from Scandinavia: the Old Norwegian and Icelandic

Rune Poems

. Their existence points to a shared cultural tradition, whose original purpose might have been the preservation of wisdom and learning by means of a human cultural instrument, the runic alphabet.

The eleventh century manuscript of the Old English Rune Poem, MS Cotton Otho B. x, was almost

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

482 words

Citation: Kries, Susanne. "The Old English Rune Poem". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 25 October 2002 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=11654, accessed 24 April 2024.]

Save this article