CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

RUNESTONES AND THE

CHRISTIAN MISSIONS

Anne-Sofie Gräslund and Linn Lager

D

uring the last decades of the tenth century the Scandinavian runestone tradition
went through a major transformation. The erection of the Jelling stone in
Denmark by King Harald Bluetooth in the 960 s is usually considered the starting point
of this transformation, even though the majority of the late Viking Age runestones were
produced during the eleventh century. The Jelling stone is unique in many ways, but it
contains all of the elements that came to characterise the late Viking Age runestone
tradition.
The runic inscription begins with stating who had the stone erected in memory of
whom, also clarifying in which way these individuals were related to each other. In this
case, King Harald had ‘these monuments’ made in memory of his father Gorm and his
mother Tyra. This introductory memorial phrase constitutes the least denominator on
virtually every runestone erected during the eleventh century, and it soon became very
formulaic. Many inscriptions then proceed to mention admirable qualities or achieve-
ments that characterise the deceased and/or the commemorator, in Harald’s case that he
had come to reign over both Norway and Denmark and that he converted the Danes.
The northernmost stone in Sweden, at Frösön in the province of Jämtland, is in some
respects compatible to the Jelling stone (although considerably later), as the inscription
goes: ‘Östman, Gudfast’s son, had this stone raised and this bridge made, and he had
Jämtland made Christian.. .’. There is also a Norwegian stone, explicitly mentioning
the conversion, the Kuli stone from the province of Møre. The normal memorial
sentence is followed by the text ‘Twelve winters Christianity has been in Norway.’
References to the conversion, and to Christianity in general, were a new addition to the
Scandinavian runestone tradition. These references generally occur in the shape of a
prayer and/or a centrally placed cross. Nearly 60 per cent of the Swedish runestones have
references to Christianity; in Denmark and Norway the percentage is considerably
lower. While the ornamentation on the Jelling stone is unique, it signifies the intro-
duction of a regular and more standardised element of ornamentation on the eleventh-
century runestones, usually in the shape of zoomorphic rune bands in Scandinavian
styles. From a chronological perspective, the standardisation of the memorial phrase and
the introduction of references to Christianity preceded the introduction of zoomorphic
rune bands by a few decades. Last, but not least, a major difference between the