Brian Hagan: Psychic and Rune Reader

The word “rune” itself means “mystery” and the history of runes is full of it.  The existence of runes may go back as far as 200 BC, but nobody’s really sure.  Scholars are still debating if its roots are in Latin or Greek, and the truth may be somewhere in the middle.  To make matters more difficult, the Nazis took an interest in Runes during the 1920s and 30s.  Their research was so distorted that decades of work were thrown away and the Nazi stigma prevented further genuine research on the Runes for almost another 50 years.

What we do know is that, as an alphabet, they were never tied directly to a spoken language.  It’s uncertain if the Runes were first an alphabet or a means of magic, but they have persisted as powerful symbols that each had their own meaning.  Cultures all across northern Europe started using the Runes for a variety of purposes, from divination to decoration.

When it came to divination, Rune Casters were most frequently women due to the belief that they have a natural connection to magic.  This belief is even reflected in the meaning of one of the Runes, Laguz, which is connected with water, magic, and female fertility.

There are a wide variety of methods for writing Runes that were developed by different cultures at different times, furthering the belief in their power and mystery.  Despite this, the Runes were not necessarily restricted to religious heads.  Depending on the culture, divination with the Runes could be done by anyone at any time.  As a matter of convenience, Runes were most often made from a tree branch, cut into small sections and the Runes carved into the surface.  Then the most senior person there–which would be the religious head if done publicly in the village–would perform the divination.

Over time the Runes have changed and evolved into different sets.  The most common used for divination is the Elder Futhark, but there is also the Younger Futhark (also known as the Norse Futhark), the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc (also known as the Anglo-Friesian Futhark), and the Armanen Futhark.  While the oldest set of Runes has 24 letters, the various Futharks have had as few as 16 and as many as 38!

To this day Runes see a wide and varied use, frequently used by the New Age movement and often the subject of fiction, the most famous of which is the Dwarven language created by JRR Tolkien.