Thydian Runes, Pre-Adrakian Era

The Adrakian Era seems to extend to the earliest recorded histories, but historians and explorers have uncovered ruins and places with writing that has nothing in common with Adrakian. These ruins are generally found in northern Theydim and some of the writings have been embedded with magic.

These runes tend to be large within the ruins, the size of a grown human's palm, though the tools to place them varies from paint to stoneworking.

Historical Placement

It has been generally determined the ruins with the writings are older than the Adrakian ruins based on some of the sites having Adrakian ruins built on top of the mysterious ruins.

The Ruins

Most of the ruins appear to be residential to some degree, suggesting those who lived in these places preferred a more communal society. The writings accompany murals in places speculated to be where larger numbers of people have gathered. The exact amount of time between these ruins' abandonment and the Adrakian habitation is difficult to gauge with current technology.

Uses Within the Ruins

Within the ruins, the runes appear to be descriptions to accompany murals, though some are runes left to stand alone and have been infused with magic. The magical effect of these runes has dwindled to the point where a mage could only tell that it once had a magical effect, but not enough to identify the effect.

Uses Within the Adrakian Empire

During the time of the Adrakian Empire, most instances of the runes had vanished, though smaller runes of some similar appearance did appear on various tools, such as a sword with an enchantment for remaining sharp for a longer period of time.

Some have found these smaller runes to be damaged, while holding to a magical imprint of having an enchantment. However these enchanted runes had once been used, damaging the rune was enough to end the effect.

Saint Antral and her fellow rebels communicated using the smaller unenchanted runes, runes roughly speculated to translate into single-words such as "Safe," "Danger," "Death," instead of a full written language.

Post-Adrakian Era Usage

The smaller runes were used to form the alphabet of Old Thydian.

Modern Usage

These more ancient runes are replicated and now decorate places as a symbol of Thydian culture, while their smaller cousins have continued to develop into the alphabet of the modern Thydian language.

There are rumors of weaponsmiths, armorers, jewelers, and other craftspeople using very similar runes to the ancient ones and enchanting them for various uses - a horse finding stable footing under their shoe, a chainshirt turning back a strike that would kill even someone wearing plate, a pendant nullifying poison. However, these rumors are hard to follow when those who are said to craft such items are finally tracked down and found to be making ordinary, mundane items of their trade instead of the rumored relics.

Speaking

There are speculations on how the language was spoken, based off the uses of the smaller variants used by Saint Antral and her rebels and the Adrakian alphabet, but the spoken form has been lost.

Writing

The runes appear to represent a single word, though the smaller variants used as the alphabet appear to also represent a single sound, with the reader having to depend on context for which meaning the rune would have. Many historians speculate the pre-Adrakian runes worked in a similar manner.