Bluetooth Before the Internet: What Ideas Are Transmitted by the Jelling Stones of Denmark?

Harald Bluetooth survives history as among the most famous Viking chieftains, primarily because his personal rune stone has been repurposed for the Bluetooth software programmed into our phones, cars, audio systems, and so on. But Chieftain Bluetooth (Harald, for the purposes of this article) played a much more significant role in history. His strides toward Christianizing Denmark inadvertently aided the countries known today as Sweden and Norway into adopting the same faith, while he simultaneously created the most monumental rune stone complex that survives from the Viking world. These stones continue to stand in Jelling, Denmark.

The larger Jelling stone, showing the inscription concerning Harald Bluetooth. (CC BY-SA 2.0 de)