An ancient stone from the River, speckled with runes, as was previously believed, told of a heroic feat, until a group of Swedish researchers from the University of Gothenburg reanalyzed and found out that the 762 runes did not speak of the fearlessness of the Vikings.
The opinion that the Scandinavian sailors were fearless, fierce warriors was formed thanks to numerous works of cinema and literature, it is supported by historians, whose knowledge is largely based on a runic inscription carved on a stone from the River.
The inscriptions on the runestone from the River date from the first half of the 9th century. Earlier it was stated that the stone is a memorial stone, since this was indicated by the line: “These runes speak about Vemud. Varin folded them in honor of his fallen son. Scientists who were deciphering the inscription first read the following legend:
Tell me, memory, what prey there were two, which was mined twelve times on the battlefield, and both were taken together, from person to person.
Tell me who is in nine knees
lost his life among the Ostrogoths
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and still all the first in the battle.
Thjodrik ruled
brave in battle, helmsman of warriors
ready at sea.
Now he sits, holding your shield, on a gothic horse, leader of the mehring.
Despite the many options for translations, it was believed that this long inscription was not inaccessible to understanding. But now Professor Per Holmberg, associate professor of the Department of Scandinavian Languages at the University of Gothenburg, argues that these runes "are not as easy to understand as they used to be," reports The Daily Mail.
“The inscription on the front of the stone says that it should be read in daylight, on the other side it says how to properly carve the runes in the stone,” says Holmberg. Previously, experts believed that this runestone is unique in its kind and is simply obliged to narrate about exploits and battles. This conviction caused speculation about the belonging of the stone to a certain Varin, who tells about the Gothic kings and the feat of his son.
The method Holmberg used is called sociosemiotics. This science helps to explain the process of making sense in a social context.
“10 years ago, the linguist Bo Ralph suggested that the story of the Gothic king Theodoric the Great (Theodoric the Great is the sole ruler of the Ostrogoth kingdom, one of the Germanic tribes) on the runestone from the River may be a fantasy with an admixture of nationalism, but there was a lack of an interpretation that would ruled out such fantasies,”said Holmberg.
According to him, without a modern text theory, it was almost impossible to find out which sections of the runic ligature were most important, so it was easier to believe in the theory of the Gothic king than in the instructions for reading the runes.
Holmberg concluded that information about the technology of carving runes on stone is much more valuable for science than ancient tales of exploits, which can also be read in fiction.