This photograph is from the local woods in my hometown, quite near where I live. The branches are of a fallen Pine wood which I clumsily arranged to form the rune. I took this quite recently actually (in late August of 2019).
Nauthiz (often spelled "Naudiz" or "Naud") is a complex rune. It means and it represents need, necessity, constraint, friction. It is connected to the Norns - Urð, Verðandi and Skuld.
Key Concepts: Need, resistance, constraint, conflict, drama, effort, necessity, urgency, hard work, need-fire, life lessons, creative friction, distress, force of growth, the consequence of past action, short term pain for long term gain.
The ninth rune is the "need" rune. Nauðr denotes "need", and above all "necessity". It is the rune of fate and is connected to the three Norns who are weaving the web of destiny. Nauðr is also the rune of magic and initiation. Magic is the ability to influence destiny, a knowledge that sometimes not even the gods and goddesses possess. Not even the deities can influence the decisions of the Norns. Destiny is the thread of life that man has given. Skuld, the youngest of the Norns, is veiled since she represents the future. She cuts the thread when the time comes for a person to die. Destiny is connected to time and death. The magical initiation is the path to control destiniy and to enter the deepest levels of the realms of death. Óðinn hangs nine nights on the Yggdrasill tree, deeply wounded by a spear in order to be initiated in the mysteries of the runes (ie. to know the secrets of the underworld). The realm of death consists of nine worlds. The distance is nine days by horse, as we know from Hermóðr's journey to bring back Baldr and thus change destiny. Nauðr is the ninth rune in the Uthark. (notice that we are dealing with a different runic system from the well known and widely spread Futhark). The fact that the number nine is connected to Nauðr is revealed on the Sigtuna-amulet where it is written: "Have nine necessities, wolf". The connection between the Norns and the number nine, is reflected in the late Edda poem "The Sun-Song" where it is told: "On the chair of the Norns, for nine days I sat". In Nordic magic in spirituality, the number nine is recurrent. The Icelandic books of magic and of the "black arts" (Galdrabók, Galdrakver, Galdrablóð, etc.), instruct and show us how to carve nine Nauðr runes, thus revealing the connection between the number nine and this rune. Nine is 3x3 and is thus a higher aspect of the magical power of the trinity. The three witches in Macbeth (that might have been very much inspired by the Norns), chant: "Thrice to thine and thrice to mine, and thrice again to make up nine". Nine is not just destiny and necessity, but also the possibility to influence fate. Nauðr is time, destiny, necessity and death, and thus also rebirth. The Nauðr rune is connected to the nine months in child birth and the pains involved are an initiation into a new reality. In Nordic spirituality death and life are intimately connected. Certain aspects of the initiatoric meanings of the Nauðr rune continue in the eighteenth rune.
