Wunjo Rune Meaning — Joy & the ᚹ Rune Explained
Wunjo (ᚹ) is the eighth rune of the Elder Futhark and it means "joy" — contentment, harmony and the well-being of a settled household. It carries the sound w and belongs to the Elder Futhark and survived into the Anglo-Saxon Futhorc as Wynn, but it was dropped when the Younger Futhark reduced the row from 24 runes to 16 in the Viking Age.
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What does Wunjo mean?
The name comes from a Proto-Germanic root, *wunjō, "joy" or "pleasure" — the same root behind the Old English word wynn and Modern German Wonne. Like Gebo, Wunjo did not survive the reduction of the rune row from twenty-four to sixteen letters in the Viking Age, so it has no Younger Futhark name or rune-poem verse of its own; only the Old English Futhorc, which kept the full older row, preserved it.
The word wynn also gave its name to a letter borrowed into the Old English Latin alphabet, ƿ, used for the "w" sound in English manuscripts for centuries until it was gradually replaced by the digraph "w" after the Norman Conquest. Wunjo is unusual among the runes for leaving that visible trace in the history of English writing long after the runic alphabet itself had fallen out of use.
Wunjo in the Old English rune poem
Wenne bruceþ, ðe can weana lyt sares and sorge and him sylfa hæfþ blæd and blysse and eac byrga geniht.
"Joy is his who knows little of woe, of pain and sorrow, and holds for himself prosperity, bliss, and a full home." — Old English Rune Poem, c. 8th–9th century
Only the Old English poem survives for Wunjo, since the Norwegian and Icelandic poems cover just the sixteen runes of the Younger Futhark, a row this rune had already left by the Viking Age. Its surviving verse is unusually specific about what joy actually consists of: not luck or excitement, but the absence of grief and pain, paired with prosperity and "a full home" — contentment measured in security rather than thrill.
How to write Wunjo
Wunjo stands for the sound w. Any name or word containing a W will use ᚹ when transliterated — try it in our free rune translator, which writes your name in the Elder, Younger or Anglo-Saxon rows and lets you download it as a poster. The full texts of all three rune poems, with our translations, are on the same page.
Wunjo and the well-being of the hall
Joy in this older sense was communal wealth as much as a private feeling: a hall free of feud, a household with enough to eat through winter, kin who returned home safely from voyage or raid. You can read every rune in order in our Elder Futhark rune meanings guide, and Wunjo appears among the symbols carved into pieces in our Viking jewelry collection.
Wunjo FAQ
What does the Wunjo rune mean?
Wunjo (ᚹ) is the eighth rune of the Elder Futhark and means "joy" — specifically the settled contentment and well-being of a household free from grief and want, not fleeting excitement.
Why doesn't Wunjo have a Younger Futhark name?
Wunjo was one of the runes dropped when the row was reduced from twenty-four to sixteen letters for the Viking-Age Younger Futhark, so it never received a distinct Norse name or rune-poem verse.
What letter does Wunjo represent?
The consonant W. It is the eighth rune of the Elder Futhark row, following Gebo, and its Old English name "wynn" also named a letter used in English manuscripts for centuries.