Let’s try two letters
If you’re wondering what the converter actually does, I’d start with th. With aliases turned on, those two letters become ᚦ. Turn aliases off, and you’ll get two separate signs instead. You’ve changed how the tool matches letters, rather than changing the meaning of a word.
That’s the distinction I want to make clear. Writing familiar letters with another set of signs is transcription. Translating means expressing the meaning in another language. The converter can help with the first, but it doesn’t understand a sentence or turn English into an ancient language.
What the settings change
Aliases let you type th for þ and ng for ŋ. The optional approximation setting goes a little further: it uses k for c and q, w for v, ks for x, and i for y. These are choices built into this app, rather than rules passed down by ancient writers.
Try typing cave with approximation off, then turn it on. I’d look at each position and see what changed. It’s a small example, but it makes the settings easier to understand than a long explanation does.
Anything the converter doesn’t recognize stays in the result. So do brackets, punctuation and line breaks. If you’ve included a note or marked a gap in a reading, those details should still be there when you copy it.
Using the result
For a name, it helps to decide what you want to preserve: its spelling or how it sounds. This converter works from written characters. It can’t choose an ancient form of your name or work out the grammar around it.
The runes themselves are Unicode text, so you can copy and search them. The Unicode Runic chart includes characters from several runic traditions, though, rather than one alphabet used together at a single point in history. [1]
I’d try a reading we can compare with an object, such as harja on the Vimose comb. Put the typed runes beside the photograph and notice what looks familiar. That’s a useful way to enjoy the converter while keeping the original writing in view.
Sources and reading notes
- Unicode Consortium: Runic chartCharacter identities and code points. This is an encoding reference, not a pronunciation guide.
