ODENSE, DENMARK—According to a report in The Guardian, a word written in runes has been found on a 2,000-year-old iron knife in Denmark. The knife was recovered from a grave found on the island of Funen. Archaeologist Jakob Bonde said that the five engraved characters, which were followed by three grooves, became visible only after the artifact had been cleaned. They spell the word hirila, which translates to “little sword” in Old Norse, and probably refers to the knife itself, he explained. “It’s an extraordinary find for us and it says something about the development of the earliest Scandinavian language,” Bonde said. Literacy was not widespread at the time, and would have been connected to status and power, added runologist Lisbeth Imer of the National Museum of Denmark. To read about runestone inscriptions referencing Queen Thyra, the mother of King Harald Bluetooth, go to "Denmark's Founding Mother."
