Ingwaz (ᛜ)
Pronunciation: ING-wahz · Latin equivalent: NG · Týr’s ætt, sixth rune
Name and meaning
Proto-Germanic ingwaz — the god Ing, whom the lore knows better as Freyr (Yngvi-Freyr, ancestor of the Yngling kings). The rune’s closed diamond is a seed: potential complete in itself, sealed, waiting for its season.
In the rune poems
Attested only in the Anglo-Saxon poem, which preserves a genuinely old fragment of god-lore: Ing first seen among the East-Danes, then departing eastward over the wave with his wagon following after. Dropped from the Younger Futhark; the Norse poems are silent, though Freyr himself certainly is not.
Upright
The stored seed: gestation, potential banked and protected, work completed and sealed before release. Hearth-peace, fertility, the quiet before fruitful action. A rune for finishing one stage fully so the next can begin clean.
Merkstave
This rune is one of the nine that cannot reverse: its form reads the same either way up. If your set marks each stone’s bottom (see Casting the Runes: Merkstave and the Marked Stone), it may still fall merkstave, and a shadow reading applies — the same force obstructed, frozen, or turned inward. Otherwise, take it as it lies. Read in shadow: the seed kept sealed past its season — potential hoarded until it goes sterile.
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