摘要：

在中世纪的欧洲，鲁尼文字被用来书写某些北欧日耳曼语族的语言，特别在斯堪的纳维亚半岛与不列颠岛屿通用。随着基督教传入北欧，鲁尼字母逐渐被拉丁字母取代并走向没落。在鲁尼文字发展后期，该文字产生了多种变体。在众多变体中，“盎格鲁-萨克逊”变体引人注目。由于维京海盗的对外侵略，鲁尼文字的传播对英语字母表的形成和发展也产生了一定影响。本论文在对鲁尼文字学的发展历程进行简要阐述后，对关于鲁尼文字为何产生和发源地的猜想进行总结。随之收集鲁尼文字在发展历程中产生的各种变体，以扩充对鲁尼文字的了解和认识，并将鲁尼字母与英文字母进行比较和分析。最后，本文尝试解释鲁尼文字对英语字母表的形成产生的影响，以加深对盎格鲁-撒克逊时期鲁尼文字的理解。

关键词：鲁尼文字；文字发展史；英语字母表

Abstract:

Runes, known as runic alphabets, are the letters in a set which were used before the adoption of the Latin alphabet in Europe, to write different Germanic languages. After the Norman Conquest, these letters were no more used for recording information, and were only used as symbols to decorate carpets and table clothes. The purpose of this study is to give a brief review on the history of runes and illustrate how the runes had affected the formation of English alphabet, especially in the Anglo-Saxon period. After a brief introduction to runes and a review on runology from a historical perspective, this paper concludes why runes were invented and the possible origins of runes. Then it collects variants of runes in distinctive ages and regions. Finally, this paper combines the author’s understanding of runes with her knowledge of historical linguistics of English, and tries to explain how runes had influenced the formation of English alphabet in history.

Key words: Runes; development history of language; English alphabet

1. Introduction
    In this very first chapter, the author will give a brief introduction to runes, what do runologists do and the research questions of this paper. In addition, this chapter includes the author’s personal motivation and academic significance of this study.
  1.1 Rune, Runic and Runology
The words “rune” and “runic” can mean a number of different things, as a glance at their entries in the Oxford English Dictionary will show. In this paper, these terms simply refer to a group of characters whose initial purpose is to record language. The paper uses “rune” for a letter of the characteristic alphabet that recorded Germanic texts in an early time. And by “runic”, this paper focuses on consisting of runes, carved or written in runes, inscribed with runes, or concerned with runes.