Nordic Runes: Understanding, Casting, and Interpreting the Ancient Viking Oracle

By Paul Rhys Mountfort

Book Overview

A comprehensive and practical guide to the ancient oracle based on the runic alphabet of the Norse

- Reveals the symbolism and divinatory significance of the 24 rune "staves"

- Provides clear instructions on how to craft your own rune stones

- Explains the role of runes in the Norse wisdom tradition and its influence on such works as Tolkien's Lord of the Rings

Nordic runes are a potent and profoundly transformative magic system that gives contemporary readers access to the ancient wisdom tradition of Northern European cultures. The runes have deep resonances within the pagan Norse world of gods and goddesses, giants, dwarves, warriors, and wizards, which have greatly influenced the work of J.R.R. Tolkien, among others. Norse tradition attributes the discovery of the runes to the "All-Father" Odin--a god of inspiration and secret wisdom and the mythical prototype for runecasters, who established the pattern for gaining his knowledge.

Nordic Runes addresses three major areas: Runelore, the history of this 2000-year-old Norse oracle; Runestaves, the meaning of the individual runes of the Elder Futhark alphabet and their powerful mythological, magical, and practical lessons for daily life; and Runecasting, a comprehensive guide to the oracular application of the ancient runes, including their crafting, divination, and self-development. As Nordic Runes shows, the runes do more than simply reflect the path of fate; they help develop and enhance intuition. By learning to cast and interpret the runes, the user becomes receptive to the energy currents in material reality and empowered in the arts of its transformation.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0892810939
• ISBN13: 9780892810932
• Release Date: May 2003
• Publisher: Destiny Books
• Length: 288 Pages
• Weight: 0.97 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

Great starting point

This book is easy to follow and my mother gave me a copy of this book as I adjust love reading runes. It is very informative if you are looking to learn about the divination. Great for baby witches or this just curious about the history of runes.

A good beginners book on rune reading

The Author has established a niche for his trilogy on divination techniques from the ancient Celts, Norse, and western Europeans and he has kept within that niche with this book. It does not provide an elaborate discussion of the history of the runes and the different systems in use. He takes the Elder Futhark, using dagaz and othila as the twenty-third and twenty-fourth runes, respectively and provides the pronunciation guides, poetry, lore, and more needed to develop an understanding of each of the individual runes. I have a fair-sized collection of rune reading books but the spreads and casting techniques provided in "Nordic Runes" were new to me.Two problems: (1) reversed runes are not well explained initially, however, the Author clarifies them in the spreads and casting section; (2) the Author denies any significance to the aettir - i.e. he believes that their order does not have any hidden meaning.For folks new to rune work, the final chapter provides an overview of the major books and authors from the past 20 years."Nordic Runes" is a good platform for further runic studies for folks drawn to this kind of work.