Viking Rune

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Mike B in OKlahoma
Posts: 1048
Joined: Fri Aug 04, 2006 10:32 pm
Location: Oklahoma City

Viking Rune

Post by Mike B in OKlahoma »

Or so it is claimed!

Image

I stopped at Heavener Runestone State Park on my way home from Southeastern Oklahoma this weekend. The park is there to protect a huge slab of rock containing several mysterious carved runes. This is just one of the letters, it's about eight inches across and six inches high. Two shots with the 180mm macro merged, shot through plexiglass by ambient light (there's a bit of contrast loss on the right due to a reflection on the plexiglass that I missed when shooting).

It is claimed that Viking explorers sailed down the East Coast of the USA, across the Gulf of Mexico, and up the Mississippi and Arkansas Rivers to the future home of Heavener, Oklahoma where they carved these runes (and about five other sets of runes in the general area). I don't believe a word of it, but I do think they are fascinating...I just hope they aren't a late19th Century hoax! There are scholars who claim to have translated them from Norse, but about three different translations out there.

I wish I'd backed up a little more to give the rune some breathing room, but I was in a documentary mindset of capturing as much detail as possible when I shot.

More on the Heavener Runestones here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heavener_Runestone
Note that they have something similar up in Minnesota!

180mm macro (two merged shots, total about 19.5 megapixels)
1.3 seconds @ f/11, ISO 100
ambient light, tripod mount (obviously!)
Mike Broderick
Oklahoma City, OK, USA

Constructive critiques of my pictures, and reposts in this forum for purposes of critique are welcome

"I must obey the inscrutable exhortations of my soul....My mandate includes weird bugs."
--Calvin

Ken Ramos
Posts: 7208
Joined: Thu Jul 27, 2006 2:12 pm
Location: lat=35.4005&lon=-81.9841

Post by Ken Ramos »

I am always a skeptic when it comes to things like this and often jump the gun on others. It seems though, judging from whats presented in the Wiki link, that no one really seems to know what they are looking at. I wonder if anyone has investigated the possibility that the carvings came from indigenous people who may have lived a good many years ago in the area. There are petroglyphs to be found here in North Carolina also, though none similar to those shown in the link or at least I think :-k . However, it does make one wonder about the exploits of the Vikings. Interesting shot of the symbol though, looks like a large butterfly. :D

beetleman
Posts: 3578
Joined: Fri Aug 04, 2006 4:19 am
Location: Southern New Hampshire USA

Post by beetleman »

I think I will get my rock hammer out and see if I can make something historical :wink: Interesting photo and information Mike...never knew anything about it.
Take Nothing but Pictures--Leave Nothing but Footprints.
Doug Breda

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