Kensington Runestone - Nielsen and Wolters.

I've just finished my first pass through the book and I have to say
that despite its faults, I'm impressed.

The book is structured and has both a bibliography and an index,
although I expect that both could be strengthened. It's apparent that
the book first set out to be a defense of Ohman as forger but it has
expanded to much more than that. The structure show signs of strain
from the way the text has rapidly expanded over the months preceding
publication.

My first reaction is that the information which emerges falls under
the following main headings:

1. Wolters has photographed the runes in unprecedented detail and in
the process has shown that the common understanding of the nature
of some of the runes is wrong. Some of the runes are almost
unprecedented.

2. Nielsen has established that the use of the rare runes was largely
confined to the region of 14th century Gotland.

3. The discovery that some of the runes are not as has been commonly
assumed means that previous interpretations of the inscription
will have to be discarded. Possible new interpretations require
that the stone be reassessed.

4. While newly discovered marks on the stone can be interpreted as
phonetic modifications of the rune, others have no such obvious
meaning. Wolters and Nielsen have hypothesised that the marks are
intended to draw attention to the particular runes and on that
basis have tried substituting the marked runes in the runic
Easter table. This produces the date 1362 in confirmation of date
inscribed on the stone. The details of this are given in the
book and at first sight the extraction of a second 1362 appears
to be valid.

5. Wolters and Nielsen also claim that apparently marked runes can
be used to derive a close (to 5 decimal figures) approximation to
the Golden Number phi. They have given the details of this also
but the derivation is more obscure and I have not yet tried to
confirm it.

6. On the basis of the numerology, Wolters and Nielsen have proposed
that the inscription on the KRS is linked to the Knights Templar
or a group linked to that body. I expect this to be highly
contentious but my recent reading suggests the Templars were into
this kind of thing and it brings into striking prominence Martin
Reboul's suggestion of April 2004 that, based on the use of the
letters AVM, the KRS was an elaborate 'masonic joke'. See
http://tinyurl.com/7alsr It may be that the insertion of AVM was
indeed a marker of the true nature of the stone for initiates, in
which case whoever carved it would be surprised to learn that its
origin was still recognised 642 years later. In any case, the use
of embedded codes reminds me of some of the techniques used to
validitate the authenticity of letters of credit in mediaeval
times.

7. The book lists an enormous amount of correspondence which has
never previously seen the light of day. It throws fresh light
into the relationship between Ohman and Holand. It also makes it
plain that many well known scholars who have dealt with the KRS
in the past have had the clearly stated objective of finding
evidence to prove the stone a fake. In one case, there is
evidence that the opportunity was deliberately ignored to
interview a newly discovered vital witness to the discovery of
the KRS (Willie Sarsland) before he died.

8. Wolters touches on the examination of the weathering of tombstones
but other than stating the broad results he goes into no great
detail.

In my humble opinion, this book is a 'must have' for anyone who
seriously wants to get the bottom of almost any aspect of the story of
the KRS.



Eric Stevens

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Relevant Pages

  • Re: KRS - Possible news to come
    ... Wolters and Nielsen touched on many points but none in great ... > The KRS is a very complex highly metamorphosed greywacke. ... > He has studied the lineations over the back of the stone and agrees ... > shows much less weathering of the pyrites. ...
    (sci.archaeology)
  • Re: KRS - Possible news to come
    ... Wolters and Nielsen touched on many points but none in great ... > KRS and the accusations against Ohman. ... > The KRS is a very complex highly metamorphosed greywacke. ... > to clean the grooves in the stone when it was found. ...
    (sci.archaeology)
  • Re: KRS - Possible news to come
    ... Wolters and Nielsen touched on many points but none in great ... >> The KRS is a very complex highly metamorphosed greywacke. ... >> shows much less weathering of the pyrites. ... >> Ohman never carved runes. ...
    (sci.archaeology)
  • Re: Kensington Runestone - Nielsen and Wolters.
    ... >for anyone interested in the KRS. ... >exploration of the stone and the language. ... >> of some of the runes is wrong. ... Wolters and Nielsen have hypothesised that the marks are ...
    (sci.archaeology)
  • Re: Kensington Runestone - Nielsen and Wolters.
    ... There has been so much passion about the KRS, passion that has oft-times led to slanting the research or the conclusions of other works, that I was hoping for a more dispassionate exploration of the stone and the language. ... of some of the runes is wrong. ... Wolters and Nielsen have hypothesised that the marks are ...
    (sci.archaeology)