Bloodborne players meet the runes in the middle of the night. You cut down the Witch of Hemwick, walk into her abode, and pick up a branding iron with a red-smudged sign on its tip. Back in the Hunter's Dream, the Memory Altar comes alive, and you start burning signs called Lake, Moon and Eye into your hunter's mind. So the question comes up: are these real runes?
No. The Caryll Runes in Bloodborne are invented sigils for whole words, not letters. There are 27 of them, and not one can be read aloud as a sound.
But Bloodborne is worth its own answer, because of how it defines a rune. Most games on this site make a rune a spell, a stat or a coin. Bloodborne's item text says a rune is a transcription of a voice, and that is very nearly what a real rune is. A real rune writes a sound you can say. A Caryll Rune writes a word no human can.
What is a Caryll Rune in Bloodborne?
A Caryll Rune is a passive upgrade you memorise. You need the Rune Workshop Tool, which waits in the Witch's Abode at the end of Hemwick Charnel Lane. With it, the Memory Altar in the Hunter's Dream lets you etch runes into four slots: three Memory slots for regular runes and one Oath Memory slot for oath runes.
Each rune adds one effect. Clockwise Metamorphosis raises your maximum health and Anti-Clockwise Metamorphosis your stamina. Communion adds Blood Vials and Formless Oedon adds Quicksilver Bullets. Blood Rapture heals you on a visceral attack, Eye improves item discovery and Moon gives more Blood Echoes.
The oath runes tie you to a side. Hunter joins the Hunter of Hunters, Corruption the Vilebloods of Cainhurst, Radiance the Executioners and Impurity The League. The Old Hunters adds Beast's Embrace and Milkweed, which change your form rather than your covenant.
The count, including the expansion: 21 regular runes and 6 oath runes, 27 names in all. Pick up a rune you already own and it becomes Madman's Knowledge instead.
Why does Bloodborne call its runes transcriptions of voices?
Because that is how the game defines them. The Rune Workshop Tool says it in one line: "Runesmith Caryll, student of Byrgenwerth, transcribed the inhuman utterings of the Great Ones into what are now called Caryll Runes."
The item descriptions keep the idea going, rune by rune:
| Rune | What its item text says it transcribes | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Lake | The Great Ones' voices, rippling "like a watery reflection" | Less physical damage |
| Moon | "'moon,' as spoken by the Great Ones inhabiting the nightmare" | More Blood Echoes |
| Eye | "'Eye,' as spoken by left-behind Great Ones" | Better item discovery |
| Clawmark | "inhuman sounds", an impulse to seek blood "like a beast" | More visceral damage |
| Formless Oedon | A Great One who "exists only in voice" | More Quicksilver Bullets |
| Milkweed | "the inhuman, sticky whispers" | Changes your form (oath slot) |
This is the best definition of a rune in any game on this site. A real rune is a sign for a piece of speech. Bloodborne got the idea right. It got the size wrong.
Every Caryll Rune transcribes a whole word: lake, moon, eye. A sign for a whole word is a logogram, the way a Chinese character or the sign ♥ works. A real rune transcribes a single sound. Ansuz is a. Raido is r. You can say both, and you can join them into any word in the language.
And Bloodborne makes sure you cannot say its runes. The voices are "inhuman". Oedon "exists only in voice". The game gives you the meaning of each sign, never its sound. That is the reverse of the futhark, where every letter's sound is known and it is the meaning of some early inscriptions that is still a mystery.
Why do five Lake runes share one symbol?
Here is the fastest way to see that Caryll Runes are not writing. Lake, Arcane Lake, Dissipating Lake, Fading Lake and Great Lake all use the same symbol. The first reduces physical damage, the others arcane, bolt, fire and all damage. Five runes, five effects, one shape.
In the game this works, because the inventory shows the name beside every rune. In an alphabet it would be a disaster. The Elder Futhark was cut from straight strokes for wood and stone, and every letter had to be told apart by its shape alone. If five letters looked the same, no reader could tell which word was written. We made the same point about Gothic 2, whose spell plates are told apart by pictures and stone colour.
Caryll Runes work like coats of arms. A stronger grade has a clearer, deeper symbol, so the shape shows how much and the name tells you what. A letter shows neither. It just says its sound.
Who was Caryll, and were there real runesmiths?
Caryll never appears in the game. The item text describes a scholar of Byrgenwerth, the lakeside college where Master Willem studied the Great Ones, who heard the voices and wrote them down. The game names two more rune makers: Ludwig, who found the Guidance rune with the Holy Moonlight Sword, and Adeline, who "envisioned" Milkweed.
This is the one place where Bloodborne lines up with history. Real runes had named carvers. More than 100 runemasters are known by name from Viking Age Sweden, and in the 11th century professionals were paid to carve runestones and many signed the finished work. The most prolific was Öpir of Uppland, who signed about 50 runestones. His name means "shouter".
So the busiest runesmith in history was named for his voice, and Bloodborne's runesmith wrote down voices. The difference is in what each left behind. Öpir's signatures stand in Swedish fields and anyone who learns the letters can read them. Caryll's runes go inside your head, and nobody can say them.
Bloodborne runes vs. the Elder Futhark
| Feature | Bloodborne (2015) | Elder Futhark |
|---|---|---|
| What one sign is | A word of the Great Ones, worn as a stat bonus | A letter with a sound, a name and a meaning |
| How many | 27 (21 regular, 6 oath) | 24 |
| What it writes | A whole word: Lake, Moon, Eye | One sound |
| Can you say it? | No, the voices are "inhuman" | Yes, every letter has a known sound |
| Told apart by | Name in the menu; five Lake runes share one shape | Shape alone |
| Where it is kept | Etched into the hunter's mind | Carved into wood, bone, metal and stone |
| Can it be read? | No, nothing is spelled | Yes, once you learn the letters |
| In use | Since 24 March 2015 | Roughly 150 to 800 CE |
The real runes, briefly
The Elder Futhark is the oldest runic alphabet: 24 letters used by Germanic peoples from roughly 150 to 800 CE. Each letter has a sound, a name and a meaning. Fehu is f and means cattle and wealth, Uruz is u and the wild ox, Ansuz is a and a god. The alphabet takes its name from its first six letters, f, u, th, a, r, k. In the Viking Age it was cut down to the 16-letter Younger Futhark, which is what Öpir carved.
The word itself suits Bloodborne. "Rune" comes from a Proto-Germanic word, rūnō, meaning a secret or a secret conversation. Gothic rūna meant secret, mystery or counsel, and Old English rūn meant whisper as well as rune. A whispered secret from beyond is close to the oldest sense of the word.
The magic grew on top of the writing. In Norse tradition, Odin wins the runes by hanging nine nights on the world-tree Yggdrasil, pierced by his own spear. The runes then served as charms and protections, were joined into bindrunes and sigils, and are read for guidance today. Real runes start as sounds and gain power. Caryll Runes start as power and never become sounds.
Why Yharnam has no room for real runes
Yharnam is Victorian Gothic. According to Wikipedia, the setting drew on Bram Stoker's Dracula and on architecture in Romania and the Czech Republic. Its horror is cosmic: Hidetaka Miyazaki has said he "was inspired by Lovecraft's The Call of Cthulhu", and the Great Ones are beings in that line. There are no Norse gods in Yharnam, no Eddas and no Yggdrasil.
In that world a borrowed Germanic alphabet would have been the wrong tool. The point of the Great Ones is that human language cannot hold them. An alphabet is a promise that any word can be written and read back. A Caryll Rune admits the word was never yours to say. That is good horror, and FromSoftware went on to strip the writing out of runes again in Elden Ring, where a rune is money.
Want runes you can actually read?
Bloodborne gives you 27 words that no human can pronounce, burned into your mind at an altar. The real futhark gives you 24 sounds that anyone can say after an afternoon, and they are not a secret any more.
The easiest way in is to draw one. You can cast a free rune reading in your browser right now, using the genuine Elder Futhark and their traditional meanings, with a quick single draw for a fast question or a fuller spread for something weightier. If you would rather build the habit slowly, pull a rune of the day each morning, or read how online rune readings work first. The rest of the series is on the runes in games hub, including Elden Ring from the same studio and Valheim, the one game that uses the real futhark.
No Rune Workshop Tool needed, and no Insight lost. , free on iOS, Android, and the web, in English and Russian.
Frequently asked questions
Are the runes in Bloodborne real runes?
No. Bloodborne's Caryll Runes are invented sigils that FromSoftware designed for the game. Each one stands for a whole word, such as Lake, Moon or Eye, and grants a stat bonus when you memorise it at the Memory Altar. None of them is a letter of the Elder Futhark or any other real alphabet, and no Caryll Rune can be read aloud as a sound.
What are Caryll Runes in Bloodborne?
Caryll Runes are passive upgrades you etch into your hunter's mind. In the lore, Caryll, a runesmith of Byrgenwerth, transcribed the inhuman utterings of the Great Ones into symbols. In play, each rune adds one effect: more health, more stamina, extra Blood Vials, damage reduction, poison resistance or more Blood Echoes. You equip them at the Memory Altar in the Hunter's Dream.
Where do you get the Rune Workshop Tool in Bloodborne?
In the Witch's Abode at the end of Hemwick Charnel Lane, after you defeat the Witch of Hemwick. The tool looks like a branding iron marked with the Hunter rune. Once you carry it, the Memory Altar in the Hunter's Dream lets you memorise Caryll Runes. Without it the altar does nothing, so most players get their first rune slots in the middle of the game.
How many rune slots does Bloodborne have?
Four, and all of them open as soon as you have the Rune Workshop Tool. Three Memory slots take regular runes such as Clockwise Metamorphosis, Lake or Blood Rapture. The fourth, the Oath Memory slot, takes only oath runes, which tie you to a covenant or change your form. Oath runes cannot go into the three regular slots, and regular runes cannot go into the oath slot.
How many Caryll Runes are there in Bloodborne?
Twenty-seven distinct rune names, counting The Old Hunters expansion: 21 regular runes and 6 oath runes. Most of the regular ones come in several grades, and a stronger grade has a clearer, deeper symbol. That is still three more signs than the 24 letters of the Elder Futhark, and every one of them names a single word rather than a sound.
What are the oath runes in Bloodborne?
Oath runes go in the fourth slot and bind you to a covenant or a transformation. Hunter joins Hunter of Hunters, Corruption joins the Vilebloods of Cainhurst, Radiance joins the Executioners and Impurity joins The League. The Old Hunters adds two that are not covenants: Beast's Embrace, dropped by Laurence, and Milkweed, from Adeline. Both change your hunter's form rather than your allegiance.
What does the Lake rune do in Bloodborne?
Lake reduces physical damage taken. Its item text calls it a transcription of the Great Ones' voices that ripples like a watery reflection. Four relatives use the same symbol: Arcane Lake reduces arcane damage, Dissipating Lake bolt damage, Fading Lake fire damage and Great Lake all damage. Five runes with one shape is the clearest sign that Caryll Runes are not an alphabet.
Who was Caryll in Bloodborne?
Caryll was a runesmith and student of Byrgenwerth, the college beside the lake where Master Willem studied the Great Ones. According to the Rune Workshop Tool, Caryll transcribed the Great Ones' inhuman utterings into the runes that now carry the name. Willem would have approved, the text adds, because the runes do not rely on blood. Caryll never appears in the game.
What does transcriptions of inhuman voices mean in Bloodborne?
It is the game's own definition of a rune. The Great Ones speak, a human cannot repeat what they say, and Caryll wrote it down as a symbol. So Lake is the Great Ones' word for lake and Moon their word for moon. A transcription of a whole word is a logogram, like a Chinese character, not a letter like the runes of the futhark.
Are Caryll Runes based on the Elder Futhark?
No. No Caryll Rune matches a futhark letter, and FromSoftware has never said it drew on one. The futhark is cut from straight strokes so that every letter differs by shape. Caryll Runes are curved, looping sigils, and five of the Lake runes share one shape. Fans have compared the Eye rune to the Elder Sign from Lovecraft's fiction, not to any rune.
What happens if you pick up a Caryll Rune you already have?
It turns into Madman's Knowledge instead, a consumable you use for one point of Insight. You can hold only one copy of each rune, so a second copy has nowhere to go. It is a neat piece of lore design: a duplicate glimpse of the Great Ones' speech does not make you stronger, it only drives you a little closer to madness.
Is Bloodborne based on Norse mythology?
No. Bloodborne is Victorian Gothic horror. Wikipedia notes that its setting drew on Bram Stoker's Dracula and on architecture in Romania and the Czech Republic, and Hidetaka Miyazaki has named H. P. Lovecraft's The Call of Cthulhu as an influence. The Great Ones are cosmic beings in that tradition. There are no Norse gods, Eddas or futhark anywhere in Yharnam.
What does the word rune actually mean?
Secret, mystery or whisper. The word comes from a reconstructed Proto-Germanic form, rūnō, meaning a secret or a secret conversation. Gothic rūna meant secret, mystery or counsel, and Old English rūn meant whisper, mystery or secret as well as rune. So Bloodborne's runes, whispered secrets of the Great Ones, are faithful to the oldest sense of the word, if not to the letters.
Where can I try a real rune reading online?
You can cast a free rune reading in your browser with the Way of the Runes rune-reading tool. It uses the genuine 24 Elder Futhark runes and their traditional meanings, with quick single draws for a fast question and fuller spreads for something weightier, and a full description for every rune. It works on any device, in English and Russian, with no Memory Altar required.
Which rune are you?
Seven questions, about a minute, and you get one of the 24 Elder Futhark runes. The scoring is shown as you answer. Free, no signup.