Practice today
The runes are history, and they are also part of a living religion. This page sets the words people use in practice today beside what the old sources say about them, so you can see both, and tell them apart.
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Who practices
In practice today
The Pagan Federation's guide to Heathenry says racist groups that use Heathen symbols do not represent the religion: "there is no place in our beliefs for discrimination of any kind."
In practice today
The Troth, founded in 1987, is part of the inclusive branch of modern heathenry; its bylaws bar discrimination by race, gender, ethnic origin, or sexual orientation.
In practice today
Many modern Heathens practice rune divination and carve runes onto talismans.
Words of practice
Old words still used today. Each one shows what the old sources say, then how it is used now.
Wyrd
In the old sources
Old English for what happens: fate, fortune, or chance, "the otherwise than humanly appointed order of things," and one of the Fates. Its Old Norse cousin is Urðr, one of the Norns. More on the Cast page.
In practice today
Many Heathens understand wyrd as "the force that connects everything in the universe throughout space and time."
Ørlög
In the old sources
An Old Norse plural noun meaning fate, doom, or fortunes, as in "if the Norns rule over the fortunes of men."
In practice today
Heathens speak of ørlög as a person's own share of wyrd.
Galdr
In the old sources
A charm or incantation that is sung or chanted. Old English has the same word, galdor (incantation, enchantment, charm, magic), from the verb galan, "to sing, enchant." In Oddrúnargrátr, "Oddrún chanted powerfully, Oddrún chanted strongly, bitter incantations" (bitra galdra) to help a woman in childbirth, and Beowulf's dragon hoard is "galdre bewunden," wound about with spells.
In the old sources
In Hávamál, Odin says he hung on a windy tree for nine nights and "took up runes," then lists eighteen charms that he knows. In one he says, "I chant so that I can walk." The poem calls them ljóð, songs, rather than galdr.
In practice today
Heathens today chant charms called galdr, and runes or rune poems are often chanted.
Seiðr
In the old sources
A kind of Norse magic. Snorri's Ynglinga saga says Freyja "first taught the Asaland people the magic art," and that though Odin practiced it, "it was not thought respectable for men to practise it." In Lokasenna, Loki taunts Odin for working it on Sámsey "like witches."
In the old sources
Eiríks saga rauða describes Þorbjörg, the "little seeress" of Greenland. She carried a staff with a brass-bound knob, needed women who knew the varðlokur songs to call the spirits, and foretold the end of a famine.
In practice today
Oracular seiðr is a modern Heathen rite in which "a seer or seeress answers questions." The group Hrafnar, which grew out of a rune class Diana L. Paxson began in January 1988, set out to recover this oracular tradition.
Hamingja
In the old sources
Luck or fortune, and also a person's guardian spirit, which could take animal or, more often, female form. At death it could pass to a son, daughter, or close kinsman, and a person could lend their luck to someone else.
In practice today
Many Heathens in North America believe luck can be earned, passed down through the generations, or lost.
Blót
In the old sources
A sacrifice: an exchange in which people gave to the gods to get something back, such as good weather, fertility, or luck in battle. Many animals were offered, especially horses; the big blóts were held by magnates and kings at their homes, and the meat was cooked and eaten by everyone present.
In the old sources
Adam of Bremen describes a great feast at Uppsala every nine years, with sacrifices hung in a sacred grove. His account is second-hand, and few scholars accept all of it.
In practice today
Modern blót "centres around the offering of food or drink (often mead)," usually followed by a feast, and is often paired with symbel (sumbel): a ritual drinking ceremony of toasts, the first to the gods.