The mother s name might be wrong as it is curiously similar to the name of Matheson's wife, Alexa Urquhart ( 1812-1897, also mentioned on the tomb stone ), or it could be a strange but not impossible coincidence : Matheson could easily have married a cousin, who, given the traditional adherence to a recurring set of first names within a family or clan, might well have had a name similar to his mother's.
42.
The " Yr " rune came to be seen as the " life rune " inverted and interpreted as " death rune " ( " Todesrune " ) During the World War II era, these two runes ( for " born ", for " died " ) came to be used in obituaries and on tomb stones as marking birth and death dates, replacing asterisk and cross symbols ( * for " born ", 'for " died " ) conventionally used in this context in Germany.
