On Thursday, October 22nd, at 4.15 p.m. Swedish time, Eric Lander will give a presentation entitled ”Is the Blekinge curse metrical?”. The Runråd (Eng. Rune Rede) takes place at its usual venue, room 16-2041 in the Dept. of Scandinavian Languages, but will also be broadcast via Zoom: https://uu-se.zoom.us/j/66402126410.

Abstract

This paper investigates the potentially metrical status of the curse formula found in two different but closely related formulations on the Stentoften and Björketorp runestones in Blekinge in southeastern Sweden. Whether or not these runic texts are ‘genuinely’ metrical is an unsettled question in the literature, with different treatments and opinions offered over the years by Krause & Jankuhn (1966), N.Å. Nielsen (1968, 1983), Kabell (1978), Grønvik (1996), MacLeod & Mees (2006), Mees (2007, 2008), Marold (2012), Naumann (1998, 2010, 2018), and Schulte (2007, 2009, 2010, 2025). In this paper I argue that the Björketorp text shows more convincing evidence of metrical structure than the Stentoften text. This is in line with previous research, but my use of transformed Old Norse to shed light on (dis)continuity with later traditions (see Males & Patria, forthcoming) produces new insights and arguments. On the one hand, I offer arguments for believing that the Stentoften text is not metrical, and also for why the Björketorp text might be composed in something akin to proto-fornyrðislag. This latter result can be interpreted in different ways, but it is suggested that the Stentoften stone displays a more conservative, non-metrical version of the curse, while the version found on the Björketorp stone is an innovative attempt at reformulating the curse text according to the four-positional template.