Perthro
The Elder Futhark rune for the “p” sound. No one knows what its name meant.
Meaning
Store norske leksikon gives the reconstructed name *perþu and, for its meaning, “unknown”; no Old Norse name exists. The Old English poem calls it peorð and describes something that is “a source of recreation and amusement to the great, where warriors sit blithely together in the banqueting-hall”. Bruce Dickins translated the word, with a question mark, as “chessman”.
Origin and history
The p sound was rare in early Germanic, and so was the rune. Dickins notes that it is absent from the earliest northern inscriptions, and Store norske leksikon lists it among the runes unusual outside complete futhark rows.
A chessman, or unknown
The Bosworth–Toller dictionary reports J. M. Kemble’s translation “chess-man”, and doubts it: “it is doubtful whether the knowledge of chess was early enough among the Teutons to allow of this interpretation.” Dickins agrees that “no stress can be laid on any of the suggested meanings”. Store norske leksikon leaves the meaning unknown.
Write in runes
stringmash.comRune translatorTurn English into Elder Futhark, Younger Futhark or Anglo-Saxon runes, with a chart of all 24 Elder Futhark runes.See also
Uruz, Thurisaz, Ansuz, Raido, Kaunan, Gebo.
Sources
- Runer (Store norske leksikon), Store norske leksikon, Runenavn (table of rune names)
- Runic and heroic poems of the old Teutonic peoples, Bruce Dickins (ed. and trans.), 1915, Cambridge University Press (Internet Archive), Anglo-Saxon poem v. 38 and note
- peorð (Bosworth–Toller Anglo-Saxon Dictionary), Joseph Bosworth and T. Northcote Toller, An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary (1898), online edition, Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Prague, entry “peorð”
Last reviewed September 26, 2026 by Rory Hansen. How we research