Das Geheimnis der Runen

Das Geheimnis der Runen (English: 'The Secret of the Runes' ) is a book by Austrian mystic Guido von List, in which he presents his "Armanen Futharkh". It appeared as a periodical article in 1906, and as a standalone publication in 1908.

Contents

Further information: Armanen Futharkh

Circular arrangement of the Armanen runes.

The book is a summary of List's Germanic mysticism as realised in the years between 1902 and 1908.

The "Armanen Futharkh", as List referred to them, are a row of 18 runes that are closely based on the Younger Futhark which were "revealed to" von List in 1902.

The row of 18 "Armanen runes" came to List while in an 11 month state of temporary blindness after a cataract operation on both eyes in 1902. This vision in 1902 allegedly opened what List referred to as his "inner eye", via which the "Secret of the Runes" was revealed to him. List stated that his Armanen Futharkh were encrypted in the Rúnatal of the Poetic Edda (stanzas 138 to 165 of the Hávamál), with stanzas 147 through 165, where Odin enumerates eighteen wisdoms (with 164 being an interpolation), interpreted as being the "song of the 18 runes". List and many of his followers believed his runes to represent the "primal runes" upon which all historical rune rows were based.

The book was dedicated to his good friend Friedrich Wannieck and in the introduction before his discussion of the runes there is a copy of a correspondence between Wannieck and List.

Reception

List's book is seminal to later currents of Germanic mysticism and Nazi occultism. The Armanen runes were employed for magical purposes in by authors such as Friedrich Bernhard Marby and Siegfried Adolf Kummer, and after World War II in a reformed "pansophical" system by Karl Spiesberger. More recently, Stephen Flowers, Adolf Schleipfer, Larry E. Camp and others also build on List's system.

Editions

Cover of the new German reprint published by Adolf Schleipfer

Das Geheimnis der Runen was published in Leipzig and Vienna in 1908 by the Guido-von-List-Gesellschaft (Gross-Lichterfelde).^[1] It was also known as GLB 1 of the Guido-List-Bücherei (GLB) series.

The book was also published as a periodical article as 'Das Geheimnis der Runen' , 'Neue Metaphysische Rundschau' [9] 13 (1906), 23-4, 75-87, 104-26.^[2]

An English language translation of the book was published in 1988 by Stephen E. Flowers.^[3]

The book also remains popular in German Neo-Nazism, with a reprint published by Adolf Schleipfer of the "Armanen-Orden.

References

1. ^ English translation of 'Das Geheimnis der Runen' by Stephen E. Flowers
2. ^ The Occult Roots of Nazism by Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke
3. ^ Flowers, Stephen (aka Edred Thorsson) (1988). The Secret of the Runes. Destiny Books. ISBN 0-89281-207-9. 

External links

• online version

See also

• Guido-List-Bücherei