Runes, Runes, the Musical Fruit

Introducing Icelandic farting magic.

Hello, wonderful witches!

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Now, on to today’s article. Friends, the time has come for us to discuss something very serious: farting, and the magic that causes it. I was so thrilled when I learned about this topic, and I’m even more excited to be able to write about it for you all. Try the below the next time you feed someone you dislike beans… they’ll never suspect you.

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Farting: It’s Not Just for Beans Anymore

Roughly four centuries ago in Iceland, grimoires were full of runes designed to, essentially, make someone fart themselves to death — or at the very least, cause them to keep farting forever in a very uncomfortable and painful humiliating habit. They were called Fretrúnir, and typically were used to embarrass someone that hurt the spellcaster’s pride or ego.

There’s actually an historical record of a young man named Jón Jónsson and his father (also named Jón Jónsson) who, in Ísafjörður in 1656, cast spells using these runes on both a pastor (also named Jón, go figure) and a local girl. Both father and son confessed to making the pastor ill with magic, and the son claimed the farts of the girl. It may sound funny, but the consequences at this time were very real — both Jónssons were burned at the stake.

Interestingly enough, once the pastor recovered, he went after Jón Sr.’s daughter for witchcraft as well. She stood trial, though, was found not guilty, and sued the pastor. She won the lawsuit, and as compensation for her trouble, won all of the pastor’s belongings.

These runes first appeared in grimoires of Icelandic witches in the 1600s. I initially found them in Tvær galdraskræður, or “Two Icelandic Books of Magic,” a compilation of late 1700s grimoires I picked up at the Museum of Icelandic Sorcery and Witchcraft in Iceland’s westfjords, where you can also see such treasures as a pair of necropants.

Necropants were basically a skin-suit that was peeled off a man from the waist down. You filled the scrotum with coins, put on the skin-pants, and wore them around town in a somewhat psychotic spell to gain unlimited wealth. Supposedly the person who originally wore the pants as, you know, their actual skin, had to agree to the spell before their death, so there’s that at least.

But back to the book. There are two recorded sets of farting runes in Tvær galdraskræður. In the first, you carve the runes onto oak smeared with your own blood — and you carve them with a human finger bone. While you’re carving, recite the following:

I carve you 8 ásar, 9 naudir, 13 pursa [rune names]. You shall explode to great discomfort, I forbid your backside to fall apart: Now shit or explode.

And here’s what you should carve, being sure to do it during a full moon:

The second set of farting runes is slightly different — and luckily, no human bones or blood needed. But you do need access to your target’s pants. Just carve the three staves below in order onto a small oak tablet, and put it in their pants. And then, let the farting commence!

You can also find farting runes in the Galdrabók, a collection of 47 spells from the 1700s used as a family’s book of shadows, republished in 1989 with English translations.

Writing the runes wasn’t the easiest of endeavors. You had to find white calfskin, and then draw blood from your own thigh to write with. Here’s the English translation of what’s said while crafting the rune:

I carve you eight áss-runes, nine nauð-runes, thirteen þurs-runes, which are to afflict your belly with great shitting and shooting pains, and all these may afflict your belly with very great farting. May your bones split asunder, may your guts burst, may your farting never stop, neither day nor night. May you become as weak as the fiend, Loki, who was snared by all the gods. In your mightiest name Lord God, Spirit, Creator, Óðinn, Þor, Savior, Freyr, Freyja, Oper, Satan, Beelzebub, helper, mighty God, protect with your followers Uteos, Morss, Nokte, Vitales.

That’s some intense crap. (Pardon the pun.)

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In the next issue…

The next newsletter will have… well, I’m not sure yet. We’ll find out together!

See you then!