Thurisaz

ᚦ · Old English þorn

The rune of Thurisaz
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Soundth
The namea giant in the Norse alphabets; a thorn in the English one
Old English runeþorn
✦
In the Old English Rune Poem
Þ. (the thorn) is exceedingly sharp, an evil thing for any knight to touch, uncommonly severe on all who sit among them.
Where this comes from

The Old English Rune Poem is the fullest surviving poem about the runes. It describes the Anglo-Saxon futhorc, which grew out of the Elder Futhark, so the stanza below belongs to the Old English rune that continues this one rather than to the Elder Futhark rune itself.

The Anglo-Saxon Runic Poem, translated by Bruce Dickins in Runic and Heroic Poems of the Old Teutonic Peoples (Cambridge University Press, 1915). The text and the runes are in the public domain.

The letterform is redrawn from the public-domain vector runes on Wikimedia Commons, set on a common canvas so every rune in the row is the same size.

The Scandinavian alphabets name this rune þurs, a giant; the Old English one names it þorn. Dickins notes the two names have no connection with each other.

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