The Ruthwell Cross and the Story it has to Tell. 119 



doubt that from time immemorial it must have been a veritable 

 "sermon in stone" even to those to whom the Runic alphabet 

 was a sealed book. The scenes from the life of our Lord which 

 are carved upon the broader faces of the pillar speak to us now 

 with the same voice with which they spoke to our forefathers a 

 thousand years ago. They depict to us the Christ in His simple 

 beauty and His matchless dignity of form and manner, His head 

 invariably encircled by the cruciform halo, His right hand 

 usually raised in the attitude of benediction. His left hand hold- 

 ing the sacred scroll ; at one time trampling down vice and un- 

 cleanness, as when He is seen standing on the heads of swine, at 

 another working miracles of mercy, as when He gives sight to 

 the man who was born blind. We pass now to the Runic 

 inscription, of which Dr Duncan pathetically said, in 1834, " it 

 has hitherto baffled all attempts of the learned to interpret it." 

 The word "rune " signifies simply a "whisper," a "secret " or 

 "something magical." "These Runic letters," observes Bishop 

 Forrest Browne, the greatest living authority on the subject, " are 

 decidedly Anglian Runes, differing in conspicuous respects from 

 the typically Scandinavian Runes. . . . For myself," he 

 continues, " I derive the Runic alphabet from the forms of Greek 

 letters which prevailed four or five centuries before Christ. The 

 Runic letters are little more than variants of the early Attic 

 capitals, altered so as to make them easy to cut on the surface of 

 wood, especially a wood that splintered." The Runes, as you 

 know, occur on the narrower faces of the Ruthwell pillar, on the 

 margin which encloses the beautiful vine-tracery. The inscrip- 

 tion on the broader faces is in Latin characters and corresponds 

 very closely with the text of the Vulgate. 



Subjects Sculptured on the Cross. 



The other subjects sculptured upon the Roman-lettered 

 sides in addition to those already alluded to are : — (a) The Cruci- 

 fixion, (b) The Annunciation, (c) Mary Magdalene, who brought 

 an alabaster box of ointment, and, standing behind her Master, 

 began to " bathe His feet with her tears and to wipe them with 

 the hairs of her head." This, the principal panel on the south 

 side, corresponds with that of the Christ standing on the heads of 

 swine, the princif)al one one the north side, (d) The Visitation. 



