1.
Sweden
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Sweden, officially the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and Finland to the east, at 450,295 square kilometres, Sweden is the third-largest country in the European Union by area, with a total population of 10.0 million. Sweden consequently has a low density of 22 inhabitants per square kilometre. Approximately 85% of the lives in urban areas. Germanic peoples have inhabited Sweden since prehistoric times, emerging into history as the Geats/Götar and Swedes/Svear, Southern Sweden is predominantly agricultural, while the north is heavily forested. Sweden is part of the area of Fennoscandia. The climate is in very mild for its northerly latitude due to significant maritime influence. Today, Sweden is a monarchy and parliamentary democracy, with a monarch as head of state. The capital city is Stockholm, which is also the most populous city in the country, legislative power is vested in the 349-member unicameral Riksdag. Executive power is exercised by the government chaired by the prime minister, Sweden is a unitary state, currently divided into 21 counties and 290 municipalities. Sweden emerged as an independent and unified country during the Middle Ages, in the 17th century, it expanded its territories to form the Swedish Empire, which became one of the great powers of Europe until the early 18th century. Swedish territories outside the Scandinavian Peninsula were gradually lost during the 18th and 19th centuries, the last war in which Sweden was directly involved was in 1814, when Norway was militarily forced into personal union. Since then, Sweden has been at peace, maintaining a policy of neutrality in foreign affairs. The union with Norway was peacefully dissolved in 1905, leading to Swedens current borders, though Sweden was formally neutral through both world wars, Sweden engaged in humanitarian efforts, such as taking in refugees from German-occupied Europe. After the end of the Cold War, Sweden joined the European Union on 1 January 1995 and it is also a member of the United Nations, the Nordic Council, Council of Europe, the World Trade Organization and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Sweden maintains a Nordic social welfare system that provides health care. The modern name Sweden is derived through back-formation from Old English Swēoþēod and this word is derived from Sweon/Sweonas. The Swedish name Sverige literally means Realm of the Swedes, excluding the Geats in Götaland, the etymology of Swedes, and thus Sweden, is generally not agreed upon but may derive from Proto-Germanic Swihoniz meaning ones own, referring to ones own Germanic tribe
2.
Runestone
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A runestone is typically a raised stone with a runic inscription, but the term can also be applied to inscriptions on boulders and on bedrock. The tradition began in the 4th century and lasted into the 12th century, most runestones are located in Scandinavia, but there are also scattered runestones in locations that were visited by Norsemen during the Viking Age. Runestones are often memorials to dead men, Runestones were usually brightly coloured when erected, though this is no longer evident as the colour has worn off. The tradition of raising stones that had runic inscriptions first appeared in the 4th and 5th century, in Norway and Sweden, the earliest Danish runestones appeared in the 8th and 9th centuries, and there are about 50 runestones from the Migration Period in Scandinavia. Most runestones were erected during the period 950-1100 CE, and then they were raised in Sweden. —The Ynglinga saga What may have increased the spread of runestones was an event in Denmark in the 960s, King Harald Bluetooth had just been baptised and in order to mark the arrival of a new order and a new age, he commanded the construction of a runestone. The runestone has three sides of two are decorated with images. On one side, there is an animal that is the prototype of the animals that would be commonly engraved on runestones. Shortly after this stone had been made, something happened in Scandinavias runic tradition, scores of chieftains and powerful Norse clans consciously tried to imitate King Harald, and from Denmark a runestone wave spread northwards through Sweden. In most districts, the fad died out after a generation, but, in the central Swedish provinces of Uppland and Södermanland, there are about 3,000 runestones among the about 6,000 runic inscriptions in Scandinavia. The runestones are unevenly distributed in Scandinavia, Denmark has 250 runestones, Sweden has as many as between 1,700 and 2,500 depending on definition. The Swedish district of Uppland has the highest concentration with as many as 1,196 inscriptions in stone, outside of Scandinavia, the Isle of Man stands out with its 30 runestones from the 9th century and early 11th century. Scattered runestones have also found in England, Ireland, Scotland. Runestones were placed on selected spots in the landscape, such as locations, roads, bridge constructions. In medieval churches, there are often runestones that have been inserted as construction material, in southern Scania, runestones can be tied to large estates that also had churches constructed on their land. In the Mälaren Valley, the appear to be placed so that they mark essential parts of the domains of an estate, such as courtyard, grave field. Runestones usually appear as single monuments and more rarely as pairs, in some cases, they are part of larger monuments together with other raised stones. However, although scholars know where 95% of all runestones were discovered, the remainder have been found in churches, roads, bridges, graves, farms, and water routes
3.
Runes
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The Scandinavian variants are also known as futhark or fuþark, the Anglo-Saxon variant is futhorc or fuþorc. Runology is the study of the runic alphabets, runic inscriptions, runestones, runology forms a specialised branch of Germanic linguistics. The earliest runic inscriptions date from around 150 AD, the characters were generally replaced by the Latin alphabet as the cultures that had used runes underwent Christianisation, by approximately 700 AD in central Europe and 1100 AD in northern Europe. However, the use of runes persisted for specialized purposes in northern Europe, until the early 20th century, runes were used in rural Sweden for decorative purposes in Dalarna and on Runic calendars. The three best-known runic alphabets are the Elder Futhark, the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc, and the Younger Futhark, the Younger Futhark is divided further into the long-branch runes, short-branch or Rök runes, and the stavlösa or Hälsinge runes. The Younger Futhark developed further into the Medieval runes, and the Dalecarlian runes, historically, the runic alphabet is a derivation of the Old Italic scripts of antiquity, with the addition of some innovations. Which variant of the Old Italic family in particular gave rise to the runes is uncertain, suggestions include Raetic, Venetic, Etruscan, or Old Latin as candidates. At the time, all of these scripts had the same angular letter shapes suited for epigraphy, the process of transmission of the script is unknown. The oldest inscriptions are found in Denmark and northern Germany, not near Italy, a West Germanic hypothesis suggests transmission via Elbe Germanic groups, while a Gothic hypothesis presumes transmission via East Germanic expansion. The runes were in use among the Germanic peoples from the 1st or 2nd century AD, no distinction is made in surviving runic inscriptions between long and short vowels, although such a distinction was certainly present phonologically in the spoken languages of the time. Similarly, there are no signs for labiovelars in the Elder Futhark The term runes is used to distinguish these symbols from Latin and it is attested on a 6th-century Alamannic runestaff as runa and possibly as runo on the 4th-century Einang stone. The name comes from the Germanic root run-, meaning secret or whisper, in Old Irish Gaelic, the word rún means mystery, secret, intention or affectionate love. Similarly in Welsh and Old English, the word rhin and rūn respectively means mystery, secret, secret writing, or sometimes in the sense of the word. Ogham is a Celtic script, similarly carved in the Norse manner, the root run- can also be found in the Baltic languages, meaning speech. In Lithuanian, runoti means both to cut and to speak, according to another theory, the Germanic root comes from the Indoeuropean root *reuə- dig. The Finnish term for rune, riimukirjain, means scratched letter, the Finnish word runo means poem and comes from the same source as the English word rune, it is a very old loan of the Proto-Germanic *rūnō. The runes developed centuries after the Old Italic alphabets from which they are historically derived. The formation of the Elder Futhark was complete by the early 5th century, specifically, the Raetic alphabet of Bolzano is often advanced as a candidate for the origin of the runes, with only five Elder Futhark runes having no counterpart in the Bolzano alphabet
4.
Runestone styles
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The term runestone style in the singular may refer to the Urnes style. The style or design of runestones varied during the Viking Age, the early runestones were simple in design, but towards the end of the runestone era they became increasingly complex and made by travelling runemasters such as Öpir and Visäte. A categorization of the styles was developed by Anne-Sophie Gräslund in the 1990s and her systematization is considered to have been a break-through and is today a standard. The styles are RAK, Fp, Pr1, Pr2, Pr3, Pr4 and Pr5, and they cover the period 980-1130, which was the period during which most runestones were made. The styles Pr1 and Pr2 correspond to the Ringerike style, whereas Pr3, Pr4, below follows a brief presentation of the various styles by showing sample runestones according to Rundatas annotation. RAK is the oldest style and covers the period 980-1015 AD and this style has no dragon heads and the ends of the runic bands are straight. This style is from the period c and it is characterized by runic bands that end with animal heads seen from above. In the styles called Pr1, Pr2, Pr3, Pr4 and Pr5 and this style is contemporary with FP dated to c. 1010- c.1050 when it was succeeded by Pr3 and this style is only somewhat younger than the previous style and it is dated to c. 1050, and it was succeeded by Pr3. This style succeeded FP, Pr1 and Pr2 and is dated to c and this style appeared somewhat later c. This style was the last one before runestones stopped being raised and this style is used by the Rundata project, although it does not attribute it to Gräslunds model. The style is common in western Södermanland and it is characterized by bordered crosses, norse art Runemaster Anglo-Saxon art Rundata Edberg, Rune. Runriket Täby-Vallentuna – en Handledning Fuglesang, Signe Horn, swedish Runestones of the Eleventh Century, Ornament and Dating, Runeninschriften als Quellen Interdisziplinärer Forschung. The Oxford Illustrated History of the Vikings
5.
Viking Age
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The Viking Age is the period from the late 8th century to the mid-11th century in European history, especially Northern European and Scandinavian history, following the Germanic Iron Age. It is the period of history when Scandinavian Norsemen explored Europe by its seas and rivers for trade, raids, colonisation and conquest. Three Viking ships had beached in Weymouth Bay four years earlier, the Viking devastation of Northumbrias Holy Island was reported by the Northumbrian scholar Alcuin of York, who wrote, Never before in Britain has such a terror appeared. Vikings were portrayed as violent and bloodthirsty by their enemies. The chronicles of medieval England portrayed them as rapacious wolves among sheep, the first challenges to the many anti-Viking images in Britain emerged in the 17th century. Pioneering scholarly works on the Viking Age reached a readership in Britain. Archaeologists began to dig up Britains Viking past, linguistics traced the Viking-Age origins of rural idioms and proverbs. New dictionaries of the Old Norse language enabled more Victorians to read the Icelandic Sagas, the Vikings who invaded western and eastern Europe were chiefly pagans from Denmark, Norway and Sweden. They also settled in the Faroe Islands, Ireland, Iceland, peripheral Scotland, Greenland and their North Germanic language, Old Norse, became the mother-tongue of present-day Scandinavian languages. By 801, a central authority appears to have been established in Jutland. In Norway, mountainous terrain and fjords formed strong natural boundaries, communities there remained independent of each other, unlike the situation in Denmark which is lowland. By 800, some 30 small kingdoms existed in Norway, the sea was the easiest way of communication between the Norwegian kingdoms and the outside world. It was in the 8th century that Scandinavians began to build ships of war, the North Sea rovers were traders, colonisers and explorers as well as plunderers. There are various theories concerning the causes of the Viking invasions, for people living along the coast, it would seem natural to seek new land by the sea. Another reason was that during this period England, Wales and Ireland, the Franks, however, had well-defended coasts and heavily fortified ports and harbours. Pure thirst for adventure may also have been a factor, a reason for the raids is believed by some to be over-population caused by technological advances, such as the use of iron, or a shortage of women due to selective female infanticide. Although another cause could well have been caused by the Frankish expansion to the south of Scandinavia. Consequently, these Vikings became raiders, in search of subsistence, There is ongoing debate among scholars as to why the Scandinavians began to expand during the 8th through 11th centuries
6.
Memorial
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A memorial is an object which serves as a focus for memory of something, usually a person or an event. Popular forms of memorials include landmark objects or art objects such as sculptures, statues or fountains, the most common type of memorial is the gravestone or the memorial plaque. Also common are war memorials commemorating those who have died in wars, memorials in the form of a cross are called intending crosses. Online memorials and tributes are becoming popular especially with the increase in natural burial where the laying of gravestones. When somebody has died, the family may request that a gift be given to a designated charity. Those temporary or makeshift memorials are also called grassroots memorials, sometimes, when a high school student has died, the memorials are placed in the form of a scholarship, to be awarded to high-achieving students in future years
