Viking Runestone Framed Print | “He Did Not Flee at Uppsala” Norse Inscription

Runestones were memorials. Scandinavians raised them in the Viking Age to honor the dead, and thousands survive today, most of them in Sweden. Their inscriptions are short and direct, and a few phrases turn up again and again. One of the best known is the line on this print: “He did not flee at Uppsala, but fought as long as he had a weapon.”

Close variants of that formula appear on several runestones, including the Hällestad and Sjörup stones in Scania, in what is now southern Sweden. They are commonly linked to a battle near Uppsala in the late 10th century.

The print imagines a runestone in the old style. A bearded warrior in a helmet and mail stands in the center with a sword and round shield, between two coiling serpents. A band of crimson runes follows the arch of the stone above him. Below, the Old Norse wording and the English translation sit above a small mound-and-farmstead scene, all on warm parchment-toned paper.

It’s a framed print with a black alder frame and an Acrylite front protector, and it comes in square sizes from 10" x 10" to 18" x 18". It suits a study, a reading nook, or a wall of history prints, and it works well for readers of Viking history, runologists, and anyone who likes an old inscription with some grit. For more, browse more Viking Age pieces for the wall and desk or history pieces with a story behind them.