Elder Futhark Runes — draw, with the rune poem
Draws one, three or five of the 24 staves and gives each its name, its sound, what the word means, and the Anglo-Saxon Rune Poem stanza in Old English with a translation. It deliberately does not print a divinatory meaning: those are 20th-century inventions under copyright, and no medieval source gives one.
Twenty-four staves of the Elder Futhark, drawn with the browser’s random source. Each comes with its reconstructed name, its sound value, what the word means, and the stanza the Anglo-Saxon Rune Poem gives it — in Old English, with a translation made here. What it does not come with is a divinatory meaning, and that absence is the most accurate thing on the page.
This is entertainment. The draw is real randomness and the poem is a real 10th-century text, but no one is claiming the staves know anything about you — and the meanings other sites print are modern inventions, which is why they are not here.
These position names are conventional and modern; no medieval source lays staves out this way. They are labels to read against, not a tradition.
Nothing drawn yet.
What this tool does not have
A divinatory meaning for each rune. The familiar ones are from 20th-century books, they are under copyright, and they are not attested: the medieval sources describe letters, not a card-like meaning for each. Rather than reprint someone’s invention as though it were old, this page gives you the name, the word, and the poem, and leaves the reading to you.
All twenty-four
| ᚠ | Fehu | /f/ | cattle, movable wealth |
| ᚢ | Uruz | /u/ | the aurochs, the wild ox |
| ᚦ | Thurisaz | /th/ | thorn; in Norse, a giant |
| ᚨ | Ansuz | /a/ | a god; in Old English, the mouth |
| ᚱ | Raidho | /r/ | riding, a journey on horseback |
| ᚲ | Kaunan | /k/ | a torch; in Norse, an ulcer |
| ᚷ | Gebo | /g/ | a gift |
| ᚹ | Wunjo | /w/ | joy |
| ᚺ | Hagalaz | /h/ | hail |
| ᚾ | Naudiz | /n/ | need, hardship, constraint |
| ᛁ | Isaz | /i/ | ice |
| ᛃ | Jera | /j/ | the year, the harvest |
| ᛇ | Eihwaz | /ï/ | the yew tree |
| ᛈ | Perthro | /p/ | unknown; perhaps a dice-cup or a pear tree |
| ᛉ | Algiz | /z/ | elk, or protection; in Old English, elk-sedge |
| ᛊ | Sowilo | /s/ | the sun |
| ᛏ | Tiwaz | /t/ | the god Tyr; a guiding star |
| ᛒ | Berkanan | /b/ | the birch |
| ᛖ | Ehwaz | /e/ | the horse |
| ᛗ | Mannaz | /m/ | a person, humankind |
| ᛚ | Laguz | /l/ | water, sea, lake |
| ᛜ | Ingwaz | /ng/ | Ing, a god or hero of the Danes |
| ᛞ | Dagaz | /d/ | day, daylight |
| ᛟ | Othala | /o/ | inherited land, the family estate |
ᚷ ᚺ ᚾ ᛁ ᛃ ᛇ ᛊ ᛗ ᛜ ᛞ — Ten of the twenty-four are unchanged by a half turn, so they can never come up reversed. Sites that reverse all 24 are reversing ᛁ and ᚷ, which does nothing.
Sources
- The Anglo-Saxon Rune Poem, from George Hickes’s 1705 printing of the manuscript that burned in 1731 (Cotton Otho B.x), via Wikisource. Public domain.
- Rune names and sound values follow the standard reconstruction of the Elder Futhark; the futhark order is attested from the Kylver stone, c. 400.
- Translations of the poem are our own. Bruce Dickins’s 1915 English is the one everyone quotes and is still under copyright in life-plus-70 countries.
- The draw is Fisher–Yates over crypto.getRandomValues.
- Old English text: the Anglo-Saxon Rune Poem, from Hickes’s 1705 printing of the lost Cotton Otho B.x, via Wikisource. Translations here are our own, not Bruce Dickins’s 1915 version, which is still in copyright in life-plus-70 countries.
How to use it
Draw one, three or five
Without replacement, from all 24. The position names on the three- and five-stave draws are modern conventions and the page says so; they are labels to read against, not a tradition.
Notice which staves cannot be reversed
Ten of the twenty-four are unchanged by a half turn — ᛁ, ᚷ, ᛞ and seven others — so they can never come up reversed. Sites that reverse all 24 are turning those around and calling it something.
Read the poem, not a meaning
The stanza is what the tradition actually says about the letter: hail is the whitest of grains, the yew is rough outside and hard in the earth. It is a mnemonic about the world, and what you make of it beside your question is your business rather than ours.
Common questions
Where are the rune meanings?
Not here, on purpose. The familiar list — fehu as new beginnings and so on — comes from 20th-century books, above all Ralph Blum’s Book of Runes (1982). They are recent, they are invented, and they are under copyright. There is no medieval source that says what a rune means when it falls out of a bag; Tacitus describes marked twigs and does not say what the marks were. Reprinting someone’s invention as though it were old is the one thing this corner of the site refuses to do.
Is the poem itself reliable?
It is real and it is old, with two caveats the page states. It survives only in George Hickes’s 1705 printing, because the manuscript burned in 1731; and it describes the 29-letter Old English futhorc, not the 24-letter Elder Futhark, so the names have shifted. It is also Christian and it is a schoolroom mnemonic, not a divination manual.
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