BabelStone Fonts

BabelStone Anglo-Saxon Runic Fonts

Description

These are a set of six Unicode Runic fonts that each cover the subset of 34 characters in the Unicode Runic block that are used in Frisian and Anglo-Saxon inscriptions from the 5th to 11th centuries :

• BabelStone Runic Beagnoth : A font based on the runic letterforms used on the Thames scramasax (more about Beagnoth)
• BabelStone Runic Beorhtnoth : A font based on the angular letterforms used in runic inscriptions (more about Beorhtnoth)
• BabelStone Runic Beorhtric : A font based on the angular letterforms used in runic inscriptions, but with some early letterforms (more about Beorhtric)
• BabelStone Runic Beowulf : A general purpose sans serif font (more about Beowulf)
• BabelStone Runic Berhtwald : A general purpose serif font (more about Berhtwald)
• BabelStone Runic Byrhtferth : A font based on the rounded letterforms used in runic manuscripts (more about Byrhtferth)

These fonts do not map runic glyphs to Latin letters like most fonts, but use the special Runic characters defined in the Unicode Standard. See How to Input Unicode Ogham for suggestions on how to input Unicode characters (just substitute "Runic" for "Ogham" on that page).

Since version 1.06 all fonts also cover three runes devised by J. R. R. Tolkien (U+16F1 ... U+16F3) and five cryptogrammic runes used on the Franks Casket (U+16F4 ... U+16F8), which were added in Unicode 7.0 (June 2014). A transcription of the runic text of the Franks Casket using the Unicode 7.0 characters is available here.

These fonts use OpenType features to implement kerning, ligatures (bind runes and mirror runes), mirrored glyphs for Right-to-Left contexts, and stylistic alternative glyphs, as described below.

Samples

BabelStone Runic Beagnoth (24 points)

BabelStone Runic Beorhtnoth (24 points)

BabelStone Runic Beorhtric (24 points)

BabelStone Runic Beowulf (24 points)

BabelStone Runic Berhtwald (24 points)

BabelStone Runic Byrhtferth (24 points)

Character Repertoire

The tables below render each character in the specified BabelStone Anglo-Saxon Runic font, either using the font installed on your local machine or using WOFF fonts if the font is not installed on your local machine (OpenType features such as ligatures and kerning may not work if your browser is relying on the WOFF fonts; and WOFF fonts won't work in IE8 or earlier).

Runic [16A0..16FF]

Ligatures (Bind Runes)

All fonts include a number of ligatures (bind runes) that can be activated by inserting a Zero Width Joiner character (U+200D or &zwj; in HTML) between the characters to be ligatured (e.g. <16BB 200D 16D6 200D 16DA> produces the HEL ligature). All attested Anglo-Saxon bind runes that I know of are included, but if there are any of others that you need, please let me know.

Mirror runes (where the glyph is mirrored around the central stem) are implememented as ligatures of the same rune doubled (e.g. <16A2 200D 16A2> produces the mirrored form of the ur rune).

N.B. The ligatures in the "Unicode Runic Text" examples below render correctly with Internet Explorer version 8 and later under Windows 7 and later if the BabelStone fonts are installed (OpenType features may not work if your browser is relying on the WOFF fonts), but may not render as ligatures with other operating system / browser combinations (e.g. ligatures do not work with Chrome version 33 under Windows 7).

Example 1 : Dragon's Head Knife Mount with Cryptic Runic Inscription

Screenshot of BabelStone Runic Beowulf at 24 points

Unicode Runic Text

ᛋᛒᛖ‍ᚱᚫᛞᚻᛏᛇᛒᚳᚪᛁ ᛖ‍ᚱᚻ‍ᚪᛞ‍ᚫᛒᛋ

Note ligatured runes E/R, H/A and D/Æ

Example 2 : The Wheatley Hill Ring Inscription

Screenshot of BabelStone Runic Berhtwald at 24 points

Unicode Runic Text

[ᚻ]ᚱᛁᚾᚷᛁᚳᚻ‍ᚪᛏᛏ[ᚫ]

Note ligatured runes H/A

Example 3 : The Undley Bracteate Inscription

Screenshot of BabelStone Runic Beorhtric at 24 points

Unicode Runic Text

ᚷ‍ᚫᚷ‍ᚩᚷ‍ᚫ ᛗᚫᚷᚫ ᛗᛖᛞᚢ

Note ligatured runes G/Æ and G/O (the text on the bracteate runs right-to-left, and should be rendered right-to-left on Firefox and Chrome, but not necessarily on other browsers)

Example 4 : Mirror Rune Stamp on Cremation Urns from the Spong Hill Saxon Cemetery

Screenshot of BabelStone Runic Beorhtric at 24 points

Unicode Runic Text

ᚫ‍ᚫᛚ‍ᛚᚢ‍ᚢ

The word ælu "ale" written in mirror runes (implemented by writing each letter twice, with a Zero Width Joiner character [U+200D] in between)

Example 5 : Cover of The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien

Screenshot of BabelStone Runic Beowulf at 24 points

Unicode Runic Text

ᚦᛖ᛫ᚻᚩᛒᛒᛁᛏ᛬ᚩᚱ᛬ᚦᛖᚱᛖ᛫ᚫᚾᛞ᛫ᛒᚫᚳᛱ᛫ᚫᚷᚫᛁᚾ᛬
ᛒᛖᛁᛝ᛫ᚦᛖ᛫ᚱᛖᚳᚩᚱᛞ᛫ᚩᚠ᛫ᚫ᛫ᚣᛠᚱᛋ᛫ᛁᚩᚢᚱᚾᛖᚣ᛫
ᛗᚫᛞᛖ᛫ᛒᚣ᛫ᛒᛁᛚᛒᚩ᛫ᛒᚫᚷᚷᛁᚾᛋ᛫ᚩᚠ᛫ᚻᚩᛒᛒᛁᛏᚩᚾ᛬
ᚳᚩᛗᛈᛁᛚᛖᛞ᛫ᚠᚱᚩᛗ᛫ᚻᛁᛋ᛫ᛗᛖᛗᚩᛁᚱᛋ᛫ᛒᚣ᛫ᛁ᛫ᚱ᛫ᚱ᛫
ᛏᚩᛚᛱᛁᛖᚾ᛬ᚫᚾᛞ᛫ᛈᚢᛒᛚᛁᛋᚻᛖᛞ᛫ᛒᚣ᛫ᚷᛇᚱᚷᛖ᛫
ᚫᛚᛚᛖᚾ᛫ᚫᚾᛞ᛫ᚢᚾᚹᛁᚾ᛫ᛚᛏᛞ᛬

This text shows the contrastive use of letters 'c' and 'k' (but 'sh' is written as two letters)

Kerning

All fonts except for BabelStone Runic Berhtwald provide kerning between runes where appropriate. N.B. Kerning is not applied in Internet Explorer 11 or Chrome 33 under Windows 7; and kerning for runes added in Unicode 7.0 (U+16F1..U+16F8) does not seem to be applied by any application that I have tested under Windows 7.

Alternate Glyphs

BabelStone Runic Beowulf and BabelStone Runic Beohtric include stylistic alternate glyphs for some characters using the OpenType salt (Stylistic Alternates) feature. Some applications may allow you to select a particular stylistic alternate glyph, but I do not have access to any such application, so I have not been able to test that this feature has been implemented correctly in my fonts.

Mirrored Glyphs for Right-to-Left Text

Runic inscriptions mostly read left-to-right (LTR), but sometimes read right-to-left (RTL) or are sometimes written boustrophedon (left-to-right and right-to-left in alternate lines); when written right-to-left the glyphs are normally mirrored, as for example on the front of the Franks Casket shown below, where the top line is written left-to-right with normal glyphs, and the bottom line is written right-to-left with mirrored glyphs.

You can cause a stretch of Runic text to be displayed in right-to-left order by putting U+202D (LEFT-TO-RIGHT OVERRIDE [RLO]) at the start of the text and putting U+202C (POP DIRECTIONAL FORMATTING [PDF]) at the end of the text (PDF is not required at the end of a line, as the directionality of the text is reset at a new line, but for the same reason RLO is required at the start of each line of RTL text).

The BabelStone Anglo-Saxon Runic fonts all include mirrored glyphs for use in Right-to-Left contexts. The mirrored glyphs should be applied by activating the rtlm (Right-to-left mirrored forms) OpenType feature (see discussion on "Left-to-right and right-to-left text" at Advanced Typographic Extensions - OpenType Layout) when the text is marked as RTL as descibed in the previous paragraph, but this feature appears not to be supported by Windows 7. Internet Explorer (tested with v. 11) and Google Chrome (tested with v. 44) do not apply the rtlm feature, but Mozilla Firefox (tested with v. 33) does apply glyph mirroring in RTL contexts.

Example of Right-to-Left Runic Text

From the Front of the Franks Casket

‮ᚹᚪᚱᚦᚷᚪ᛬ᛋᚱᛁᚳᚷᚱᚩᚱᚾᚦᚫᚱᚻᛖᚩᚾᚷᚱᛖᚢᛏᚷᛁᛋᚹᚩᛗ‬

<RLO> WARÞ GA:SRIC GRORN ÞÆR HE ON GREUT GISWOM <PDF>

The runes should be laid out right-to-left, but glyph-mirroring may not be applied, depending on your browser (works correctly in Firefox and Chrome, as shown in the screenshot below)

OpenType Features

Version History

Download

All BabelStone Anglo-Saxon Runic fonts on this page are licensed under the SIL Open Font License 1.1, which means you are free to use them for personal or commercial purposes, and to redistribute them by themselves or as part of a free or commercial software package, just as long as you do not sell the fonts on their own. The license also allows you to modify the fonts in any way you like, as long as the modified fonts do not use "BabelStone" in their name. Please read the license for details.

For use on your computer or mobile device please download and install the TTF files. The WOFF and WOFF2 files are for web use only, and are not required by most users.

• Download BabelStone Runic Beagnoth [WOFF, WOFF2] v. 7.004 (2023-11-09)
• Download BabelStone Runic Beorhtnoth [WOFF, WOFF2] v. 7.004 (2023-11-09)
• Download BabelStone Runic Beorhtric [WOFF, WOFF2] v. 7.004 (2023-11-09)
• Download BabelStone Runic Beowulf [WOFF, WOFF2] v. 7.004 (2023-11-09)
• Download BabelStone Runic Berhtwald [WOFF, WOFF2] v. 7.004 (2023-11-09)
• Download BabelStone Runic Byrhtferth [WOFF, WOFF2] v. 7.004 (2023-11-09)
• Download a ZIP archive of all six fonts [latest version of TTF files]

BabelStone Runic | BabelStone Runic Elder Futhark | BabelStone Younger Futhark Runes | BabelStone Runic Staveless | BabelStone Runic Dotted | BabelStone Anglo-Saxon Runes | BabelStone Moon Runes

BabelStone Fonts