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The Sæbø sword (also known as the Thurmuth sword) is an early 9th-century Viking sword, found in a barrow at Sæbø,
The sword itself is categorized as 'Type C' by Petersen (1919), who notes that it is unique in showing remnants of a metal thread at the broadsides of the upper hilt, compared to other specimens of the type which show horizontal ridges or protruding edges, or less commonly inlaid forged stripes or protruding moldings that seem to be imitations of twisted or smooth thread. It is described as an imitation of a foreign ontinentalsword inscription because of the lack of parallels in native tradition. There is an inscription realised in iron inlay along the center of the blade, close to the hilt.
The sword was described in 1867 by George Stephens, an English archaeologist and philologist who specialised in the runic inscriptions of Scandinavia, in his book ''Handbook of the Old-Northern Runic Monuments of Scandinavia and England''. In this work he showed a drawing of the sword with a very clear inscription comprising five runes or rune-like letters with a
Vikøyri
Vikøyri is the administrative center
An administrative centre is a seat of regional administration or local government, or a county town, or the place where the central administration of a commune, is located.
In countries with French as the ...
, in Norway's Sogn
Sogn is a traditional district in Western Norway (''Vestlandet''). It is located in the county of Vestland, surrounding the Sognefjord, the largest/longest fjord in Norway. The district of Sogn consists of the municipalities of Aurland, Balestra ...
region in 1825. It is now held at the Bergen Museum in Bergen
Bergen (, ) is a city and municipalities of Norway, municipality in Vestland county on the Western Norway, west coast of Norway. Bergen is the list of towns and cities in Norway, second-largest city in Norway after the capital Oslo.
By May 20 ...
, Norway
Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...
.
The sword has an inscription on its blade, which has been identified by George Stephens (1867) as a runic inscription
A runic inscription is an inscription made in one of the various runic alphabets. They generally contained practical information or memorials instead of magic or mythic stories. The body of runic inscriptions falls into the three categories of E ...
incorporating a swastika symbol. The blade is poorly preserved, and the inscription barely legible, but if Stephens' interpretation is correct, the sword would be a unique example of a Viking-era sword with a runic blade inscription.
Description
The sword itself is categorized as 'Type C' by Petersen (1919), who notes that it is unique in showing remnants of a metal thread at the broadsides of the upper hilt, compared to other specimens of the type which show horizontal ridges or protruding edges, or less commonly inlaid forged stripes or protruding moldings that seem to be imitations of twisted or smooth thread. It is described as an imitation of a foreign ontinentalsword inscription because of the lack of parallels in native tradition. There is an inscription realised in iron inlay along the center of the blade, close to the hilt.
Inscription
The sword was described in 1867 by George Stephens, an English archaeologist and philologist who specialised in the runic inscriptions of Scandinavia, in his book ''Handbook of the Old-Northern Runic Monuments of Scandinavia and England''. In this work he showed a drawing of the sword with a very clear inscription comprising five runes or rune-like letters with a swastika
The swastika (卐 or 卍, ) is a symbol used in various Eurasian religions and cultures, as well as a few Indigenous peoples of Africa, African and Indigenous peoples of the Americas, American cultures. In the Western world, it is widely rec ...
symbol in the middle. According to Stephens the inscription reads oh卍muþ from right to left. He interpreted the swastika as being used in rebus
A rebus ( ) is a puzzle device that combines the use of illustrated pictures with individual letters to depict words or phrases. For example: the word "been" might be depicted by a rebus showing an illustrated bumblebee next to a plus sign (+ ...
-writing to represent the syllable ''þur'' for the god Thor
Thor (from ) is a prominent list of thunder gods, god in Germanic paganism. In Norse mythology, he is a hammer-wielding æsir, god associated with lightning, thunder, storms, sacred trees and groves in Germanic paganism and mythology, sacred g ...
, and thus expanded the reading to ''oh Þurmuþ'' meaning "Owns e Thurmuth". This reading was inspired by the idea that the swastika was used as a symbol of Thor (more precisely, of Thor's hammer) in Viking Age
The Viking Age (about ) was the period during the Middle Ages when Norsemen known as Vikings undertook large-scale raiding, colonising, conquest, and trading throughout Europe and reached North America. The Viking Age applies not only to their ...
Norse paganism
Old Norse religion, also known as Norse paganism, is a branch of Germanic paganism, Germanic religion which developed during the Proto-Norse language, Proto-Norse period, when the North Germanic peoples separated into Germanic peoples, distinc ...
. It was the subject of scholarly discussion at the International Congress of Anthropology and Prehistoric Archæology at Budapest in 1876, where the prevalent opinion was that the swastika stood for "blessing" or "good luck".
In 1889, in a review of a book by A. L. Lorange, Stephens noted that the sword had been treated with acid whilst at the Danish Museum, with the result that the sword and its inscription were severely damaged, and consequently the inscription shown in a colour plate in Lorange's book was undecipherable.
See also
* Seax of Beagnoth, anAnglo-Saxon
The Anglo-Saxons, in some contexts simply called Saxons or the English, were a Cultural identity, cultural group who spoke Old English and inhabited much of what is now England and south-eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. They traced t ...
seax
A ''seax'' (; also sax, sæx, sex; invariant in plural, latinized ''sachsum'') is a small sword, fighting knife or dagger typical of the Germanic peoples of the Migration Period and the Early Middle Ages, especially the Saxons. The name comes f ...
with a runic inscription on its blade
* Swastika (Germanic Iron Age)
The swastika design is known from artefacts of various cultures since the Neolithic, and it recurs with some frequency on artefacts dated to the Germanic Iron Age, i.e. the Migration period to Viking Age period in Scandinavia, including the V ...
Footnotes
References
* * * * * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Saebo Sword Viking swords Germanic archaeological artifacts Runic inscriptions Swastika Individual weapons 9th-century artifacts Archaeological discoveries in Norway 1825 archaeological discoveries