Bergakker inscription

The Bergakker inscription is an Elder Futhark inscription discovered on the scabbard of a 5th-century sword. It was found in 1996 in the Dutch town of Bergakker, in the Betuwe, a region once inhabited by the Batavi. There is consensus that the find dates from the period 425-475 and that the inscription is either the singular direct attestation of Frankish, or the earliest attestation of Old Dutch.

Inscription

Runic writing at the time was used along the North Sea coast, in Frisia, but there are very few other extant inscriptions from Francia. The inscription can be read as
where V is a non-standard rune, apparently a vowel, and * represents an unknown rune.
Several readings have been presented in literature. There seems to be a consensus that the ann is the past tense of unnan, corresponding to Modern Dutch gunnen, which means "give/bestow/grant". Several authors read the first word as a personal name in the genitive, and the last word as meaning "flame, brand", a kenning for swords. The third word is read either as kusjam, meaning "chooser" or "chosen", corresponding to Modern Dutch keuze, or as kesjam meaning "cut" or "cutter", also referring to swords or sword wielders.

Graphemic peculiarities

The text features graphemic peculiarities that have led to ongoing scholarly debate. Modern imaging and analysis suggest that the first rune may have been misidentified in earlier publications, complicating the reading of the opening word. The inscription also contains double-lined and unusual runes not found in other Elder Futhark examples, prompting caution in transliteration and highlighting the complexity of the text.