A lot of people in the modern world loves runes. They tattoo them on their body, write letters, mark weapons, jewelry and belongings. And of course use them in articles and messages on Facebook. So, since it’s so popular one would think that they do proper research. Some say “everybody knows that”! But clearly a lot doesn’t. A very clear and easy thing to do is at least to use the correct futark for the time period you represent. You do not write a Viking message using the old futark! It ended at the very beginning of Viking age. And some people are very sloppy about how they write the specific letters. For instance the letter R. How to write it and how to use it. Here is a few runestone inscriptions to show how they did then. The mid angle point NEVER touch the stem! Sometimes it’s not even an angle.

All following pictures are from Jørgen Markvad’s book Runer og runesten, Forlaget Yduns Æbler

More about the R. The YR or end-R. The upside-down M-rune. Some people tend to use it in the middle of a word. (Actually there is at least one stone who does that.) But the rule, in the younger futark, is that it is ALWAYS at the end. A more normal mistake is to use the R (reidh) at the end of words. That also happens on at least one stone.

Towards the end of Viking age YR went from being the end R to become Y, still named YR.