Mann byth on myrgthe his magan leof,

Sceal theah anra gehwylc othrum swican,

For tham dryhten wyle dome sine thaet earme

Flaesc eorthan betaecan.

Man might be pleasant in his mirth,

Though each shall betray and deceive eachother,

Thereon lords will be doomed to entrust that miserable flesh to the earth.

This poem sounds rather grim but it is not. It is more or less a reality check for us all. We as a human species are social animals by nature and in our complicated society as with the society of our forefathers this social behavior had and has its drawbacks. We as people need friendships and relationships. So many times we wear our hearts on our sleeves so to speak. While this is not a bad thing, it can get us in trouble. It can get us hurt, even by those closest to us. This rune poem does not give the message never trust another person again rather it is telling us to be selective of those we choose to have around. It is also saying to us to be self-reliant. These days so many people are reliant on others around them instead of taking control of their lives. When someone hurts these people their whole life gets turned inside out. Mann says be strong choose who you want to have around you and rely on yourself and have an air of independence.

The other message of Mann is that we are here to live life to the fullest extent. Even though death is part of life this rune tells us that we are not to dwell on it. We are here to learn and enjoy life and that we must understand that death is the natural process. Everything that lives must at one time or another die. So many times people don't want to deal with this aspect of life but that can be just as damaging to the person as one who obsess over death. Mann is just another representation of Wyrd in that it represents two opposing forces: life and death. With this in mind it is important to choose friends and relationships selectively and to live life to the fullest.

On a more esoteric level Mann represent the son of Tuisto or Tiw. It is said that Mannas or Mann gave birth to three sons. Those being Ing, Irmin and Ist. These three sons in turned fathered the three races of the Germanic people. The first three tribes were called Ingaevones who lived nearest the sea, Herminones who lived in the interior and the Istaevones who lived everywhere else. From these three tribes came all the people in the northlands. This is very interesting when we look at the names of the tribes.

Take for example the Ingaevones, if we drop the all the letters except the first three it gives us Ing. Ing is the god who is identical to the Norse Frey or Freyr. He was a fertility god and it is interesting that his cult was mostly in the North Sea area of Europe hence the ones who live nearest the sea. Ing also has a rune named after him and it is comes later in the Futhorc. The Herminones were named after Hermin or Irmin. He was a sky father to some of the people that lived in the more nothern part of Germany. There was a great pillar called Irminsul and it represented the world tree. The Saxons still had this pillar until 772 when Charlmagne had it cut down. Also the word Irings Weg was the name of the Milky way in Anglo-Saxon. All of these different aspects of Hermin point to the direction of Sky Father. The Istaevons were the tribes along the Rhine and in the southern part of Germany. Ist is speculated to be none other then Wodan. As Jacob Grimm points out in his book Teutonic Mythology that Ist is maybe meant to mean Ash. When we look at the Anglo-Saxon word Ash it is Aesc. The Ash is one of Wodans trees but whether or not this name is to mean the god Wodan we shall ever know.

This rune is a very special rune in that it represents all of the Germanic people springing from one divine source, Tiw. This tradition followed in many of the royal dynasties that usually had a god source as the beginning of their line. The royal houses of the Wessex had Woden at the beginning of their pedigree, while Seaxneat or Saxnot was sat at the head of the royal families in Essex. None the less our ancestors believed that they sprang from a divine god. If we look at most old cultures we will see that most had a god source as the parent of the race or tribe. This puts the Germanic culture along side to fit in its rightful place among the other cultures of the world.

Lagu byth leodum langsum gethuht,

Gif hi saeytha swythe bregath,

And se brimhengest bridles ne gymeth.

Sea is to men seemingly everlasting,

If the fierce sea-waves frighten him,

And the sea-horse heeds not its reins.

The most fundamental meaning of this rune is sea. To the people who lived in Northern Germany, Holland, Denmark, England and the rest of Scandinavia the sea was a vital part of life and people live and died by it. The North Atlantic is rough and inhospitable and crossing it was and still is fraught with many dangers. To many people there was really no other option if they wanted to gain new land or have enough provisions for the winter. Even to this day people of Northern Europe still rely heavily on the oceans and seas for sustenance and livelihood.

There is another meaning for this rune and one that is equally important. It’s meaning is law, ordinance and regulation. It is clear to see that these two meanings, i.e. sea/law, go hand in hand in the search for new territories in example Briton. In order to conquer Briton the Anglo-Saxons had to transverse the North Sea in order to reach their soon to be new colony and henceforth brought with them their customs and laws. Lagu has another association with law and that is one of right or legal privilege. All of the above meanings seem to point in the direction of the noble class and their constant desire for new lands by which they would govern with certain tribal laws. In my view I believe that Lagu is closely connected with the act of expansion and law. On a more spiritual level this rune can be used to expand ones mind as will be pointed out later in this section.

Lagu has deep esoteric connotations and if we look at its root words and their variant spelling they will keys us into the mysteries that surround this rune. The first variant of Lagu is Lac and this word in the forerunner to our modern word Lake but it used to have other various meanings such as strife and battle. Hence connecting it to the above paragraph which had to do with land expansion and seafaring. Its other meanings include sacrifice, offering and gift. These meanings also seem to be eluding to a divine aspect of this rune. The above mentioned meanings could represent the act of offering gifts to the gods in hopes that they would lend their help in future combat henceforth bringing success to the tribe. The plural version of Lac is Lacan which means to jump up and down, leap, jump and fly. When we look at these words they seem to be describing action and movement. When we combine sacrifice, offering and the acts of jumping and movement it seems to point us in the direction of some sort of exstatic ritual. We know that in Scandinavia there were many fertility cults dedicated to the clan of fertility gods known as the Vanir. The symbol of many of the Vanir cults was that of the boar. While the two most important gods in the Vanir cult were Freyja and Frey and they both rode boars as their mode of transportation. The boar symbol has been found in various archeological digs in England and Scandinavia such as the famous English ship burial at Sutton Hoo. The image of the boar can be found in many Old English manuscripts such as Beowulf, the Maxims and the gnomic poems. It would seem that Lagu has close connections with the fertility cults of northern Europe and represents the exstatic rites that went along with many of the rituals.  It is my personal belief that Lagu also contains the mystery of the Laece or physician. The word Laece can be translated into modern English as leech but in Anglo-Saxon times it simply meant doctor or physician. The laech was connected to herbal and spiritual healing and they used words such as laecewryt meaning medicinal herb or drug. If we combine all of the different aspects of Lagu the picture and the message begin to be revealed. This rune is connected to the ancient spiritual practice of shamanism. Such words as flying, jumping and offering all confirm with me that Lagu contains the mysteries of the herbal healer and describe an exstatic type of ritual whereby the shaman would enter a state of exstacy in order to heal the person or being in need. Also the correct offerings or sacrifices would have to administered to appease the certain gods, helper spirits or ancestors aiding in the ritual or healing. This rune has yet another connotation with the esoteric and one that would be vital for any shaman to have mastered if he/she would be a true healer and that would be traveling into the spirit world. When we look at Lagu as water and transfer that to the concept of the astral the rune rune poem can be read in a different light. We could analys the poem like this. The astral is everlasting, if the visions frighten him. The Sea horse could be describing the mode of transportation into the other world, like that of Sleipnir and Hermond in his decent into Hel. This rune poem could be akin to the 9^th charm in the Havamal where it tells of night hags sporting in the sky. It goes on further to explain how one can make them lose their senses and shape. It is my belief that Lagu is definitely connected to any activity that might involve dealings with the astral. There is yet another word connected to Laece and it is Leac. This word means leek, onion or garden herb, hence its further connection with the use of Lagu in healing practices. The leek has magical and traditional associations in Northern Europe. In chapter 44 of the Egils Saga there is an instance where somebody tries to poison the Viking Egil. Egil then carves runes on the drinking horn and reddens them with his blood whereupon the horn bursts asunder. There is another instance telling if there is poison in ones drink. This story comes from the Sigrdrifumal, where the wise Valkyrie Sigrdrifa tells the hero Sigurd to cast a leek in his cup. Upon doing this the cup also breaks apart if there is poison within it. There is no doubt that this passage in the Eddas is correlated with that in the Egils Saga. It is Lagus connection with ale that brings us to yet another occult aspect of this rune. There is an ancient formula in the north called ALU which means ale. There have been many interpretations on this formula and each are valid in their own right. Lets look at two examples of the interpretation of ALU. If we translate ALU into runes it would be AC, Lagu and Ur, which can be translated as Strength, emotion and will respectively. These three are describing the very basis of any magical act. If we look at the Anglo-Saxon EALU it varies just a bit. The rune for EA is Ear and it means grave, earth and even sea. Looking at its function as grave we might get a different sort of translation on the above mentioned subject. In ancient times the people of the northlands venerated their ancestors. If we look at the function of Ear representing the underworld, Lagus as the astral plane and Ur as the primal source of all being the picture becomes less obscure. EALU represents our link with the ancestors and the source of our heritage. This is in keeping with what the ancient Germans believed. This being the we all came from an Earth-born god in a sacred grove as mentioned above. Lagu is the driving force that allows the Witena or shaman to transverse the astral and connect with the primal source held within the well of beginning. On a more physical level Lagu represents the emotions. It symbolizes those ups and downs that we experience in our lives. Our moods can be calm, rough and wild just as the ocean can be it on a summery day or during a winter storm. Just as the sea was frightening to those who had to cross it so too can our emotions be to us. We must ride through our moods and feelings no matter how much they might scare or hinder us, just as those brave souls had to transverse over the terrifying seas.

Lagu appears to be describing three types of emotions depression, fear and anger. The first line is speaking of the grandeur of the sea. To our ancestors this must have been a place of awe and respect since it was a vast unknown mass of water and no one where the end of it might be. There is an Old English poem call The Seafarer and it is about a man exiled to a life on the sea. In the poem the man speaks to us in a meditative verse, he explains how beautiful the sea is and yet how full of hardships it is. We can view this awe as an overwhelming experience and can be translated into a state similar to that of depression. The emotion of depression can be viewed as the element of water since it tends to hinder daily experiences and leaves us in a place of fear almost like drowning in emotional waters.