Bülacher primer

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The runic inscription on the Bülacher fibula
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The fibula from Bülach is a disc fibula (garment needle) made of silver with almandine inlays . It is dated to the 6th century AD and so far is the only find with a runic inscription in Switzerland. An Alemannic or Franconian background is assumed for the origin of the primer . The fibula was found in the city ​​of Bülach in 1927 in the burial ground “Im Füchsli”. The primer is kept in the Swiss National Museum in Zurich.

description

The fibula has a diameter of 4.4 cm. The front side with a filigree ornate central hump is covered with silver sheet and has a silver cell structure with almandine inlays in two outer zones. The middle zone is divided into three parts by pieces of sheet silver with a pressed-in braided band ornament. On the reverse side are incised nineteen characters, eighteen runes and one foreign character, including six left-turning characters in generally clockwise, multiline inscription. The needle apparatus is no longer preserved.

inscription

The runic inscription is written in older Futhark. It is:

inscription A German interpretation
Line 1: ᚠᚱᛁᚠᚱᛁᛞᛁᛚ frifridil Friedel (with caressing reduplication of the first syllable)
Line 2: ᛞᚢ you you
Line 3: ᚠᛏᛗᛁᚲ f (a) t (o) mik (plus a comma-like foreign character) grab me (and foreign characters)
Line 4: ᛚ ᛚ ll Two l- runes (left-handed) for leek or limb

Notes on translation

The first f- rune in the 1st and f-rune in the 3rd line and the k- rune at the end of line 3 are left-handed. Frifridil can be combined with an Old High German male name Fridil , Middle High German friedel . The Old High German word fridil is also conceivable , which can be translated as dearest , lover or husband . Frifridil could then be translated as love-dearest .

The two runes in the second line are du and can be translated as the personal pronoun du . The West Germanic spelling þu would actually be expected here ; the present form of writing already refers to an early Old High German.

Also striking are the spellings in the third line of the t- rune and the k- rune, for the consonants ss and ch , which were certainly already spoken as fricatives in Alemannic of the 7th century , which are not provided for in runic writing.

This article or section needs to be revised: " l -runes as an abbreviation for leek (* laukaz) " - leek is New High German and is not abbreviated by the runes. Correct would be "as an abbreviation for # (from ancient Germanic * laukaz ) = leek , where # has to be replaced ...
Please help to improve it and then remove this marking.

The other runes are interpreted differently by different scientists. Krause and Jankuhn translate fri [d] fridil du f [a] t mik ll than you, my lover, hug me, leek! Leek! , whereby the two l -runes are read as an abbreviation for leek (* laukaz) , which means fertility or thriving . Klingenberg points out in this context that leeks played an important role in runic magic and fertility magic as an effective means of preserving freshness and youthfulness and was also used as an aphrodisiac.

Heinz Klingenberg points out when reading frifridil [lid] du [fud] f [a] t [o] mik. (l) [au] k (l) [i] dll indicates a possible mirroring of the runic inscription. So lid a reflection of dil and fud could of as a reflection of you for being seen. This creates palindromes, which have been assigned a magical power because of the two reading directions. Klingenberg believes that the text is also encrypted and shortened because of its erotic meaning. lid means limb and fud vulva . In this context, the l runes could be read as phallic symbols, again as the short form of lid . Interpreted in this way, the text would be translated as: [Your] dearest [who] [has] the member - You [who] [has] the vulva, take me into you! Limb - limb

Stephan Opitz interprets the text in a similar way to Klingenberg: [Your] Frifridil, [who [has] the] member: you [who [has] the] vulva, take me into you! - leek (limb) - leek (limb)

Later researchers, on the other hand, interpreted the l runes as merely accidental scratches and dismissed the sexualized reading of Klingenberg and Opitz as the product of an excited imagination. Looijenga follows this point of view and also reads the third line as af tmu (ᚨ ᚠ ᛏᛗᚢ ). However, the interpretation of frifridil as an address between lovers is also undisputed by the later researchers .

In the Landesmuseum Zürich the inscription is translated as “Beloved, you embrace me”.

Date of origin and place of origin

Joachim Werner assigns the primer to a workshop district probably on the Middle Rhine and shows its proximity to the primers from Mayen and Schwarzrheindorf on the right bank of the Rhine . He therefore assumes that the Bülach primer should be more Franconian than Alemannic . Bernhard Salin expressed the assumption that the knowledge of the runes reached Central Europe with a current breaking out from the north . Max Martin supports this thesis by pointing out that other finds from the middle and last third of the 6th century betray Nordic influence, and in isolated cases even reached the western Germanic region as imported goods or with their owner from the north. Klingenberg puts the primer at the beginning of the 7th century AD, which would give it a temporal proximity to the grave of an Alemannic nobleman in the reformed church in Bülach. Max Martin, on the other hand, dates the origin of the primer from Bülach to the fourth or early last fifth of the 6th century AD on the basis of more recent, well-datable grave finds.

The grave finds mentioned by Max Martin with rune carvings from Central Europe date from 540 to 600 AD and belong to the West Germanic hemisphere (Franconia, Thuringians , Lombards and Alemanni). The older Futhark , the runic writing that was used on these grave finds, has been attested much longer and much earlier in northern Europe in the hemisphere of the northern and eastern Germanic peoples . The grave goods from this early period found in the south, however, have no rune carvings. The fact that in the grave finds with runic inscriptions from the period from 570 to 590 AD that the incisions are often made on the invisible underside of the objects suggests that the inscriptions served a private, magical purpose. Werner suspects that contact with the Roman world led to the runic writing suddenly being used for private purposes.

Historical context

After the withdrawal of the Roman troops from the Rhine line of the Upper German-Raetian Limes in the early 5th century, the Alemanni broke into the area between Eschenz , Zurich and Rafz after 450 AD . The ending -ach in the place name Bülach indicates, however, that the settlement of the former Roman estate of Bülach did not come about by the Alamanni, but that Celtic settlers were already based in Bülach during the retreat of the Romans and founded a settlement structure (Celtic suffix -ako (s)> Gallo-Roman -acum: * praedium Pulliacum = country estate of Pullius> ahd.Puillacha (828 AD)). Between the 4th and 5th centuries, the Franks under King Clovis and his sons successively subjugated the areas of the Alemanni and administered them as the Duchy of Alemannia . In this, the lower Glatttal and thus also the area of ​​today's Bülach stood in an important location between the centers of the rulers in Zurich, on the Hohentwiel and in Ulm . Immigration to the Bülach area is likely to have been so strong that the Alemannic language gradually gained the upper hand over the Celtic language.

The introduction of Christianity to the region also fell during this Alemannic period. Around 610 AD the Irish missionaries Columban and Gallus appeared in eastern Switzerland . Excavations by Walter Drack in the Reformed Church in Bülach in 1968 show that this church was founded by an Alemannic nobleman around 650 AD and that the region was Christianized early on.

Renata Windler presents the settlement history around Bülach differently. She assumes that shortly before the middle of the 6th century a small group of z. T. has settled wealthy people near Bülach. But it was not about Alamanni, but about Franks or Franconian population groups. Windler concludes this from the oldest graves in the Im Füchsli grave field . Only after 580–600 did the Alamanni settle in the Bülach region.

Due to the unresolved settlement issue and the different theories about the time and place of origin of the Bülach primer, it remains open whether it can be assigned to an Alemannic or a Franconian context.

Find situation

The fibula from Bülach was found at a depth of 1.10 meters in a grave on a burial ground in the area of ​​today's Strasse Im Füchsli and given the number 249. It is dated to the 6th century AD. In addition to a well-preserved female skeleton, the grave contained a chain made of glass beads , at the waist an iron belt buckle with tongue-shaped, three-rivet fittings and on the left side a belt hanger with iron chain parts attached to a small iron plate and hanging from it, plus a comb, knife and scissors. Between the right elbow and the spine was an iron ring and - slightly overlaid by this - the fibula from Bülach, underneath a small conical pearl and a small gold-plated double pearl from the 6th century AD. A grave photo from 1927 shows that the fibula, together with the iron ring and pearls, was not worn by the dead as a costume decoration, but was worn as an old or heirloom in the quality of an amulet or talisman and was given to the grave. The runes incised on the back of the fibula from Bülach could have been the reason for this.

The grave field "Im Füchsli"

The burial ground Im Füchsli is 600 meters north of the Reformed Church in Bülach. It reflects the rapid increase in the local population in the 7th century. New excavations would have to determine whether the cemetery included a closed village or several farm groups. On the other hand, it is less likely to assume that the cemetery belonged to the somewhat distant Bülach settlement.

The excavation

The first grave finds were made in the Im Füchsli area as early as 1860 . When further graves were found during earthworks in 1919, the Swiss National Museum sent its conservator Fernand Blanc, who uncovered most of the graves and recovered important finds in several excavation times between 1919 and 1923. Grave number 249, in which the Bülach primer was located, was not uncovered until 1927. The excavation was completed in 1928. A total of 299 graves with 300 burials were examined during the excavations carried out by the Swiss National Museum, of which 108 were men's graves, 71 women's graves and 29 children's graves. In 92 graves, the sex of the buried could not be determined.

The occupancy started around the year 550 on the flat surface above the slope. The graves from the first half of the 7th century are located in the slope itself; the graves south of Dachslenbergstrasse were probably created after the year 650. In the early 8th century the cemetery will have been abandoned.

The pair of fish primers

Fish brooch pair

Another precious and unique find was made in grave number 14: the pair of cloisonnated fish brooches . Each fibula is 9 cm long. The pair was found lying on top of each other with the tail end down above the pelvis of the dead. A wide pale gold strip forms the contour line of a swimming fish, the head and scales of which are laid out with flat almandines on waffled gold-plated silver foil. The round cell of the eye was empty at the time of the excavation, but was originally filled with a colored mass. The bridge is made of pale gold and is fitted into a gold-plated, 5 mm wide silver frame that rests on the back plate made of sheet silver. The pair of fish primers was depicted on a Pro Patria stamp in 1973 .

literature

  • Joachim Werner : The Alemannic burial ground of Bülach. Monographs on the prehistory and early history of Switzerland 9, Basel 1953.
  • Wolfgang Krause , Herbert Jankuhn : The runic inscriptions in the older Futhark . Goettingen 1966.
  • Joachim Werner: The emergence of images and writing in Northern Europe. Munich, 1966.
  • Heinz Klingenberg : Runic primer from Bülach, Canton Zurich. Love inscription from the early Alemannic period , in: Alemannisches Jahrbuch 1973/75, pp. 308-325.
  • Heinz Klingenberg: The runic inscription from Bülach , in: Helvetia archaeologica, 7, Basel 1976, pp. 116–121.
  • Stephan Opitz: South Germanic runic inscriptions in the older Futhark from the Merovingian period . Kirchzarten, 1977.
  • Max Martin : The rune fibula from Bülach grave 249. Thoughts on the dissemination of rune monuments among the West Germans. In: Karl Stüber, Andreas Zürcher (ed.): Festschrift Walter Drack. Stäfa 1977, pp. 120-128 ( uni-heidelberg.de ).
  • Walter Hildebrandt: Bülach. History of a small town in time images, basic features and documents. Bülach 1985.
  • Renata Windler: On the settlement history of the Bülach area in the early Middle Ages. Archeology of Switzerland 13 No. 2, 1990, pp. 67–79.
  • JH Looijenga: Runes around the North Sea and on the Continent AD 150-700 . Dissertation, University of Groningen, 1997.
  • Max Martin: Script from the North: Runes in the Alamannia - Archaeologically considered. In: The Alemanni. Stuttgart, 1997; Pp. 499-502.
  • Wilhelm Schmidt: History of the German language. Stuttgart etc. 2000, pp. 49-50.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Max Martin: The rune fibula from Bülach grave 249. Thoughts on p. 121 and 126.
  2. ↑ a b Heinz Klingenberg: The rune inscription from Bülach. P. 116.
  3. ↑ Johanna Wirth Calvo: Historical search for traces ( Memento of the original from February 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . City of Bülach. Flyer design showing both sides of the primer on p. 15. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.buelach.ch
  4. ^ A b Wilhelm Schmidt: History of the German language. P. 50.
  5. ^ Heinz Klingenberg: The runic inscription from Bülach. P. 118 f.
  6. ^ Heinz Klingenberg: The runic inscription from Bülach. Pp. 116-117.
  7. ↑ Wolfgang Krause and Herbert Jankuhn: The runic inscriptions in the older Futhark. Goettingen 1966.
  8. ^ Heinz Klingenberg: The runic inscription from Bülach. P. 119.
  9. ^ Heinz Klingenberg: The runic inscription from Bülach. P. 120.
  10. ↑ Kiel rune project
  11. ↑ Stephan Opitz: South Germanic rune inscriptions in the older Futhark from the Merovingian period. Kirchzarten 1977.
  12. ↑ Tineke [= Jantina Helena] Looijenga: Texts and Contexts of the Oldest Runic Inscriptions . Brill, Leiden 2003, ISBN 90-04-12396-2 , pp. 235 ( limited preview in Google Book Search).
  13. ^ Joachim Werner: The Alemannic burial ground of Bülach. P. 10.
  14. ↑ Bernhard Salin: The old Germanic animal ornamentation. 1935, p. 148.
  15. ↑ Max Martin: The rune fibula from Bülach grave 249. P. 124–125.
  16. ↑ Max Martin: The rune fibula from Bülach grave 249. P. 121.
  17. ↑ Max Martin: The rune fibula from Bülach grave 249. P. 122–124.
  18. ↑ Joachim Werner: The emergence of image and writing in Northern Europe. P. 34, and Joachim Werner: The two decorative disks from the Thorsberg moor find. 1941, pp. 68-69.
  19. ^ A b Renata Windler: On the settlement history of the Bülach area in the early Middle Ages. P. 70.
  20. ^ Walter Hildebrandt: Bülach: History of a small town in time pictures, basic features and documents. Pp. 186-187.
  21. ^ Walter Hildebrandt: Bülach: History of a small town in time pictures, basic features and documents. Pp. 187-188.
  22. ↑ a b Max Martin: The rune fibula from Bülach grave 249. P. 120.
  23. ↑ Renata Windler: On the settlement history of the Bülach area in the early Middle Ages. P. 76
  24. ↑ Max Martin: The rune fibula from Bülach grave 249. P. 126
  25. ^ Walter Hildebrandt: Bülach: History of a small town in time pictures, basic features and documents. P. 194
  26. ↑ Renata Windler: On the settlement history of the Bülach area in the early Middle Ages. P. 75
  27. ^ A b Walter Hildebrandt: Bülach: History of a small town in time images, basic features and documents. P. 190.
  28. ^ Walter Hildebrandt: Bülach: History of a small town in time pictures, basic features and documents. P. 191, based on Joachim Werner: The Alemannic burial ground of Bülach. 1953.
  29. ^ Pro Patria