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"Do you have to cast a charm or spell upon them?" asked Jamie with his hand up. "So that it can have its powers and be different from heiroglyphics?"
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Cassandra raised her hand "Do they need to be in physical form? Amulets and such?"
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"do you need to say some sort of poem or something?"eliza tried to think of the word "a chant."
"Yes, all of the above are required--casting a spell on runes written or engraved on a surface, such as wood or stone--and then an incantation. Five points each to all of you."
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Beck raised her hand "To make the writing magic, you have to have the correct tree, herb or stone associated with the symbol."
"Not necessarily, but it would enhance the effect. What you write or carve the runes on usually depends on how long you want the spell to last. For example, the entrance to Platform 9 3/4 relies somewhat on runes carved in stone around the entrace, though you normally can't see them as you pass through."
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Ariana thought about this and raised her hand as she guessed in a small voice "Um, shouldn't you perform a small ritual before casting them? I mean, like putting them in a bag and swirling them around then placing them as they fall softly onto your hand or something like that..." her voice trailed off as her answer sounded dumb to her. She blushed a bright red colour and covered her face in her hands.
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Angel wasn't sure of her answer but she gave it a shot. "There are three sources on divination that give vague descriptions to runes. They are Tacitus' Germania, Snorri Sturluson's Ynglinga saga and Rimbert's Vita Ansgari. No one is sure though if they have anything in common. Are any of us even close Professor?" Angel asked.
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Vicky raised her hand after she remembered something she'd read in a book.
"Shouldn't somebody find windfall branches in order to burn the rune glyph after the branches are cut and finally...make Runes...?"she said, still not so sure.
"Well, what you've described is how runes are used for Divination purposes, which case the runes do not necessarily have to be spelled--however, they must be carved on a specific medium and undergo a certain ritual to ready them for Divination use. I suggest you refer to the Divination Professor for more information on that.
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Jordana raised her hand, "Professor, isn't writing something in runes a spell in itself? Because you are bringing the statement into concrete reality. A way of using the runes for magic is to write out rune rows, or rune scripts." she was probably wrong but it didn't matter, she was there to learn.
"Yes and no--five points for bringing this up. As far as we know Muggles used the runic script to write messages, and those have no magical value whatsoever. Only a few samples of runic writing have been found to have some magical connotation to them, but, as they were made hundreds of years ago, the magic they contained has faded. Activating runes is done differently, depending on the wizard or witch, and so attempting to re-activate another wizard's runic script is not advisable unless you really know what you're doing. Otherwise, there might be a magical misfire."
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"Don't you need to figure out what it means first?" Jackie asked. She had been sitting in the back of the classroom, "Something bad is likely to happen if you don't translate it correctly." she said, pretty sure it was a good answer
Professor Opteryx nodded. "That's why Ancient Runes is a difficult subject to master and put into practice. The more runes a runic script or rune string contains, the more complicated it is to translate it as the runes will work to change or cancel out each other. You can think of it like brewing a potion--the more ingredients there are in the cauldron and the more steps there are, the more complex the potion is and the chance of failure increases."
"So," he said, after a pause as students scribbled down notes, "Are there any questions before we move on to a small activity?"