Traces of Runic Lore in Italy The Wooden PDF

Classiconorroena 29 (2011)
http://classiconorroena.unina.it
ISSN 1123-4717 © 2013 Classiconorroena
Traces of Runic Lore in Italy:
The Wooden Calendar “Book” in Bologna
and Its Medieval Connections*
by Carla Cucina
1. Introductory Note
Medieval and post-medieval perpetual runic calendars
engraved on wood are most probably well known to any
* This paper is the text of a public lecture held on April 23rd, 2009,
at the National Museum of Denmark (Danmarks Nationalmuseum),
København.
Classiconorroena 29 (2011), pp. 95-181

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Scandinavian audience: several hundreds of artifacts, up to
about a thousand, are spread in public and private
collections, since they were common everyday instruments
for picking out Sundays and festivals from the sequence of
days in the year. In other words, they were meant as
practical tools for determining weekdays and liturgical
dates, especially Easter, of course, which falls on a different
date every year in accordance with the Moon cycle.
We will see formal specific features of the old Nordic
runic calendars in detail, but some preliminary
considerations need to be taken into account at this point.
First of all, it is noteworthy that this vast corpus of
portable runic calendars in the Northern countries shares
means and functions with the contemporary calendar
production of the rest of Europe, basically through proper
indication of both the Solar cycle and the Moon cycle, by
means of Dominical letters and golden numbers
respectively, the only difference resulting in the use of
Classiconorroena 29 (2011) http://classiconorroena.unina.it

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Traces of Runic Lore in Italy
runes instead of Latin letters and Roman numerals1. As for
their function, it is clear that they pointed to isolate Church
festivals rather than working days, and one has always to
bear this in mind, in order to understand first their late
appearance in the Scandinavian countries, due to the
relatively late Conversion to the Christian faith in the
North; and then the great relevance taken by liturgical
symbols and emblems of the Saints in the formal
composition of these clog almanacs.
As a second point, one should remember that,
notwithstanding this immediate connection with the
Church, everywhere in Europe, but particularly in the
North, calendars in the form of sticks, bars or tablets
(rimstavar or rimbokar) were not the exclusive domain of the
clergy, but were also extensively used by laymen. In fact,
they have long been spread among peasants, artisans and
1 For the most comprehensive overview of the history and features

of time-reckoning and calendars in the North, see LITHBERG 1953. See
also NILSSON 1934 and LIEBGOTT 1973.

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merchants, as well as among noble and educated people of
course.
In the Nordic countries, as far as the use of the Christian
everlasting calendar is concerned, the passage from the
clergy and the aristocratic milieu to uneducated people
may be easily seen in the early substitution of the written
names for the Saint feastdays with pictures and symbols
indicating the same Saints or festivals. Thus, we find
crosses (or half-crosses) with names in the oldest Swedish
rune calendar stick2, but only figures, marks and symbols
in the hundreds of various calendars produced in the
North mainly during the 16th and 17th centuries.
By the way, it is worth mentioning that a further reason
for scholarly interest in the runic calendar production is
that it was carried on until modern times, in some areas
(for ex. Ovansiljan in Dalarna) until the first decades of the
18th century, in the Eastern Baltic region (Estonia) and
Russia until well after the middle of the same century.
2 This is the well known Nyköping runic calendar, on which see

below, note 4 with related context, and fig. 3.

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Eventually, the overall design of clog almanacs and
calendars in general has to be held as a standard all over
Europe and runic exemplars are no exception; but some
features – above all concerning graphic computational
notes, and marks and symbols for the Saints – are of course
peculiar to or at least show possible origin from a certain
area, sometimes giving mixed evidence or hints as to the
provenance of the reference model and the actual place of
production of a single artifact.
As a broad classification of the whole documentary
corpus, first we have to distinguish epigraphic from
manuscript calendars. As we will soon see, this is of no
little relevance for the analysis of our “Italian” wooden
calendar book.
Now, suffice it to remember that calendars of various
kinds are very often written on parchment and/or inserted
in manuscripts all over Europe and consequently also in
the Scandinavian area: they may be poor and schematic in
design, following the basic Church tradition drawn from

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the Roman calendar model, such as a well known exemplar
from Vallentuna church, the oldest one from Sweden,
written in Latin at the end of the 12th century (see plate 1,
reproducing part of the page of June); or they may be
gorgeous in color illuminations and figure details, as it is
the case with the Schoyen Collection MS 2913, a refined
folding calendar from Uvdal in Norway dated 1636 but
based on an older English model variously reproduced in
Danish and Norwegian variant forms during the 16th
century (see plate 2).
Whatever be the case, they are generally richer in
calendar information than their epigraphic analogues, so
that not only Dominical letters, golden numbers and
feastdays, but also occupations of the months, hours of
light and darkness, tables with good and evil days etc. can
often be traced in them.
Epigraphic calendars are widely known as well, even if
they are most commonly found in the North, especially in
the runic variant graphic form. They are portable objects

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usually made of wood, that is above all walking sticks,
sword-like staves, single clogs and little boards tied in
book form.
Figure 1. Olaus Magnus, Historia de Figure 2. Olaus Magnus, Historia de

gentibus septentrionalibus I, 34 De gentibus septentrionalibus I, 35 De
baculis (vignette). menstruis signis tonitruorum (vignette)
Walking sticks (or “sword-like staves”) were well known
to and properly described for the first time by Olaus
Magnus in his Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus, a sort of
monumental “know-the-people-and-travel-through-the-
land” advertising book on Scandinavia and the Baltic area,
which he printed in Rome in 1555 with many useful
pictures he called “vignettes”3.
3Cfr. OLAUS MAGNUS, Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus, Romae

1555, fac-simile edition, with an English Introduction by J. GRANLUND,
Copenhagen 1972. For a thorough study of the runic lore handed
down by Olaus and Johannes Magnus in their Historiae, see CUCINA
1999.

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In the pictures appended to Book I, Chapters 34 and 35
(see figures 1 and 2, respectively), men – but also a boy and
some women – carry these walking sticks as they go to
church along the rough country paths, or as they stop and
discuss in order to determine Sundays and other mass
festivities correctly. Olaus called these “vandringstavar”
baculi annales rimstaf dicti, and in fact we still call them
rimstavar (also primstavar) or, when cut in runes, runstavar
(prim- or rim-staf is a broad and general term, the walking-
stick type being properly called in the past rim-stok; the
comprehensive Icelandic name for the general epigraphic
class is runakefli).
The type is widespread and standard: we may find some
rather late exemplars from Norway (see plate 3,
reproducing a 17th century walking stick rune calendar
with weekdays, feastdays and golden numbers, plus a
futhark), but they originated in Middle Age Sweden and
circulated much more there indeed, as the famous
Nyköping runstav shows (see figure 3).

103
It dates from the middle or second half of the 13th
century or maybe from the very beginning of the 14th (so it
is by far the oldest example of the kind), and was
discovered in 1964 in the excavation of the old central
quarter of Nyköping. It is now 44 cm long, but it used to be
of about double length and of the kind of an ordinary
promenadkäpp type. It is simple in design, octagonal in
section, with two lines of runes (Sunday letters and golden
numbers series) and one line of symbols (i.e. cross) marks,
the length of the year being parted in two halves,
corresponding to a winter side and a summer side.
Figure 3. “Runstav” from Nyköping, Sweden.

Winter side from January, 1st to February, 3rd
(downwards: numeri aurei, litterae Dominicae, feriae).
It is also worth mentioning that Christian feast day
marks are expressed by the written names of the Saints,
and not through pictures or symbols – as will become
usual from the 16th century onwards on wooden calendars.

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The Nyköping stave is well known to scholars, of course,
and very useful to build a basic and original model for the
genre, thanks also to the complete edition and thorough
study published by Elisabeth Svärdström in 19664. We
should keep in mind, however, that calendar sticks of this
kind are usually quite later artifacts, mostly dated from the
16th through the 17th century, even if they are of a much
earlier origin, as the Nyköping stave shows5.
We find also broader and shorter sticks, bars or clogs,
often slim boards in the form of a short sword or sword
blade, we call rimstavar or runstavar as well (see plate 4);
also in this case, the stav is usually two-sided, with marks
and signs for the first half of the year on side A (winter
side), and with information about the second half of the
4 See SVÄRDSTRÖM 1966.

5 The rimstav group, especially with the large Swedish runic
variant class of runstavar, corresponds to the most widespread
Medieval calendar model in Scandinavia. Its formal and functional
characteristics are analysed in a series of articles and contributions,
which form the bulk of the critical literature published on the Nordic
calendar production. See particularly LITHBERG 1921; LITHBERG 1932;
LITHBERG 1934; JANSSON 1947; SVÄRDSTRÖM 1966; LIEBGOTT 1973, pp.
21-32; HALLONQUIST 1994.

105
year on side B (summer side). It may have a hole at one
end, in order to be hung on the wall, and may be more or
less decorated, especially on the handle.
This more varied type is well attested in the British Isles
too, particularly in Staffordshire, where for instance we
find a peculiar clog calendar form (i.e. a square prism of
wood, on which the days were marked by notches cut on
the four long edges, each edge corresponding to three
months), well-known from an old drawing published by
George Stephens (see figure 4)6, and where also a number
of runic staff-calendars of Swedish origin or based on
Swedish models were found and published during the 19th
century by the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland.
In plate 5 and figure 5 respectively, we can appreciate
runic clogs, sword-like staves and walking sticks of various
kind and provenance, in the last case reproduced
according to antiquarian drawings, all put side by side for
comparison by Nils Lithberg at the beginning of the last
6 STEPHENS 1866, p. 871.

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century7: most of them are Swedish, as it is well to be
expected, and are preserved in Stockholm, in the Nordiska
Museet or in the Statens Historiska Museet.
Figure 4. Staffordshire clog almanac Figure 5. Runic “sword-like” sticks

in a drawing published by George from the Mälar region, Sweden.
Stephens, 1866 Stockholm, Nordiska Museet
Eventually, little boards or tablets bound together to
form a sort of “book” have been handed down to us from
very late and post-Medieval times, which is what we call
7 Cfr. LITHBERG 1921, p. 3, figg. 1-5; LITHBERG 1932, p. 135, figg. 16-
20.

107
rimbok or runbok, and what in fact we find in our present
case.
In plate 6 we can appreciate a Swedish runbok of the
commonest kind: here a point of interest lies in that the
artifact comes from Gammalsvenskby in Russia and must
have been made on Dagö in Estonia before the Swedish
community there was forced to move to Ukraine (it is
dated as late as 1766)8.
Another very nice example for this group is a calendar
from Östergötland, now in the Statens Historiska Museet
(see plate 7); and a “booklet” in a proper sense may be
considered another wooden runic calendar from the isle of
Öland, Sweden (see plate 8) – but we are soon to consider
this runbok calendar type with due attention.
Anyway, we can comfortably compare the two main
classes of primstavar (rimstaf vs. rimbok) in an old
illustration drawn from a description of Lapland
antiquities in the Kunstkammer collection of the
8
Cfr. JANSSON 1987, pp. 173-174.

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“Gottorfischen Sammlung” in Schleswig by the librarian
and antiquarian Adam Olearius (dated 1666; see figure 6);
which is also a good way to remind us that the Baltic
region (mainly Lapland and Estonia) is very rich in
calendar epigraphic tradition as well.
The simple runbok from Lapland reproduced in plate 9
shows no indication of the golden numbers, and can be
taken as a good specimen of a vast and interesting
production in wood, bone or reindeer horn9.
Figure 6. Runic calendars in a drawing by Adam Olearius, 1666.
9 Cfr. GRANLUND 1973.

109
Portable calendars written on parchment, which can be
compared in overall design and function to our runic
rimstaf or rimbok, are known from Scandinavia as well, for
instance from Östergötland, where the 15th century pocket
calendar shown in plate 10, now in the Statens Historiska
Museet in Stockholm, originated (the picture shows days
from the 10th of June to the 10th of July).
The same period of the year (June and July) can also be
seen on a much later (1685) pocket almanac painted on
paper from Västergötland, now in the Skara Museum:
again we find runes for Dominical letters and golden
numbers, and symbols for Saints and seasonal activities
(see plate 11).
Indeed, parchment or paper portable calendars are quite
common and widely spread also outside Scandinavia: as a
good specimen we may take a parchment exemplar folded
in a leather case and tied with strings, dated 1440, which
was carried about hung at the belt of Mamert Fichet, a

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French cleric living in a little village under the Alps, along
the pilgrim route to Rome (see plate 12)10.
It deserves attention here as good evidence of how the
Nordic runic and epigraphic production can be counted
original and somewhat peculiar, though within a serial
mode, against the standard contemporary European
background. Certainly calendars cut in wood, particularly
of the rimstaf type, were a most distinguished product of
the Nordic world.
When we come to consider the runic variant form of the
Western everlasting calendar in a broad sense, as I pointed
out before, we have just to think of a simple process of
substitution of graphic symbols, namely runes for
alphabetical letters or Roman numerals. In order to identify
Sundays, the standard Christian – or Julian – calendar
model used the series of the first seven Roman capital
letters (or litterae Dominicae, i.e. “Dominical or Sunday
letters”) from A to G in the alphabetical order, each for one
10 Cfr. MAIELLO 1996, pp. 20-22.

111
of the week days; in the Nordic tradition, the first seven
runes were used for this purpose, in the order peculiar to
the younger futhark.
The so-called Sunday letters allowed to define the weeks
for each year according to the Solar cycle: being this a 28-
years cycle, the cipher of a certain year improved by 9
needed to be divided by 28; the rest indicated the position
of that year in the Solar cycle and that number
corresponded to the Sunday letter of that year. (You had to
add 9 to any year date because, from the Concilium of
Nicea in 325, the solar cycle was made to begin again in
328, so that the first year of the solar cycle properly came to
fall in the year 9 B.C.) Every fourth year, which is a leap (or
bissextile) year, had two Sunday letters, one for the period
before the 24th of February and another for the rest of the
year.
The Sunday runes could be applied to a circular model
of the Solar cycle or to a corresponding hand-palm model
of computus (schema chirometricum), as we find in Ole

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Worm’s drawing taken from his paper copy of the well-
known Gotland runic calendar, dated 1328 (see plate 13,
and also below)11.
The series for the golden number was based on the
Moon cycle, which lasted 19 years. It was made up of
Roman letters with progressive numerical value or
numbers from I to XIX, and it served the purpose of
identifying the phases of the Moon, in order to find out the
date of Easter for each year (according to the Concilium of
Nicea in 325 A.D., Easter falls on the first Sunday after full
moon following March, 21st).
Therefore, to calculate the golden number for a certain
year you had just to take the cipher of that same year
improved by 1, and divide it by 19; the rest was the
number you needed. (You had to add 1 to any year date
due to Christ’s birth falling on the 25th of December, year 1
A.D., and that being the new moon; as a consequence, the
following year 2 A.D. started with the first number in the
11 Cfr. LITHBERG-WESSÉN 1939.

113
golden series only on the 23rd of January [note that the
golden number increased by one every year]).
In late Medieval calendars – particularly illustrated
calendars on parchment or paper – you may find a
“corrected” golden number series, in order to adjust the 19-
years cycle to the real new moon cycle and eventually to
the fact that every 308 years the golden number was one
day late.
In runic calendars, the 19 alphabetical or numerical signs
of the Roman tradition were simply converted in runes;
but, as the younger futhark had only 16 characters, three
supplementary runes were added to complete the series:
these three runes were somehow created ex novo from the
combination or mirror-like reduplication of existing runes,
and were called in fact Z árlaug (combination of a ár + l
laug), Â tvímaðr (bottom-up reduplication of M maðr) and z
belgþorn (left-right reduplication of q þorn).
In plate 14 you have the runes for the golden number
series applied to a circular model of the Moon cycle and

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the corresponding hand-back model of computus, drawn
from the same paper copy of the Gotland calendar by the
hand of Ole Worm we have seen before (see also below).
As a summary table of runes for the golden numbers and
Sunday letters, we may refer to the list titled Observationes
in Kalendarium Runicum printed in the famous Runtafla by
Johannes Bureus in 1600 (see plate 15): Golden runes are
shown above (Aurei Numeri, with names and meanings of
the runes) and Sunday runes below (Cyclum Solare &
Litterae Dominicales).
The most common Medieval calendar model in
Scandinavia shows three lines of runes and signs:
Dominical letters, golden number runes and names or
symbols of Church festivals, possibly with marks for
various seasonal activities added. Further information may
be included, such as signs of the zodiac; occupations of the
months; hours of light and darkness, good and evil days
etc.

115
Moreover, apart from Roman capitals and runes, other
(epi)graphic systems were known and widely used both in
Scandinavia and in Southern Europe: for example, the so-
called “Continental ciphers” and the “English pentadic
notes”, which both referred to a counting system based on
the number five, and both prove to be of some relevance to
our present case.
We will turn to them soon, for it is now time indeed to
examine our runic “book” from Italy in some detail.
2. The Runic Calendar “Book” in Bologna: A Description
The Bologna runic calendar (Museo Civico Medievale, inv.
nr. 1890) is a rimbok made up of eight rectangular little
boards or tablets. Material is boxwood, and each tablet
measures 7.8 x 12.7 cm, with two holes along the longer
side meant to let a string be inserted in order to keep the
“book” together. Each tablet is engraved and carved in bas-

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relief on both sides. Its state of preservation is excellent. Its
date is explicitly settled in 1514.
The actual calendar is placed on six of the tablets, each
side intended for one month, 12 sides in all. The first and
the last boards are meant as a sort of “cover” for the pocket
book, and they are both filled with carvings without and
within12.
2.1. The tablets of the months
Let us first consider the layout of the tablets of the months.
I am not starting from the beginning, so to speak, i.e. from
the January “page”, since some of the months seem apter
for comparison with the Medieval calendar tradition from
Scandinavia than others. Obviously what I can offer here is
12 A preliminary description and brief study of the Bologna

calendar can be found in CUCINA 1992.

117
only a selection of clues and hints about our rune book
design13.
When we look for instance at the February page (plate
16), we easily realize that the space is split in two sections
along the longer side. The broader upper section is devoted
to bas-relief images of Saints and symbols for Church
festivals, while the narrower lower section is engraved
with “runic” and “pseudo-runic” signs parted in four
parallel rows, indicating respectively (downward
direction) the Sunday letters, the golden number old series
(aureus numerus antiquus), the golden number corrected
series (aureus numerus correctus) and eventually the average
hours when it was new moon (Lunar synodic cycle) within
the period described by our calendar (1436-1454).
Evil days are noted through nails attached to single
Sunday letters in the first graphic line. Each image or
symbol in the upper section is connected to the
13I am presently working on a complete edition and study of the

Bologna calendar and its nearest analogues, which I hope will be
ready for print in 2013.

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corresponding day in the first “runic” row through well-
marked bending lines. In the spaces between the last three
figures of Saints, two different combinations of characters
are inserted, indicating both the number of days in the
month (to the right; here 9 + 19 = 28, corresponding to the
days of February) and the average hours of light and
darkness in the same month (to the left; here 10 vs. 14, that
is 10 hours of light and 14 hours of darkness). The two
holes, well evident next to the upper margin, are meant for
fastening straps.
In determining origin and character of any artifact of this
kind, we have to think about two main fields of
investigation, one (epi-)graphic, concerning the form of the
runes, and the other iconographic, concerning marks,
symbols, Saints’ attributes, style of figures, dressing details
and so on.
Graphic forms in our calendar are interesting, in that
they result in a mixture of runic and pseudo-runic
characters, which we find in a small number of other

119
artifacts of the same kind. Only four of them are known to
scholars, being mentioned by Nils Lithberg in his book on
Computus as a little group14, but only three of these are still
extant and in fact preserved in European libraries and
museums (in Copenhagen, Paris and Berlin)15, being now
lost the one described by Ole Worm in the second edition
of his Fasti Danici16.
To this short list, a new runbok exemplar may be added,
which I am presently investigating in order to edit it,
hopefully in a few months. It lies in a private collection
located partly in Oslo and partly in London, it is engraved
in an apparently similar style on little ivory boards, it must
be dated around 1500, and may be of Swedish origin but of
French (or Flamish?) direct provenance.
The list of the first seven runes for the Dominical letters
and the whole golden number series (see table 1) includes

14 Cfr. LITHBERG 1953, pp. 102,173.
15 These so-called “French” runbokar are: Copenhagen, National-
museet, inv. nr. 15323; Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, inv. nr. Scand.
29ter; Berlin, Staatsbibliothek – Preussischer Kulturbesitz, sign. Libr.
pict. A 75.
16 Published in 1643 (cfr. p. 97).

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non-runic signs, but the order is undoubtedly that of the
futhark, and I tend to attach great importance to this
circumstance, in order to determine the basic runic quality
of our calendar; because its script system must certainly be
late and spurious, but it is significant that it ignores the
easy adaptation to the alphabetical ordering of letters
which was characteristic of the late medieval rune-row
itself.
Non-runic signs are possibly drawn – and I think they
are – from other competing calendar graphic systems,
which were used in Western Europe within the wide Old
Germanic area, particularly in the British Isles and in the
Southern part of the German-speaking region.
You can compare the graphic system of our exemplar in
Bologna both with the standard 19-runes futhark for
calendar purpose (see table 2) and with the sort of variant
pentadic systems we call respectively “Continental”
ciphers (see table 3) and “English” notes (see table 4).

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Table 1. The graphic system for the golden number series in the runbok calendars of
the Bologna class. From above: Berlin, Copenhagen, Bologna, Paris and Ole
Worm’s calendars.
fUQorkhniacTblmyZÂz
Table 2. The calendar runes.
Table 3. The “European” or “Continental” pentadic cyphers.

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Table 4. The “English” pentadic system.
The “European” or “Continental” ciphers are found in a
few rimstavar or rimbokar from Västergötland in Sweden
and from Denmark, and also in a little group of wooden
calendar booklets from Southern Germany (Bavaria) and
Austria (above all in Tyrol and Istria). For instance, the
rimbok owned by a “Georg Reychart von Pfranten” (so
possibly from Pfronten im Allgäu), made up of seven
boards, was minutely described in 1909 by Karl Brunner as
an original late exemplar (dated after 1690), but later
thought rather to be a wooden copy of a printed lunar
calendar, possibly derived from a 16th century German
psalm-book (plate 17 shows the tablets of January and
February, indicating the month with the number of its days
in the left section, and then both written and pictorial

123
indication of feastdays, notches for the Sunday letters and
pentadic signs for the golden numbers)17.
The “English” pentadic system is employed in some
calendars of English but also Scandinavian origin; see for
instance the interesting illustrated parchment calendar
dated 1396, now in the Historisches Museum in Basel,
shown in plate 18 (pages of November and December, with
both written and pictorial indication of feastdays, Sunday
letters, canon golden numbers [above] and corrected
golden numbers [below])18.
In the graphic system of our Bologna calendar, for
example, characters for the numbers 1, 5, 10 and 15 may be
influenced by or possibly derive right from the
“Continental” ciphers; characters for the numbers 17, 18
and 19 from the arrow-like pentadic ciphers of the so-
called “English” type. On the contrary, obvious runes – in
some cases with a minimum variant style – stand for
17 Cfr. BRUNNER 1909 (for plate 17, cfr. p. 254, fig. 2); LITHBERG 1953,
pp. 191-193.
18 Cfr. LITHBERG 1953, pp. 142-146, with fig. 57.

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numbers 3, 4, 6, 7 (so well within the Sunday letters series),
and also for numbers 8, 9 and 16, even if with some
alteration of the proper order of the futhark.
On the pictorial and artistic side, our Bologna calendar is
interesting and somewhat peculiar in that it is carved in
bas-relief (whereas runes and alphabetical scripts are cut in
the wood). No other rimbok or rimstaf – not even the nearest
graphic analogues from Paris, Berlin and Copenhagen we
have mentioned – are made in the same style.
By the way, it is significant that the relatively late date of
our calendar (beginning of 16th century), together with the
rather rough medieval flavour of the figures, so far from
the contemporary Italian Renaissance production, greatly
surprised Luigi Frati, the Italian local historian who was
the first commentator of our calendar in the first half of the
19th century19.
When correctly seen against the contemporary calendar
production from Northern Europe, on the contrary, the
19 See FRATI 1841.

125
Bologna artifact shows some remarkable artistic skills.
Moreover, the figures carved in the wood can be read as a
sort of compendium of Late Medieval popular
iconography of the Saints, possibly not so highly refined as
a piece of art, but interesting in itself and relevant to the
Western folk-lore tradition.
When we look at the figures as feastday marks, we easily
recognize the Saints from their traditional attributes: on the
February page (plate 16), for example, we can easily trace
the Virgin Mary holding her Child (as she always does in
our calendar), for the feast of Purification (on the 2nd of
Feb.); st. Blaise, bishop and martyr, with a comb in his hand
as the traditional tool of his death (unknown martyrdom;
feastday on the 3rd); st. Agatha, virgin martyr, holding a
dove as a symbol of her chastity and pincers as a symbol of
the tortures she suffered, namely the cutting off of her
breasts (feastday on the 5th); st. Apollonia, martyr, holding a
forceps gripping a tooth, to remind that she had all her
teeth knocked out (feastday on the 9th); st. Peter, leader of

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the Apostles, wearing the mitre and with a book and a big
key in his hands (feastday as bishop of Antiochia on the
22nd); st. Matthias, apostle, thought to have suffered
martyrdom by crucifixion and here gripping three nails in
his left hand (feastday on the 24th).
Other figures cannot be as easily identified, since they
lack clear attributes and/or certain anniversary: any way,
the little female figure for the 1st of February, holding just a
book, must be st. Brigid from Ireland; the little young man
holding a pastoral staff under st. Apollonia is certainly st.
Valentine, martyr (feastday on the 14th), here possibly
confused as for the attribute with an Italian bishop with the
same name, who in fact may be only a doublet of the
Valentine above.
But the central male figure next to st. Peter, for all his
attribute (a club or sledge-hammer?), cannot be found out
about with plain certainty: it may represent st. Eleuterius,
knocked down to death with clubs while preaching among
the Arian heretics in Tournay (feastday on the 20th). As for

127
the two other female figures, they may be respectively st.
Mildred from the convent at Minster in Thanet (ags.
Mildthryth; died c. 700; feastday usually on the 13th of July,
occasionally on the 20th of February, though never on the
19th, as it appears in this case possibly through confusion
with st. Eleuterius’s day), and her elder sister st. Mildburga
(ags. Mildburh; died c. 700; feastday on the 23rd), from
Wenlock abbey in Shropshire. But we are far from feeling
confident that these identifications are correct.
We can easily compare the symbols for the main
feastdays in February on the Swedish runbok from Öland
we have seen before (plate 8). Obviously, the Öland
calendar belongs to a simpler class, and only few feast
marks are roughly noted: in the picture you can trace the
days from the 1st of January to the 11th of February on the
left tablet, from the 12th of February to the 23rd of March on
the right tablet.
You may easily pick out a big comb for st. Blaise’s day
(3rd of February) and a forceps for st. Apollonia’s day (9th of

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February) at the lower left-hand corner, as well as a key for
st. Peter’s chair in Antiochia feastday (22nd of February)
and a huge axe for st. Matthias apostle (24th of February) at
the upper right-hand corner. Nails can be picked out too,
here and there in the same section of feastday symbols,
corresponding to certain days: they are marks for the so-
called “evil days” (dies egyptiaci, mali, egri or atri), as we
have seen, according to the old and usual tradition of
Middle Age calendars.
On the wooden rimbok from Pfronten in Bavaria, which
we mentioned as an example of the “Continental” calendar
graphic system (plate 17), we can now easily distinguish
the three only feastday marks in February (see Hornung –
that is “February” – tablet, lower side in the picture) as the
Purification of the Virgin Mary on the 2nd (female figure
with three candles, for the candle-procession established
by pope Sergius I in 689; in addition to the script
Lyechtmesse or “Light-mass”); st. Peter’s chair in Antiochia
on the 22nd (male figure with a key, in addition to the script

129
Peter Stuelfeyr or “Peter’s Chair-feast”), and st. Matthias
apostle on the 24th (male figure with an axe, in addition to
the script Mathes for “Matthias”).
A quick comparative look at the pages of April in our
Bologna calendar (figure 7) and in the Paris runbok
calendar (figure 8) shows that, given some occasional
differences in the figures of Saints and feastdays, they have
great similarities and the same basic design.
Figure 7. Bologna “runbok” calendar: Tablet 3, side B (April).

Drawing by Author

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Figure 8. Paris “runbok” calendar (page of April).

Drawing by Author
We can consider the right-hand side of the boards, for
instance, and pick out st. Theodore of Sykeon in Galatia
(feastday on the 22nd ) as the male figure in the middle,
dressed as a monk but holding a pastoral staff on the
Bologna calendar and a monastery or church building on
the Paris calendar, where he is also connected with a little
man-head wearing a mitre (in fact, Theodore was bishop
for ten years, founded many monasteries, but then gave up
his office and died as a monk); st. George killing the dragon

131
(feastday on the 23rd), more plastic in the representation of
the Bologna calendar, where he pierces the big dragon’s
heart with his spear, while riding his horse in full arms (see
the same scene on the Paris calendar, where most of the
space is given to a detailed drawing of George himself as a
crusader knight, and the dragon is stabbed in the mouth;
nevertheless, the overall outline of the scene is the same);
st. Mark evangelist (feastday on the 25th), represented with
(or as) a lion, a cross and (on the Bologna calendar) also
wings, in both cases marked with a fish (two on the Paris
calendar) as a sign of the vigiliae, meaning that it was a
solemn feast and the faithful should not have eaten meat.
Note also that among the figures there are the same
binderuner or combinations of ciphers for the number of
days in the month and for the hours of light and darkness
in both calendars: on the Bologna tablet the combination of
19+11=30 (days of April; between the dragon and st. Mark)
and 14 (light hours) + 10 (darkness hours; lower left-hand
side of st. Theodore) respectively; on the Paris calendar, the

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same combinations with slight differences in graphic style
and inverted order, respectively to the left-hand side and
to the right-hand side of the figure next to st. Theodore.
By the way, we can consider the simpler structure of the
Paris exemplar with reference to the calendar computing
data, because in fact only the old golden number series is
given in the line below the Sunday letters.
When we come to the months of June and July, very
interesting clues can be found with reference to the
feastdays recorded on the Bologna calendar, above all
concerning its possible Scandinavian connections or, in
other words, its relationship to genuine Scandinavian
runstavar. We can consider the June page (figure 9) and
have a comparative look at the folding pages of a Danish
parchment pocket calendar now in the Royal Library
(“Rålambska samlingen”), the so-called Erik XIV’s
Almanac, dated 1560 (see figure 10 for the month of June).
By this exemplar, one can easily appreciate the commonest
kind of feastday marks on manuscript calendars, where

133
attributes or figures of Saints are only roughly or partially
sketched (for instance, only the head or bust of the Saint
usually appears). The golden numbers are of the
“Continental” type, the Sunday letters are Roman-Gothic
characters; also the names of feastdays are given, in cursive
script and in an abbreviated form above the figures.
Figure 9. Bologna”runbok” calendar: Tablet 4, side B (June).

Drawing by Author.
Figure 10. Erik XIV’s pocket calendar (page of June).

Drawing by Author.

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In the pocket calendar from Copenhagen you can pick
out some clear feastday marks, such as a pastoral staff for
st. Boniface, bishop and martyr (feastday on the 5th); st.
Barnabas (on the 11th); a tripod for st. Vitus martyr (on the
15th); st. Botolph (ags. Botulf; feastday on the 17th); a lamb
for st. John the Baptist (feastday for his birth on the 24th); a
hammer for st. Eligius bishop (translatio on the 25th); a key
for st. Peter (on the 29th), and a sword for st. Paul (on the
30th).
If now we turn to our Bologna calendar, we find
basically the same feastdays selection, though the figures
prove more elaborate in design and increased in number.
We distinguish st. Boniface, with the mitre and a crosier
instead of the pastoral staff to mean that he was apostle
among the Germans; here he is shown between st. Justin,
apologist and martyr (feastday on the 1st; dressed as a
layman, as he was in fact all his life), and a bishop, possibly
st. Medard of Noyon, or st. William of York, or any other of
the many bishops celebrated on the 8th of June.

135
St. Barnabas apostle (on the 11th) is represented with an
axe and a book in his hands, the axe being the tool of his
martyrdom according to some traditional versions of his
life. Apart from a couple of minor feastdays’ figures, you
may easily pick out a big st. John the Baptist holding a lamb
with the nimbus on the 24th (see the fish for the vigilia on
the day before); st. Eligius bishop holding a hammer (on the
25th); st. Peter leader of the apostles holding a book and a
big key on the 29th (again with a fish for the vigilia on the
previous day); st. Paul with a sword hanging at his side on
the 30th. (Note: binderune for the light hours + darkness
hours combines 18+6; binderune for the number of days is
the same as April, that is 19+11, upper right-hand corner.)
Investigation of feastdays on the Bologna July page
(plate 19) is even more interesting from the point of view of
comparison with proper Scandinavian calendar tradition.
We can take as an example the same page in the
manuscript calendar from Linköping (Lands- och
Stiftsbibliotek MS J 79), dated 1469 and containing the

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provincial and national law code of Magnus Eriksson (see
plate 20).
It is a fine, complete almanac, fairly rich in calendar
information, where three different rows of “Continental”
ciphers combined with two series of Latin letters can be
picked out, in a sequence respectively dealing with (from
above): Sunday letters; old golden numbers; corrected
golden numbers; average time of day for new moon (Lunar
synodic cycle) in the years 1378-1397; letters for the Lunar
sidereal cycle, employed to determine tide periods. In the
space above these lines, feastday marks are found as usual,
with the addition of possible seasonal (i.e. non liturgical)
notes20.
We can distinguish the festival for the Visitation of the
Virgin Mary on the 2nd of July; st. Knut with the regal
crown, a knot (with reference to the name; cfr. sved. knut)
and a scythe as a note for the beginning of harvest (on the
10th); st. Margareth with the dragon (on the 20th); st. Mary
20
Cfr. CUCINA 1992, pp. 206-207.

137
Magdalen (on the 22nd); st. James the Greater with the
pilgrim stick and the hat with a cockle shell (on the 25th); st.
Botvid martyr and preacher in Sweden, killed at sea in the
Baltic (a fish on the 28th); st. Olaf with the regal crown and
an axe (on the 29th); and st. Elene (sved. Elin) from Skövde
in Västergötland (on the 31st).
A little blue circle marks the evil days (here the 15th and
the 17th) and in the bottom left-hand corner there is a
kringla (lat. rotula) with 24 radial notches in two different
colours to indicate the hours of light (16) and darkness (8),
and a lion as the appropriate sign of the zodiac in the
middle.
The Swedish origin of the calendar is not to be
questioned, as one can clearly infer from the identity of a
number of Saints celebrated in July. King Knut of Denmark
and King Olaf of Norway, first of all, are the most obvious
evidence of a Scandinavian tradition: if their feastdays are
not recorded in a given almanac, this can by no means be
counted as Nordic. But here the mentioning of Botvid and

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Elene is enough to prove with certainty that the place of
origin of the calendar must be somewhere in Sweden,
probably in the Southern or Götaland region.
If we now turn to the Bologna calendar, we can find both
similarities and differences when feastday figures and
general calendar outline are considered. Regarding the
iconographic apparatus, some of the figures we have
traced on the Linköping calendar appear on the Bologna
tablet for July as well, corresponding with fairly important
festivals such as the Visitation of the Virgin Mary (on the 2nd),
st. Margareth virgin and martyr, with the dragon (on the
20th), st. Mary Magdalen with long hair and a little ointment
jar (on the 22nd).
No traces are found of Knut, Olaf, Botvid or Elene; but
the space is otherwise full of glorious and widely
venerated Saints, such as st. Martin (armed figure on
horseback with sword, next to a mantle-wearing man;
translatio corporis on the 4th); st. Christine, virgin and martyr,
holding an arrow (on the 24th); st. Christopher martyr

139
carrying Jesus child across the river (on the 25th); and st.
Anne teaching young Virgin Mary (on the 26th).
Leaving out any other hint, for the moment, what can be
easily inferred from our comparative analysis at this point
is that the feastdays outline on the Bologna calendar is both
more accurate and better rooted in the common Middle
Age European tradition than on the Linköping exemplar.
From the point of view of calendar computation data,
and graphic and overall design, nevertheless, we may say
that both calendars share important features and prove
much more similar to each other than usual among
almanacs that are so different in type and function.
In other words, the Bologna calendar, though cut in
wood and belonging to the general class of rimstavar, is no
less rich and detailed than illustrated calendars inserted in
medieval manuscripts, presenting for each month Sunday
letters, old and corrected golden numbers, the Lunar
synodic cycle (compare the fourth line of the Linköping
calendar), the evil days, the hours of light and darkness

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(see here binderune 16+8 respectively, in the upper right-
hand corner), the number of days in the month (see here
binderune 19+12=31, in the bottom left-hand corner). So that,
in the end, it can be held to stand halfway between the
epigraphic and the manuscript calendar production,
together with the few other runbokar of the same kind we
have already talked about, for instance from Copenhagen
and Paris.
Figure 11. Copenhagen “runbok” calendar (page of November).

Drawing by Author.
A close investigation of the calendar features and
religious festivals in the last two months of the year will be
our next concern here. Very interesting clues can be found

141
by examining November both in the Bologna version (plate
21), in the Copenhagen runbok version (figure 11) and in
the so-called Erik XIV’s Almanac version (figure 12), from
which we start our inquiry.
Figure 12. Erik XIV’s Almanac (page of November).

Drawing by Author.
According to the plain design of this last exemplar, then,
the golden numbers are of the “Continental” type, the
Sunday letters are Roman-Gothic characters, and the
names of feastdays appear in cursive script and
abbreviated form above the figures. If we now read the
rough feastday marks, we find a church building for All
Saints’ Day on the 1st; human faces in a black hole for the
Commemoration of the Dead on the 2nd; st. Villehado,
Anglo-Saxon bishop of Bremen, on the 8th; a chalice for st.
Martin bishop on the 11th; st. Rufus on the 21st; an anchor

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for st. Clement, who, according to a legendary tradition,
was lashed to an anchor and thrown into the sea in Crimea
(on the 23rd); a spiked wheel for st. Catherine of
Alexandria, martyr, on the 25th; and st. Andrew apostle
with an X-shaped cross on the 30th.
The Copenhagen wooden rimbok proves much more
articulated in both graphic and picture contents, being
organized in exactly the same way as our Bologna
calendar.
One may pick out a church with a well-marked bell for
All Saints’ Day (on the 1st); a Saint’s bust holding a cross for
the Commemoration of the Dead (on the 2nd); st. Hubert,
bishop and missionary, soon regarded as patron Saint of
hunters and trappers in Ardenne, here on horseback
blowing a big hunting horn (feastday on the 3rd); st. Martin
bishop, again fully armed on horseback and holding a
sword (on the 11th); st. Clement Pope, elsewhere
represented by means of an anchor, but here quite
interestingly holding two piles of small buildings under a

143
great and dominating Church, I think as a figurative
representation of the so-called “Prima Clementis” epistle, a
letter he sent to the church of Corinth which is the first
statement of the Church of Rome’s supremacy over all the
other churches (nevertheless, and quite interestingly again,
you can possibly make out the shape of an anchor in the
same structure built around the Saint; feastday on the 23 rd);
st. Catherine of Alexandria, martyr, holding a sword
surmounted by a wheel, on the 25th; and st. Andrew
apostle with an X-shaped cross wittily disguised in the
dress outline (feastday on the 30th; see the preceding fish
for the vigilia on the 29th).
The pictorial solutions for November featsdays, then,
look refined, rather detailed in content and somewhat
original; like our Bologna calendar, also the Copenhagen
runbok shows the hours of light and darkness through the
binderune or combination of the ciphers 8 vs. 16, which you
can easily pick out above st. Martin’s head.

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The Bologna page of November proves richer in details
and more realistic in the carrying out of figures. Close
examination reveals that most of the feastdays we have
detected on the Copenhagen parallel page are noted here,
too, sometimes in more or less the same way, sometimes
according to a different tradition.
We can refer to the similar church bell-tower for All
Saints’ Day (1st), but to the different figure for the
Commemoration of the Dead, here a dancing Death (see the
naked man with a skull face, holding the pole of what can
possibly be figured out as a schyte21; feastday on the 2nd);
young st. Hubert, here on his knees in front of a stag, which
displayed a crucifix between its antlers, as a 15th century
legend narrates (on the 3rd); st. Leonard hermit, who was
missing on the Copenhagen calendar, but here is clearly
represented on his feet, holding a preaching man by a rope,
since he was widely venerated as the patron Saint of
prisoners (on the 6th); then st. Martin, on horseback and
21 Especially if one considers the bending line, joining the upper

figure of the Saint to the third day of the month.

145
sharing his mantle with a poor, half-naked and disabled
man (on the 11th); st. Clement Pope, with the mitre and the
pastoral staff of bishops (on the 23rd); st. Catherine with a
crown, a sword and a big wheel at her feet (on the 25th); st.
Andrew apostle, holding the X-shaped cross of his martyr-
dom (on the 30th, with a fish for the vigilia on the 29th).
Note, by the way, that a little bust of a bishop (probably
st. Brice [Brictio, Britius, Briccius] of Tours, successor of st.
Martin) was later inserted, right in the space under st.
Martin’s horse’s legs, for the 13th day22. As usual, two
binderuner give the numbers of days in the month (see the
combination of 19+11=30 for the days of November; under
st. Leonard’s feet) and the hours of light and darkness,
respectively (8 light hours vs. 16 darkness hours in
November; to the lower left-hand side of st. Catherine).
Eventually, we can compare the December page in the
Bologna calendar (plate 22) with the Copenhagen runbok
22 This was certainly a later addition, since the bust is engraved

rather than carved in bas-relief.

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Carla Cucina
version (figure 13), and also with the Paris runbok version
(figure 14).
Figure 13. Copenhagen “runbok” calendar (page of December).

Drawing by Author.
Figure 14. Paris “runbok” calendar (page of December).

Drawing by Author.

147
As usual, our Italian calendar is overcrowded with
Saints and feastday symbols. We can easily recognise st.
Eligius (or Eloi), artisan from Limoges and bishop of Noyon
and Tournai, accordingly represented here with the mitre
and a hammer in his hand, since he is regarded as the
patron Saint of smiths, farriers, and all kinds of
metalworkers (feastday on the 1st); st. Barbara martyr
holding a palm and a tower, this last being her special
emblem, since she was a maiden of great beauty and her
father Dioscuros shut her up in a tower to discourage the
attentions of many suitors (on the 4th); st. Nicholas, bishop
of Myra in Lycia during the 4th century, who according to a
popular tale brought to life three murdered children
hidden in a brinetub23 (on the 6th); the feast of the
Conception of the Virgin Mary, who is represented here
crowned and holding Jesus as a child in her arms, as she
always does in the Bologna calendar (on the 8th); st. Lucy
23 Probably this tale derived by confusion from the story of three

girls that st. Nicholas saved from prostitution by throwing three bags
of gold as dowry into their window at night.

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virgin martyr from Syracuse in Sicily (tradition tells she
was cruelly persecuted and finally killed by a sword thrust
in the throat; her name, suggestive of light, made her
popularly invoked against disease of the eyes, but here
neither the traditional emblem of the eyes in a dish nor any
other emblem are found, and we only see a short female
figure compressed in the little space left under the Virgin
Mary; feastday on the 13th); st. Nicasius, bishop of Reims,
with no particular emblem, to be true, probably because of
scarcity of space again (on the 14th); st. Thomas apostle,
holding a square in his right hand as a sign that he was
sent to India as an architect at the king’s service, but in fact
in order to bring the gospel there (according to the
apocryphal Acts of Thomas; feastday on the 21st); Nativity of
Christ, in a framed picture attached to the upper margin
(on the 25th, with a fish for the vigilia on the 24th); st. Stephen
protomartyr, preaching on his knees, as is told he was in
the Acts of the Apostles, while the Jews stoned him to death
(on the 26th); st. John apostle and evangelist, holding a book

149
or maybe a little jar or cup in his hand (on the 27th); the Holy
Innocents, close to the upper margin, next to the Nativity –
the feast for the children of Bethlehem who were killed by
order of King Herod is here represented by a sword and a
naked body cut in pieces (on the 28th); a blessing bishop,
probably st. Trophimus of Arles, with a cross on the mitre
as a possible sign of his being called vir apostolicus in Gallia
(on the 29th); and eventually st. Sylvester pope (on the 31st).
If we now turn to the Copenhagen runbok (see figure 13),
in order to have a quick visual comparison, we certainly
find the same main feastdays, but some others are missing
and the series of Saints is arranged in a simpler way, one
figure next to the other in a fixed and static row.
Eligius and Barbara have the same emblems (a hammer
and a tower, respectively), and Nicholas is also celebrated
on the 6th, even if only as a bishop, with no reference to the
traditional tale of the three children or maidens.

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The Virgin Mary is wearing a crown and holding the
Child here too, as her most common representation in art,
even for the feast of the Immaculate Conception.
On the 14th Nicasius is represented by means of his head
only, inscribed in the chasuble of the bishop: and this is an
interesting point, because in this case the picture comes
closer to the legend of the Saint than the figure on the
Italian calendar (in short, Nicasius had his head cut off, but
went on singing psalms all the same).
Thomas, Stephen and John are all represented with the
sacred book in their right hand; John wears a short beard
and handles a cross, but no other difference exists among
the figures.
Jesus is a naked, standing child on the Nativity feastday,
preceded by the usual fish for the vigilia. A single sword
recalls the Holy Innocents’ feastday as the last annotation
for the month.
The December page in the Paris calendar (see figure 14),
as we have already pointed out while discussing other loci

151
of the same runbok, turns out to be less rich in calendar
information but more complex in picture design, since the
space is filled in quite the same way as on the Bologna
tablet.
So we can pick out again Eligius with the hammer and
Barbara with the tower, Nicholas bishop and the Virgin
Mary with the Child, a little Lucy martyr holding the palm
and a beheaded Nicasius, here a body dressed as a bishop
holding his head with both hands (which is a faithful
representation of the cut-off-head-speaking-on theme, as
part of the so-called kephalophoreia (or motif of the Saint
carrying his own head about, usually in order to show his
own choice of a nice burying place).
On the 18th we find a new feastday, maybe for st. Gatian,
bishop of Tours (one cannot be sure of this identification,
though; it could be st. Wunibald, abbot of Heidenheim, as
well); but after that day the rest of the figures represent the
same Saints and festivals as the other two calendars:
Thomas apostle with the square; Nativity of Christ, within

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the same framed picture attached to the upper margin we
have seen on the Bologna page, and with a fish for the
vigilia; Stephen protomartyr and John apostle and
evangelist, both holding a book; a sword for the Holy
Innocents’ day, to end possibly with st. Trophimus of Arles
(see the same association with a cross we have detected on
the Italian calendar) and certainly with pope Sylvester I,
shifted upwards for lack of space.
Good evidence for the Paris calendar being used in later
times, I think well after the 16th century, is the double inser-
tion of a second rough mark for the number of days in each
month, as an easy, self-understanding application of the
“Continental” cipher system; it results in a bar crossed three
times (i.e. three times the cipher for 10) plus a notch, which
is the unit mark (i.e. once the cipher for 1). Everyone, even
if he was not able to read the graphic design of the almanac
and to work out the computing any more, could still make
some use of the series of feastdays, and easily associate
each month to the exact number of days.

153
2.2. The “Cover” Tablets of the “Book”
Examination of the “cover” tablets, i.e. the first and the last
boards, of the Bologna rune book gives some clear, definite
clues to the question of the artifact’s place of production.
Though its reference model is of Swedish origin, the
Bologna calendar – which our investigation of Saint and
feast days has proved to be of no direct Nordic provenance
– was certainly produced somewhere in France, possibly in
the Northern region around Rheims. This, regardless of
some inconclusive evidence adduced thereby, was also
Luigi Frati’s ultimate suggestion24, while Lithberg went so
far as to class the whole group of calendars (Bologna, Paris,
Copenhagen and Berlin) as a “French” type25.
In fact, even our present investigation has shown that a
pretty good number of the Saints represented on our
almanac are French or especially venerated in France;
while another, admittedly more direct and convincing hint
24 See FRATI 1841, pp. 14-15.

25 See LITHBERG 1953, pp. 101-102, and 173.

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of Continental origin may be found in the linguistic form of
the names engraved upon the verso of the first outer tablet
(front “cover”, side B), which we are going to examine later
on in this paragraph.
On the front cover, side A (plate 23), we can see eight
figures carved in bas-relief, representing the descent from
the Cross. Christ’s body lies in the middle of the scene,
Jesus’ Mother being the central female figure holding him
tight with both her arms.
The woman Saint touching Christ’s feet and carrying a
little ointment jar is certainly Mary Magdalen, while the
other two female figures standing near Jesus’ Mother are
respectively Mary the wife of Cleophas and mother of
James the Younger and Joseph (to the left), and Salòme the
wife of Zebedeus and mother of James the Older and John
(to the right), since, according to the Gospels (versions of
Matthew 27, 56, and Mark 15, 40), there were three women
helping Christ’s Mother to take care of His corpse.

155
The elegant male figure to the right must be Joseph of
Arimathaea; the other two standing figures to the left are
respectively Nicodemus, holding Jesus’ thorny crown and
carrying a stick and a little bag (probably filled with the
ointments mentioned in the Gospel of John 19, 39; to the
left), and John the Evangelist (to the right).
In the space under the picture, a legenda in Roman-
Gothic letters can be read, namely the Roman date
M.D.XIV (1514), followed by AVE MARIA. In between the
scripts, three lilies are inserted. Around the outer margin,
geometrical and interwoven decoration motives plus a
stylized life tree (along the upper side) are cut. The script,
the lilies and the frame are engraved and then filled with a
black paste, as engravings always are on our calendar.
On the same tablet, side B (plate 24), most of the space is
covered by an Easter board or Tabula Paschalis, used to
determine the date of Easter for a certain number of years.
The first vertical line reports the seven Dominical or
Sunday letters from A to G, to be read upwards: the

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Roman-Gothic letters show the same ductus as the ones on
side A and the repeated series of Sunday letters cut in the
two rows at the bottom of the “page”; but, apart from the
letters A and B, they are turned by 180° (from C to F) and
by 90° clockwise (G).
Figure 15. Paris “runbok” calendar (Easter table).

Drawing by Author.
The closest rendering of an Easter table can be found in
the runbok from Paris we have already dealt with (see
figure 15), but the most famous example in Scandinavian
time-reckoning studies is the Påsktavla inserted in the well-
known manuscript rune calendar from Gotland, dated
1328, which we have already referred to, now lost but
hand-copied on paper (see Ny Kgl. Samling 203 8:o, in the

157
Royal Library of Copenhagen) by Olaus Wormius (Ole
Worm) with the title Computus Runicus ex Vetustissima
membrana erutus ab Olao Worm, and then printed in his Fasti
Danici (1626). This Tabella Epactarum (see plate 25)
reproduced the so-called Great Easter Cycle of 532 years, in
this case performing from 1140 to 1671. The same Easter
Board is also widely known by runologists through the
explicative printed version published in 1832 by Liljegren
in his Run-Lära (see figure 16).
Figure 16. Tabula Paschalis from Liljegren, Run-Lära (1832).

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In the Tabula on our Bologna calendar, which covers only
133 years and not the whole 532-year cycle, the date of
Easter is already determined for each year: one simply had
to pick out the Sunday letter of a certain year in the first
vertical row and the golden number of that same year in
the last horizontal row, and then cross the corresponding
horizontal and vertical lines to obtain the required date.
Some mistakes are to be found, by the way, in the
occasional ambiguity of a few dates, for example in the
occurrence of the same “runic” or “pseudo-runic” sign
both for the 31st of March and for the 1st of April; but this is
not the place to enter this question in detail. It is enough to
say that this table represents an attempt to attain a more
direct way of finding out Easter days, while the general
Påsktavla from Gotland, for instance, needed further
calculations, usually to be done with the help of formulas
and hand-fingers.
Above the Easter table, a short text can be read, written
in the same Roman-Gothic characters used for the legenda

159
on the front side of the same tablet (side A). It contains two
names only: Moisi Anthoin Neporiet in the first line, and
Simon Vincent de Maon (the last two letters partly erased;
maybe Macon?) in the second line. It can be safely assumed
that the first name may refer to the owner of the calendar,
while the second to its maker.
Linguistic forms confirm that France must be the place of
origin of the artifact. Under the Easter table, a Solar cycle in
Roman-Gothic letters is engraved, starting from the 10th
year, and then going on to complete the 28-year period. At
both sides of the Easter table, the symbols of the four
Evangelists are carved in bas-relief, John’s eagle and
Mark’s lion on the left, Matthew’s angel and Luke’s ox on
the right.
On the back cover, side A (plate 26), there is a
representation of Christ [in the middle] with the twelve
apostles, six on each side, parted in two rows. The Virgin
Mary, wearing a mantle and holding a book, is inserted as
a half figure within an arch under Christ’s feet.

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Each apostle bears his own traditional emblem: starting
from Christ’s left hand, raised to hold the crossed globe to
signify that He is Creator and in fact Keeper of the World,
and proceeding clockwise, we make out st. John the
evangelist, according to tradition the “disciple whom Jesus
loved” most, with a chalice and a snake (for he could resist
poison); st. Peter, with a key (note that he is the only one
among the figures to have rays on the nimbus, surely as a
sign of his being the Leader of the apostles); st.
Bartholomew, with his butcher’s knife; *lower right-hand
corner:] st. Jude, with a saw (as one of the many tools
mentioned in the apocryphal tradition relating to his
death); st. James the Greater, with the pilgrim stick and the
hat with a cockle shell; st. Simon, with a cross; [lower left-
hand corner:] st. Paul, with a sword; st. Thomas, with a
square; st. Andrew, with a cross saltire; [upper left-hand
corner:] st. Matthias, with an axe; st. James the Less, with a
tool with a long handle, once employed to dry wet clothes
and by some people believed to have been used to kill him;

161
st. Philip, with a cross (since he was tied up to a cross and
stoned to death).
The composition is accurate, harmonious and well
balanced, so that, for instance, all the apostles are variously
turned towards Jesus and the Virgin Mary, and the Saints
on the right-hand side hold their own emblems by the left
hand, whereas the Saints on the left-hand side, by the right.
In the end, all the figures are well carved and clearly
recognizable, and due attention is also given to particulars
and details.
The back cover, side B (plate 27), is more interesting
from the point of view of stylistic features and calendar
notes. First of all, it is entirely engraved with no bas-relief
carvings. Surely, the intention of the “runic” master is here
more concerned with clarity of information rather than
interested in artistic devices.
On this page, a list of all the graphic systems employed
in the inner pages of the almanac is found, obviously
intended as a reference model for consultation, together

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with a summary view of the principal Church festivals of
the year, more or less one for each of the twelve months.
Eventually, also a prayer is added, as a thanksgiving for
God’s help to the artist while performing his job. If you
read the three lines of text on the left-hand side of the
tablet, each line from left to right and all the lines from
bottom upwards, you have the Latin Christian invocation:
Corpus dni nti ies
u Xpi qui me forma
sti tu miserere mei am
en
Corpus domini nostri Jesu Christi, qui me formasti, tu miserere mei. Amen.
“Our Lord Jesus Christ’s Body, who created me, have mercy on me.
Amen”.
Reading the rest of the engravings from above, we
distinguish first the 19 characters of the Lunar cycle, that is
the golden number series; then the Solar cycle, as usual

163
with a double Sunday letter for leap years; then a stylized
vine shoot; and finally a series of twelve festival symbols,
parted in two rows, starting from the bottom right-hand
corner and going from right to left in the second line, to
start again from the right-hand side in the first line.
We can make out:
1. a cup or jar, for the Epiphany (January);
2. a bust of the Virgin Mary, for the feast of Purification
(February);
3. a crucified Christ, for the Passion and Death of Jesus (most
often in March);
4. a pyx, as a symbol of Easter (most often in April);
5. a dove, as a symbol of the Holy Spirit, for the feast of
Pentecost (most often in May);
6. a bust of Christ, possibly as a sign of the feast of Corpus
Domini (most often in June);
7. a lamb with a cross on the back, as a symbol of John the
Baptist (feastday on the 24th of June);
8. a key, as a symbol of st. Peter (feastday on the 29th of
June);

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9. a bust of the Virgin Mary again, for the feast of her
Nativity (September);
10. an angel, as the recurrent symbol of all the evangelists in
the inner pages of our calendar (see, for instance, st. Luke
in October);
11. a bell and a human face, as symbols of the All Saints’ feast
(November);
12. a naked child surmounted by a cross, for the Nativity of

Christ (December).
Some of these symbols are meant to signify the most
important movable feasts of the liturgical year (Passion
and Death of Christ, Easter, Pentecost, Corpus Domini); two
are connected with the main feasts of the Virgin Mary
(Purification and Nativity); two (Epiphany and Christmas)
recall fixed dates of Jesus’ life; and some remind us of
feastdays celebrating first-rank Saints (John the Baptist,
Peter, Luke and the other evangelists), even when they do
not correspond to the expected month in the sequence.

165
A last and most interesting point for further discussion is
about what value we can assign to the graphic compound
marks engraved under the twelve pictorial symbols. This is
not easy to determine, to be honest, but I think the right
way to read them must be in accordance with the counting
of solemn celebration days within the liturgical cycle.
For instance: the symbol of Easter (pyx) is preceded by a
string of six crosses that might recall the Sexagesima (or the
period of about 60 days which has preceded Easter since
the 7th century) and followed by a similar string of four
crosses that might indicate the Quadragesima (or the period
of exactly forty days from Quadragesima Sunday until
Good Friday). Moreover: the dove of the Holy Spirit (next
to Easter) is tied to five crosses in all, which should point to
the Pentecost (a mobile feast which falls fifty days after
Easter). And so on.
The counting, apparently accurate, is in fact obscure in
some cases, and needs to be examined in detail. Further
difficulty derives from our calendar being in all probability

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a copy of a slightly older calendar, organized to cover a
different range of years.
3. The Cospian Collection in the Museo Civico of Bologna and
the Runic Calendar
I would like to add only a few brief remarks about the
story of the collection, which the runic “book” in Bologna
came to belong to. As far as we can trace it back in time, the
calendar was originally part of the private collection of
naturalia et artificialia gathered together in Bologna by
marquis Ferdinando Cospi in the 17th century, in other
words a collection both of rarities or curiosities from the
natural world and of strange and peculiar artifacts and
objects variously worked by man in eclectic styles at
different times and places.
These “wonders” from all over the world used to be
brought together in the so-called Wunderkammern, which
represent a form of apparently random exhibition typical

167
of the 16th and 17th centuries, halfway between magic and
the spectacular show.
Figure 17. Portrait of Ferdinando Figure 18. The Cospian Museum in

Cospi, from the Catalogue of the 1677 (etching by G.M. Mitelli).
Cospian Museum (publ. 1677).
The Cospian Collection is a fairly good example of the
kind: it was particularly rich in rare exotic items, such as
for example artistic vases, pots and jars of Eastern
provenance or Islamic flavour, and different objects
especially from the New World, above all from Mexico and
Brazil, generally defined as “Indian” or “Indic” and often

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Carla Cucina
of pre-Columbian origin (this is the case of the famous
Codex Cospianus or Bononiensis, an interesting manuscript of
Pueblo-Mixtec culture).
Moreover, it gathered together many items of natural,
ethnographical and scientific relevance or interest; to the
extent that it was later, like so many similar collections,
incorporated in a scientific foundation, namely the “Istituto
delle Scienze”, based in Bologna since 1714.
The Cospian Museum, which was at that time located in
the City Palace (Palazzo Comunale), was relocated in
Palazzo Poggi within the Institute between 1742 and 1743.
The “Museo Civico”, where the calendar is exhibited today
on the ground floor entrance room of the Medieval section,
was founded in 1881, and gradually gathered together a
number of different collections within the bulk of the
“Istituto delle Scienze”’s permanent exhibition26.
So, Ferdinando Cospi’s repository of artistic wonders
found its final destination: to the marquis our calendar was
26 Cfr. GRANDI 1987, pp. 7-17.

169
obviously a curious and rare artifact, and this is partly true
today, too, since pseudo-runic signs and general
composition of the almanac make it pretty unusual among
European calendar staves and “clogs”. To the point that
some of its features, as we have seen, have still to be
questioned in order to be completely cleared up.
4. Conclusions
In the end, our present investigation of the Bologna
calendar has shown both similarities and differences with
respect to the common tradition of wooden rimstavar from
Scandinavia and Northern Europe.
Calendar graphic forms and general layout are of a
special kind, and we have submitted to comparison a little
group of so-called runbokar which shares the peculiar traits
of the Italian exemplar. This group has been detected to be
of French provenance, regardless of where the various
artifacts are now preserved, but its runic or partially runic

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quality, as well as other hints about design model and
compositive style, clearly points to a Scandinavian origin.
We may quite confidently suggest that Normandy was
the area where this calendar type developed, as a local
adaptation of the strong runic tradition from Scandinavia;
it is also possible that this same tradition came to France via
Denmark through the Low Countries.
Among the closest analogues of the Bologna calendar,
our analysis has selected the Paris runbok calendar as the
most similar with reference to the arrangement of the
sacred figures, and the Copenhagen runbok calendar as the
nearest with reference to the almanac features and time-
reckoning data. The general pattern of our class of wooden
calendar “books” has proved to owe much also to the
Nordic production of illustrated manuscript almanacs.
However, the Bologna calendar stands out from the late
medieval corpus because of its refined and accurate
execution, its peculiar low-relief style of carving, the
neatness of its graphic ductus.

171
BIBLIOGRAPHY
BRUNNER 1909 = Karl Brunner, Ein Holzkalender aus Pfranten, in
«Zeitschrift des Vereins für Volkskunde» 19 (1909), pp. 249-261.
CUCINA 1992 = Carla Cucina, Il calendario runico di Bologna, in Il
mondo dei vichinghi: ambiente, storia, cultura ed arte, Atti del Convegno
Internazionale di Studi, Genova 18-20 settembre 1991, Genova 1992,
pp. 197-218.
CUCINA 1999 = Carla Cucina, Literae Aquilonarium antiquiores. Le
rune in Johannes e Olaus Magnus fra prospettiva antiquaria e tradizione
etnica, in C. Santini (ed.), I fratelli Giovanni e Olao Magno. Opera e
cultura tra due mondi, Atti del Convegno internazionale di studio,
Roma-Farfa Sabina 24-26 settembre 1996, Roma 1999, pp. 33-100.
FRATI 1841 = Luigi Frati, Di un calendario runico nella Pontificia
Università di Bologna, Bologna 1841.
GRANDI 1987 = Renzo Grandi, Il Civico Medievale, formazione e
vicende, in Introduzione al Museo Civico Medievale. Palazzo Ghisilardi-
Fava, Bologna 19872, pp. 7-17.
GRANLUND 1972 = OLAUS MAGNUS, Historia de gentibus
septentrionalibus, Romae 1555, fac-simile edition, with an English
Introduction by J. Granlund, Copenhagen 1972.

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GRANLUND 1973 = Ingalill Granlund-John Granlund, Lapska ben-
och träkalendrar, Stockholm 1973.
HALLONQUIST 1994 = Sven-Göran Hallonquist, Primstaven, en
runalmanacka, in S. Benneth-J. Ferenius-H. Gustavson-M. Åhlén (ed.),
Runmärkt. Från brev till klotter. Runorna under medeltiden, Stockholm
1994, pp. 177-193.
JANSSON 1947 = Sam Owen Jansson, Runstavsproblem, in «Rig» 30
(1947), pp. 168-181.
JANSSON 1987 = Sven B.F. Jansson, Runes in Sweden, Transl. by
Peter Foote, Stockholm 1987 (orig. title Runinskrifter in Sverige, 1963).
LIEBGOTT 1973 = Niels-Knud Liebgott, Kalendere. Folkelig tidsregning
i Norden, København 1973.
LITHBERG 1921 = Nils Lithberg, Runstavens uppkomst, in
«Fataburen», 1921, pp. 1-27.
LITHBERG 1932 = Nils Lithberg, Runstaven, en ursvensk rådgivare åt
Sveriges bönder, in «Fataburen», 1932, pp. 117-138.
LITHBERG 1934 = Nils Lithberg, Kalendariska hjälpmedel, in NILSSON
1934, pp. 81-93.
LITHBERG 1953 = Nils Lithberg, Computus med särskild hänsyn till
runstaven och den borgerliga kalendern, enligt uppdrag utgiven av Sam
Owen Jansson, Stockholm 1953.

173
LITHBERG-WESSÉN 1939 = Nils Lithberg-Elias Wessén, Den
gotländska runkalendern 1328, Stockholm 1939.
MAIELLO 1996 = Francesco Maiello, Storia del calendario. La
misurazione del tempo, 1450-1800, Torino 1996.
NILSSON 1934 = Martin Persson Nilsson (ed.), Tideräkningen,
Stockholm-Oslo-København 1934.
STEPHENS 1866 = George Stephens, The Old-Northern Runic
Monuments of Scandinavia and England now first collected and deciphered,
vol. II, København-London 1866.
SVÄRDSTRÖM 1966 = Elisabeth Svärdström, Nyköpingsstaven och de
medeltida kalenderrunorna, Uppsala 1966.
WORM 1643 = Ole Worm, Fasti danici, Hafniæ 16432.

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PLATES
Plate 1. Vallentuna calendar (June). Plate 2. Folding calendar from Uvdal, Norway.
Plate 3. “Runstok” (walking stick) from Norway.

175
Plate 4. Two-sided “runstavar” from Sweden.
Plate 5. Different forms of runic clogs and staves from Sweden.

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Plate 6. “Runbok” from Gammalsvenskby, Russia
Plate 7. “Runbok” from Plate 8. “Runbok” from Öland, Sweden

Östergötland, Sweden. (January, 1st - March, 23rd)

177
Plate 10. Parchment pocket calendar with runes from

Östergötland, Sweden.
Plate 9. “Runbok” from Lapland. Plate 11. Paper runic almanac from Västergötland,
Sweden.

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Plate 12. Parchment pocket calendar, Plate 13. Cyclus Solaris from Ole
France. Worm’s copy of the runic calendar
1328 from Gotland.
Plate 14. Cyclus aurei numeri seu Plate 15. Detail from Johannes
Lunaris from Ole Worm’s copy of the Bureus’ Runtavla (1600). Observationes
runic calendar 1328 from Gotland. in Kalendarium Runicum: Aurei Nume-
ri, Cyclum Solare & Litterae Dominicales

179
Plate 16. Bologna “runbok” calendar: Plate 17. Wooden “rimbok” from Pfronten,
Tablet 2, side B (February). Bavaria (pages of January and February).
Plate 18. English parchment calendar from Basel

(folding pages of November and December).

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Plate 19. Bologna “runbok” calendar: Plate 20. Linköping calendar

Tablet 5, side A (July). (page of July).
Plate 21. Bologna “runbok” calendar: Plate 22. Bologna “runbok” calendar:
Tablet 7, side A (November). Tablet 7, side B (December).
Tablet 1, side A (front cover). Tablet 1, side B (Easter table).

181
Plate 25. Tabula Paschalis in the runic calendar 1328 from Gotland
(Ole Worm’s draft).
Tablet 8, side A (back cover). Tablet 8, side B (inside back cover).

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Classiconorroena 29 (2011)

Traces of Runic Lore in Italy:

The Wooden Calendar “Book” in Bologna

and Its Medieval Connections*

Medieval and post-medieval perpetual runic calendars

engraved on wood are most probably well known to any

Classiconorroena 29 (2011), pp. 95-181

Scandinavian audience: several hundreds of artifacts, up to

about a thousand, are spread in public and private

collections, since they were common everyday instruments

for picking out Sundays and festivals from the sequence of

days in the year. In other words, they were meant as

practical tools for determining weekdays and liturgical

dates, especially Easter, of course, which falls on a different

date every year in accordance with the Moon cycle.

We will see formal specific features of the old Nordic

runic calendars in detail, but some preliminary

considerations need to be taken into account at this point.

First of all, it is noteworthy that this vast corpus of

portable runic calendars in the Northern countries shares

means and functions with the contemporary calendar

production of the rest of Europe, basically through proper

indication of both the Solar cycle and the Moon cycle, by

means of Dominical letters and golden numbers

respectively, the only difference resulting in the use of

Classiconorroena 29 (2011) http://classiconorroena.unina.it

Traces of Runic Lore in Italy

runes instead of Latin letters and Roman numerals1. As for

their function, it is clear that they pointed to isolate Church

festivals rather than working days, and one has always to

bear this in mind, in order to understand first their late

appearance in the Scandinavian countries, due to the

relatively late Conversion to the Christian faith in the

North; and then the great relevance taken by liturgical

symbols and emblems of the Saints in the formal

composition of these clog almanacs.

As a second point, one should remember that,

notwithstanding this immediate connection with the

Church, everywhere in Europe, but particularly in the

North, calendars in the form of sticks, bars or tablets

(rimstavar or rimbokar) were not the exclusive domain of the

clergy, but were also extensively used by laymen. In fact,

they have long been spread among peasants, artisans and

1 For the most comprehensive overview of the history and features

Classiconorroena 29 (2011) http://classiconorroena.unina.it

merchants, as well as among noble and educated people of

In the Nordic countries, as far as the use of the Christian

everlasting calendar is concerned, the passage from the

clergy and the aristocratic milieu to uneducated people

may be easily seen in the early substitution of the written

names for the Saint feastdays with pictures and symbols

indicating the same Saints or festivals. Thus, we find

crosses (or half-crosses) with names in the oldest Swedish

rune calendar stick2, but only figures, marks and symbols

in the hundreds of various calendars produced in the

North mainly during the 16th and 17th centuries.

By the way, it is worth mentioning that a further reason

for scholarly interest in the runic calendar production is

that it was carried on until modern times, in some areas