runic plaque

This fascinating object is a thin rectangular sheet, pierced at one end, and inscribed with forty-nine runic letters, neatly inscribed in seven lines. They appear not to make any sense. However, a number of similar runic inscriptions have been found in Scandinavia, their strange language suggesting that they acted as charms or amulets. The tight folding of the St Benet’s sheet may have been deliberate, ‘holding in’, or hiding, the charm.