ELDER FUTHARK · HAGAL'S AETT · RUNE 14 OF 24
Perthro ᛈ
“Lot-cup” · the sound p
IN A READING
Mystery, chance, the hidden.
REVERSED
Secrets exposed badly, stagnation, bad luck.
IN MAGIC
Divination; revealing hidden factors.
In the rune poems
Three medieval poems give a short verse to each rune's name, the oldest record of what the names meant. What they stress for Perthro: a source of play and laughter among the bold, in the hall.
THE OLD ENGLISH RUNE POEM · ᛈ PEORTH
Peorð byþ symbleplega and hlehterwlancum [on middum],ðar wigan sittaþon beorselebliþe ætsomne.
Known only from George Hickes's printing of 1705; the manuscript burned in the Cotton library fire of 1731.
The Icelandic and Norwegian poems have no verse for Perthro: they follow the sixteen-rune Younger Futhark, which gave it up.
The verses are given in their own languages, Old English from Bruce Dickins's edition (1915) as transcribed on Wikisource, Old Icelandic as normalised in Wikipedia's article on the rune poems. Square brackets mark words the editors restored.
In the later rows
Anglo-Saxon futhorc
ᛈPeorth
Younger Futhark
Given up when the row was cut to sixteen, about 800.
Hagal's aett
The futhark falls into three rows of eight, the aettir. Perthro is number 6 of Hagal's aett:
Learn more in the lessons
- The Elder Futhark Runes · 15 min
- Runes in Magic · 15 min
- The Younger Futhark and the Runestones · 18 min