2023-10-13 18:35:47
The Laeborg rune stone, one of the stones of Ravnunge-Tue – ROBERTO FORTUNA / CC BY-SA 4.0
MADRID, 13 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) –
A 3D scan of inscriptions carved on two groups of Danish rune steles reveals that four of these stones were probably engraved in dedication to a powerful Viking queen.
The first group, the Jelling Stones, were raised by Harald ‘Blue Tooth’ Gormsson the king who is credited with founding the Danish state, in commemoration of his parents Gorm and Thyra. The second group, the Ravnunge-Tue Stones, also mention a woman named Thyra.
The research team theorized that these two groups of stones referred to the same person. If it is correct, then Thyra would be the person most mentioned in Danish rune stones from the Viking Age.
“We wanted to see if we could find the same rune engraver on some of these stones, so we could connect the Ravnunge-Tue stones with the Jelling stones,” says lead author of the research, Dr. Lisbeth M. Imer of the National Museum from Denmark, in an article published in Antiquity. “If there was a connection, it would be very likely that all the stones referred to the same woman, Thyra, mother of Harald ‘Blue Tooth’ Gormsson.”
To test the validity of this theory, Dr. Imer and a team of researchers from several Scandinavian institutions made 3D models of the rune stones and analyzed the shape and carving techniques used to record the runes and the language used.
The authors compared grooves carved into well-preserved rune stones to identify distinctive marks made by different carvers. Similarities between the runes of the Læborg Stone (one of the Ravnunge-Tue Stones) and Jelling Stone 2 suggest that they were engraved by the same person.
Therefore, the references to Thyra in both groups of stones probably refer to the same person: the Danish queen and mother of Harald ‘Blue Tooth’ Gormsson. This indicates that she was a particularly powerful and celebrated individual. It is likely that she had land and authority in her own right, not just through her husband.
“No other Viking man or woman in Denmark has been mentioned on so many runestones,” says Dr. Imer, “and this underlines his undeniable importance to the consolidation of the kingdom under the rule of his son, Harald ‘Blue Tooth’ Gormsson.”
Importantly, this means that women probably had more influence in Viking Age Denmark than previously believed. It indicates that Viking women may have been able to hold power in their own right and rule on behalf of their husbands or minor sons.
It also has important implications for our knowledge of the formation of the Danish state.
“The combination of current analyzes and the geographical distribution of the runestones indicates that Thyra was one of the key figures, or even the key figure, for the formation of the Danish kingdom,” the authors state.
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