UMD Theses and Dissertations

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/3

New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a given thesis/dissertation in DRUM.

More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.

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Author: search.filters.author.Bishop, ChristopherSubject: search.filters.subject.Literature, Germanic

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    Runic Magic
    (2007-05-03) Bishop, Christopher; Oster, Rose-Marie; Germanic Language and Literature; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    This thesis seeks to illustrate that runes were considered magical even if also utilized as an alphabetic script. This argument will be achieved by first looking at scholarly arguments concerning the characters' origins. However, though runes may be compared to other scripts, there existed a belief among the Old Norse people that the runes contained more and that even their true origins could be found in the divine. These divine connections are not without problems as they seem to fall into two categories involving male and female divinities. In addition, it will be shown that the practice of runic magic can be separated into three major categories: curse, cure/protection, and prophecy. More mundane, but equally important subjects such as memorials and inheritance will also be explored. Finally, lingering traces of runes continuing until today will be viewed to gauge lasting effects of the runes even after their primary time period.