1. Anglo-Saxon (Anglo-Frisian) Alphabet By Alex Kriteman March 30, 2011

2. Origins of the Alphabet – Elder Futhark  Developed from an earlier alphabet, named the Elder Futhark  Derived from an alphabet with 24 runes  Runes- means “secret, something hidden”  Knowledge of runes was originally considered to be restricted to the elite class  Thought to be created for magical signs and charms and not a writing system

3. Transition to Anglo-Saxon Alphabet  2 theories  Developed in Frisia (the southeastern corner of the North Sea) and later spread to England  Runes were first introduced to England from Scandinavia where the futhorc was modified and then exported to Frisia

4. Transition (continued)  In England, the futhorc was further extended to 28 and finally to 33 runes  Anglo-Saxon Futhorc was generally used from 400 A.D. to 1100 A.D.  Runic writing in England became closely associated with Latin scripture and Christian scripture in the 7 th century

5. Features of the Alphabet  Called “Futhorc” after the first 7 letters of the alphabet  Up to 33 characters with no horizontal lines  Expanded due to sound changes in Old English  The direction of writing varied, though later the writing developed from left to right  No spaces between words, but sometimes dots were used

6. Features (Continued)  Use of runes include being inscribed on stone slabs, stone crosses, bones, rings, brooches, weapons, urns, writing tablets, sun dials, combs, caskets, and dishes  Used for spells, divination, poems, and ornamentation

7. Actual Anglo-Saxon Alphabet 400 – 1100 A.D.

8. The Loss of the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc  Started to be replaced by the Latin alphabet in the 9 th century  Gradually replaced by the Younger Futhork  The Norman Conquest marks the end of Old English and the beginning of Middle English

9. Modern References and Uses  Nazis used runes in their party symbols  J.R.R. Tolkien used runes in his book The Hobbit on a map  The character of Hermione studies runes in the Harry Potter series  Modern English derived from Anglo-Frisian dialects

10. References  http://www.omniglot.com/writing /runic.htm http://www.omniglot.com/writing /runic.htm  http://www.uponreflection.co.uk/runes/rune _histroy.htm http://www.uponreflection.co.uk/runes/rune _histroy.htm  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runicalphabet http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runicalphabet