Jera (also Jeran, Jeraz, Yera) is the conventional name of the j-rune of the Elder Futhark, from a reconstructed Common Germanic stem meaning "harvest, (good) year".
The corresponding letter of the Gothic alphabet is Gothic , named (), also expressing .
The Elder Futhark rune gives rise to the Anglo-Frisian , named gēr , and , named ior, and to the Younger Futhark ár rune , which stands for , as the phoneme disappears in late Proto-Norse.
Note that also can be a variation of dotted Isaz used for ; e.g. in Dalecarlian runes.
Name
The reconstructed Common Germanic name is the origin of English year (Old English ).
In contrast to the modern word, it had a meaning of "season" and specifically "harvest", and hence "plenty, prosperity".
The Germanic word is cognate with Greek () "year" (and () "season", whence hour), Old East Slavic () "spring" and with the -or- in Latin "of this year" (from *hōjōrō), as well as Avestan () "year", all from a PIE stem .
Elder Futhark
The derivation of the rune is uncertain; it may have been adapted from the classical Latin alphabet's G, ("C (ᚲ) with stroke"), or it may be a Germanic innovation. The letter in any case appears from the very earliest runic inscriptions, figuring on the Vimose comb inscription, harja.
As the only rune of the Elder Futhark which was not connected, its evolution was the most thorough transformation of all runes, and it was to have numerous graphical variants.
Younger Futhark
During the 6th and 7th centuries, the initial j in *jāra was lost in Proto-Norse, which also changed the sound value of the rune from /j/ to an /a/ phoneme.
The rune was then written as a vertical staff with a horizontal stroke in the centre, usually transliterated as A, with majuscule, to distinguish it from the ansuz rune, a.
During the last phase of the Elder Futhark, the jēra-rune came to be written as a vertical staff with two slanting strokes in the form of an X in its centre (10px). As the form of the rune had changed considerably, an older 7th century form of the rune (6px) was assumed by the s-rune. When the n-rune had stabilized in its form during the 6th and 7th centuries, its vertical stroke slanted towards the right (10px), which made it possible to simplify the jēra-rune by having only one vertical stroke that slanted towards the left, giving the ár-rune of the classic Younger Futhark (note however, that the earliest YF inscriptions, such as the Ribe skull fragment, still retain the earlier X-shape).
Since a simpler form of the rune was taken by the /a/ phoneme, the older cross form of the rune now came to be used for the /h/ phoneme.
The development of the Jēran rune from the earliest open form was not known before the discovery of the Kylver Stone in 1903, which has an entire elder futhark inscription on it. Therefore, the interpretation of the golden horns of Gallehus was slightly wrong before 1903, as it was believed this rune form could be an early form of the Ingwaz rune. The second word on the horns was thus interpreted as holtingaz rather than holtijaz.
See also
- Elder Futhark
- Rune poem
Notes
References
- Enoksen, Lars Magnar (1998). Runor: Historia, Tydning, Tolkning. Historiska Media, Falun.
- Looijenga, J. H. (1997). Runes around the North Sea and on the Continent AD 150-700, page 76. Dissertation, Groningen University
- Page, Raymond I. (2005). Runes. The British Museum Press