Ehwaz
*Ehwaz is the reconstructed Proto-Germanic name of the Elder Futhark e rune, meaning "horse". In the Anglo-Saxon futhorc, it is continued as eh.
The Proto-Germanic vowel system was asymmetric and unstable. The difference between the long vowels expressed by e and ï was lost. The Younger Futhark continues neither, lacking a letter expressing e altogether. The Anglo-Saxon futhorc faithfully preserved all Elder futhorc staves, but assigned new sound values to the redundant ones, futhorc ēoh expressing a diphthong.
In the case of the Gothic alphabet, where the names of the runes were re-applied to letters derived from the Greek alphabet, the letter ? e was named aíƕus "horse" as well.The Anglo-Saxon rune poem has:
