Rune 3 of 24 · Freyr's aett
Thurisaz
“giant (Norse þurs); thorn in Old English” · sound: th (as in 'thin')
Can be drawn reversed when reversals are on.
Historical evidence
Norse þurs means a giant, a hostile being of myth; both Norse poems call it a torment of women. The Old English poem renames it þorn, 'thorn', painful to grasp.
The name Thurisaz is a modern reconstruction of the Proto-Germanic name; the Elder Futhark’s own names are not recorded.
In the rune poems (original texts)
Ðorn byþ ðearle scearp; ðegna gehwylcum
anfeng ys yfyl, ungemetum reþe
manna gehwylcum, ðe him mid resteð.Þurs vældr kvinna kvillu;
kátr værðr fár af illu.Þurs er kvenna kvöl
ok kletta búi
ok varðrúnar verr.
Saturnus þengill.Original texts as printed in Bruce Dickins, Runic and Heroic Poems of the Old Teutonic Peoples, Cambridge University Press, 1915. Public domain. The summary above is Scryway’s own; no translation is reproduced.
Modern interpretation
From 20th-century and later divinatory practice, written for Scryway. Not a historical meaning.
Keywords: defence, a sharp threshold, reactive force
Upright
A barrier or sharp edge: something that protects, but hurts to handle. Pause before a threshold and decide deliberately.
Reversed
Reacting before thinking, or running into thorns of your own making. Hostility, outside or inside.