Reading the Runes in the Isle of Man

In March, a group of students on the MA in Viking and Anglo-Saxon Studies went on a field trip to the Isle of Man to hone their runological skills, led by Judith Jesch. This small island is unique in having 31 stones with Scandinavian runic inscriptions from the Viking Age, as well as a good range of other Viking sites and artefacts. The scene was set with visits to the Balladoole burial site, and then the Manx Museum on Friday, with Saturday and Sunday devoted largely to study of the runic monuments, though we also found time for quick visits to a Viking Age settlement at Braaid and the old assembly site at Tynwald. The group studied 26 of the Scandinavian rune-stones (plus the only two Anglo-Saxon ones) at nine different church sites. The students produced their own readings of each inscription and discussed the difficulties of reading and interpretation. John Gallagher said, ‘Much of what we know about the Vikings comes from reading their literature and trying to conceptualise this very distant culture in our minds. The opportunity to examine the artefacts of this culture gave us a hands-on experience of the Vikings.’ For Kate Crossley, ‘Working directly from the stones is an experience that cannot be replicated by using photographs or facsimiles’.