The Runes

The runes are a form of divination descending from ancient Nordic alphabets. If you are not familiar with divinatory tools, please vist my divination disclaimer.

The runes can be consulted for answering "yes and no" questions and for predicting the likely outcome of near future events as things stand.

There are four key principles to understanding the runes. The first is simply knowing what each rune means. This is outlined in the table below.

RUNE	NAME	M E A N I N G
	Wyrd	Cosmic power of fate; karma; the void
	Fehu	Material gain; fulfillment
	Uruz	Good health and stong, natural powers of resistance; masculinity; strong emotions; true will; changes
	Thurisaz	Protection; luck
	Ansuz	Spoken word; taking of advice; aquisition of wisdom; examination
	Raidho	Travel or movement
	Kenaz	Strength; energy; power; opening up; creativity
	Gifu	Gift; partnership
	Wunjo	Joy; success
	Hagall	Limitations; delay; all forces out of your control
	Nied	Patience; passing through a difficult learning situation; think twice; failure; needs
	Isa	Cesation of activities; cooling trend in a relationship
	Jera	Reaping of rewards for efforts expended; justice; legalities
	Eihwaz	Protection
	Perdhro	Things hidden; secrets; occult abilities; unexpected gains and surprises
	Eolh	Fortunate new influence; instincts; friendship; protection
	Sigel	Victory; great power; gret health and vitality
	Tir	Success in any competition; extreme motivation; increase in money or power; masculinity; quick recorvery from illness
	Beorc	Birth; family; true home
	Ehwaz	Physical movement; physical shifts; new dwelling places; gradual development; steady progress
	Mannaz	Independence; humankind
	Lagaz	Intuitive knoweledge; femininity; good memory; success in learning
	Ing	Successful conclusion; relief
	Daeg	increase and growth
	Othel	Possessions; ideals; visions; inherited traits

The next important principle is understaning reversals. When a rune is drawn reversed (i.e upside-down) then it means the opposite of what it would normally mean. For example, drawing Wunjo reversed would indicate sadness, instead of joy. Just as drawing Mannaz reversed would mean dependence as opposed to independence.

Certain runes, however, cannot be reversed. Runes such as Gifu, Isa, Ing, ect., simply mean the same thing no matter how tey are drawn.

The third step to mastering the runes is actually knowing how to do the runcast itself. This is done by dumping the runes from thier pouch onto a rune cloth. Now light a white candle and while staring into the flames, and say a brief prayer to Odin and Freya (Norse God and Goddess of the runes). My prayer usually goes something like this:

"Great lord Odin and Lady Freya, I am about to embark on the sacred journey of the runes. Guide my hands, oh mighty ones, and help them make the right choices."

Now make sure all the runes are turned over so that none of them can be seen. Close your eyes and carefully swirl them all around on the rune cloth, so as to mix them up without turning them over. Once they have been sufficiently mixed, you may either keep your eyes closed, or re-open them and stare into the candle flame. Concentrait on your question. Now with your receptive (left) hand, slowly move over the runes, feeling their energy. Continue moving your hand (some people find it eaisier to use only there index and middle fingers) about an inch or so above the runes, untill you find one whoose energy feels different. Pick this rune up (without turning it over) and place it aside some where on the rune cloth. repete this process untill you have the number of runes you need for your spread (see below). Then turn them over and interperet their meaning.

The final step toward mastery of the runes is simply practice. As with anything else, the more you practice with the runes, the better you will become at them. Some people like to do a runecast when they get up every morning, just to see how the day will be. This gives them a daily practice, and therefore, they become more and more proficient with them every day. I highly recomend this method of daily runecasts for anyone new to the runes. You will quickly find that you will start to simply know what the runes mean without having to look them up first. When this happens, it's a great feeling.

Spreads

Although there are probably thousands of different speads for runecasts available. I am only going to outline the two most basic and comon ones here. These are the one rune and the three rune spreads.

The one rune cast is the perfect type of spread to do for your daily cast. Simply draw one rune, place it aside on the cloth (note, be very careful when placing the runes, because if a rune is accidentally placed upside-down, then it comes out reversed, and obviously the runecast is incorrect). Now flip the rune over from left to right (never from top to bottom) and interpret it. This should give a generaly outlook of how the next 24 hors or so should be.

The three rune cast is ideal for answering "yes and no" questions, or for giving a general idea as to the state of things over the two weeks or so.

To cast this type of spread, simply draw three runes, and place them side by side. If you are using this spread to answer a "yes or no" question. Turn over all three runes at the same time. If you draw three positive runes, he answer is yes. If you draw three negitive or delay runes, the answer is no. If you draw two positive runes and one negitive or delay rune, the answer is still yes, but one should interperet the negitive rune to see what knid of difficulities may arise in arriving at a positive conclusion. If you draw to negitive or delay runes, the answer is no, but read the positive rune for ideas as to how to change the situation to make the answer yes.

The other way to use the three rune spread is to use it to answer a question about events which may come to pass in the next two weeks or so. Do this by drawing the three runes, then turning them over and interperet them one at a time. The rune on the far left is the subject rune. This tells you what the problem at hand is. The middle rune tells you what course of actions you should take, and the final rune tells you what the outcome will be if you follow this course of actions.

Runic Alphabets

Many Witches like to engrave there magickal name into ritual tools or in there book of shadows. Some people feel that this can be made more magickal by doing it iin a runic alphabet. There are probably hundereds of different runic alphabets, and it seems that just about everybody has a favorite. However, usually the basics are the same, and one person can (with some difficulty) interpret anothers runic wrightings. Here is a copy of the runic alphabet that I prefer.

to make capital letters, simply reverse the rune. Therefore a capital 'B' would be represented by Beorc reversed.

If you like, you may download a runic alphabet font for your computer here. This font was the same one I used to make most of the graphics for this page, and I highly recomend it.