ᛒ is a rune that is transliterated as b or ƀ ()
Anglo-Saxon / Old English tradition
thumb|upright=0.5|ᛒ (berc) in BL Cotton MS Domitian A IX
The Anglo-Saxon and Old English name is recorded as beorc or berc ("birch" or "poplar"). It is found as early as the 8th century, as featured in the Old English rune poem.
The Old English rune poem goes:
Norse tradition
In West Norse tradition (Norway, Iceland) the rune is called bjarkan, meaning birch, albeit archaically, as the common form for birch is . The form probably existed in East Norse as well (Denmark, Sweden), as the Old Danish Norse form biercan is found in Codex Leidensis (10th c.).
Danish tradition
thumb|[[Abecedarium Nordmannicum (10th c.), featuring ᛒ as "brica/briꞇa"]]
In Denmark, little is preserved of Danish runic tradition, in comparison to Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. No indigenous rune poem is known. As aforementioned, the rune name "bjarkan" is recorded in Danish Old Norse as biercan, as found in Codex Leidensis (10th c.).
Another Danish name is recorded in Abecedarium Nordmannicum (10th c.), which became largely unreadable in the 19th century due to a failed preservation attempt. A handwritten copy exists from 1826, by Wilhelm Grimm, which has the name written as brica or briꞇa (brita) depending on the assumed identity of the fourth character (c or insular t). If "brica" is correct, then a reasonable scenario could be that it is a corruption or misspelling of the name birka. If "brita" is correct, then various theories are possible. For example, Brita is a Nordic shortform for the name Birgitta, which stems from the same root as the Irish pagan goddess Brigid, who is believed to have had the "birch" as her holy tree. Likewise, "Börk", a Nordic dialect form for birch, is recorded as a variation of the given name Brita in Västerbotten and Norrbotten in Sweden.
Icelandic tradition
In Iceland, the rune is called bjarkan per Norwegian tradition. The Old Icelandic rune poem is partially incomplete, as the original record, AM 687d 4°, is damaged and impossible to make out at parts, such as the bjarkan poem. A recorded form by Jón Ólafsson of Grunnavík (1732), attributed to either Magnus Olafsson (c. 1573-1636) or a Sveinn a Barði, with Latin translation, reads as: