The Norsta runestone is an 11th-century

runestone A runestone is typically a raised stone with a runic alphabet, runic inscription, but the term can also be applied to inscriptions on boulders and on bedrock. The tradition of erecting runestones as a memorial to dead men began in the 4th centur ...

inscribed in

Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...

with the Younger Futhark that stands near Wik Castle outside

Uppsala Uppsala ( ; ; archaically spelled ''Upsala'') is the capital of Uppsala County and the List of urban areas in Sweden by population, fourth-largest city in Sweden, after Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Malmö. It had 177,074 inhabitants in 2019. Loc ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...

. It is notable because of the mention of two people named "maiden" and Sweyn. The form ''møy'' which appears on this runestone is the accusative form of

Old East Norse Old East Norse was a dialect of Old Norse which evolved into the languages of Old Danish and Old Swedish from the 9th century to the 12th century. Between 800 and 1100, East Norse is in Sweden called '' Runic Swedish'' and in Denmark ''Runic ...

''māʀ'' which meant "maiden" and this is the only attestation of this word as the name of a girl, in

, besides a mention in the '' Hervarar saga'', where a ''Mær'' ("maiden" in

Old West Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and their ...

) married the Swedish king Inge I. Her brother was

Blot-Sweyn Blot-Sweyn (Swedish: ''Blot-Sven'') was a Sweden, Swedish king c. 1080, of disputed historicity, who was said to have replaced his Christians, Christian brother-in-law Inge I of Sweden, Inge as King of Sweden, when Inge had refused to administer t ...

, who succeeded Inge. As the runestone is from about the same time as Blot-Sweyn, it is likely that the Sweyn mentioned in the runestone is the same as the Swedish king Blot-Sweyn.

Inscription

Notes

{{reflist

Sources

*
Sveriges runinskrifter
' (1922) by Erik Brate *

Rundata The Scandinavian Runic-text Database () is a project involving the creation and maintenance of a database of transliterated runic inscriptions. The project's goal is to comprehensively catalog runestones in a machine-readable way for future resea ...

Runestones in Uppland Runestones raised in memory of women 11th-century inscriptions Uppsala Municipality

Inscription

See also

Notes

Sources