#kalevala louhi

During its time of existing, the Kalevala has been interpreted many times, in various ways, and quite often from a male view. Even though the main characters in the Kalevala are men, there is also an abundance of strong and amazing female characters presented in the national epic. My favourite character when I was growing up was Louhi, the powerful sorceress and ruler of Pohjola. To me she represents strength, a kind of and unyielding and cunning mind. Louhi is a fierce leader, but she still holds her daughters so dear to her that she makes the men who ask them for marriage really work for it.

And it’s not just Louhi who should be celebrated as the woman who protected her land from men who wanted to steal the Sampo, there is not a single female in Kalevala who shouldn’t be celebrated. May it be said that the world of Kalevala itself was created by a woman, and with that, I’ll let you find your own feminist icon among the women of Kalevala.

Aino

Aino’s brother, Joukahainen, goes against Väinämöinen, the old wise man, and loses. Väinämöinen sings him into a swamp and Joukahainen keeps drowning deeper and deeper. When he’s neck deep in the muddy water he promises his young, beautiful sister Aino to be Väinämöinen’s wife. Väinämöinen agrees to this and so lets Joukahainen keep his life. He returns home to give the news and breaks to tears, being ashamed of what he’s done.

Their mother is overjoyed by this; a great man such as Väinämöinen is sure to bring the family riches and raise their status. But Aino is not pleased. Väinämöinen is old and she is not yet ready to marry, she wants to be free and wander in the woods, not cook and clean after a man. Her mother suppresses her resistance to the marriage and only sees how grand a wedding they will soon have, without realising the agony her of her daughter.

One day after Aino had met with Väinämöinen in the woods, felt his looks, hungry and desiring, on her body she decides to run away from it all. She puts on the wedding dress her mother has laid out for her, weaves ribbons in her hair and just runs. For two whole days Aino travels aimlessly, contemplating on her life and whether anyone would really care if she exists or not. “Mother might cry a little, father probably wouldn’t, brother would hardly notice” she thinks to herself. Her brother had sold her off just like that, only to keep his own sorry life, her mother pushed her to be married without giving any thought to how Aino felt about it. Eventually Aino comes to the shore of the ocean where she sits down and just waits for a night.

In the morning mist over the water Aino sees young maidens, dancing and bathing with their hair running free and she longs to be just like them. She takes off her wedding dress and starts to swim towards a rock, gleaming golden in the sunlight. When she reaches the rock and sets foot on it, it suddenly sinks into the waves and takes Aino with it.

Mother of Aino

A forest rabbit brings the news of Aino’s drowning to her mother. Tears of remorse fill her eyes. Only now, after she has lost her daughter she realises how wrong she did, pushing her daughter like that. She only wanted Väinämöinen for his name, for his fame, for her own sake without understanding Aino’s needs and desires.

“Do not force your young daughters, do not decide for them. Do not raise your children only to fulfil your own wishes”, she warns other parents as her tears keep flowing. They flow so long and so strong that three rivers are born of them and the sorrow that fills the mother’s heart ages her before her time. She sees her fault and wrong doing when it’s already too late, but she is able to admit it and  grow from her mistakes. She knows she can’t get her daughter back but maybe she can help some other young maiden by telling their parents of her mistakes.

Aino’s brother Joukahainen doesn’t see his own blame in Aino’s destiny, but sets to kill Väinämöinen, blaming the man for Aino’s death. The mother tries to stop this; no good will come out of another death, it won’t bring Aino back. But Joukahainen doesn’t listen and shoots Väinämöinen’s horse and sees the great wise man fall to the ocean. What he doesn’t know is that Väinämöinen didn’t drown, maybe by the help of Aino’s mother’s prayers?

Kyllikki

Kyllikki is the daughter of a wealthy family, known among many men for her beauty and for the amount of suitors she’s turned down. Kyllikki is strong in her belief that one day she will find the man of her dreams, someone stable and caring to come and ask for her hand and so she keeps turning down everyone who she thinks is unable to meet her high expectations.

Among her suitors is Lemminkäinen, a poor fisher and a ladies man, who sees Kyllikki as a challenge and sets to put his charms to the test. Alas, out of all the women in the town only Kyllikki isn’t seduced by his good looks and sweet talk. His man-ego hurting after being turned down, Lemminkäinen steals Kyllikki to be his wife, who of course is reluctant at first, but eventually she accepts her fate. She agrees to be wife to Lemminkäinen in one condition; Lemminkäinen must never start fights or go to battles. He agrees and sets his one condition to Kyllikki; she must never go to village dances and festivals. She agrees.

Time goes by, Kyllikki learns to love her husband and they both hold onto their promises. Lemminkäinen goes to the sea for fishing and stays on his way for a few days longer than he should for his catch is so huge that it requires celebration. Back at home Kyllikki awaits days for him to come back, but grows bored of just sitting around and decides to go out to a dance. When Lemminkäinen comes back and hears from his sister Ainikki that Kyllikki has broken her vow he grows mad.

Lemminkäinen starts to find a war that he could join; Kyllikki broke her vow so he’s going to do the same just for the sake of revenge. Kyllikki tries to hold him from going, his mother tells him to drink a pint of ale and calm down, but Lemminkäinen doesn’t listen. To him, now that Kyllikki has done as she pleased and not what he wanted, she is no longer the challenge he conquered. His man-ego has once again been hurt. Off to Pohjola he goes, that’s a good place to start a good fight. He leaves his comb to his mother and wife, telling them that once it turns bloody he’s been hurt.

So is Kyllikki left behind to wait for his husband who has gone to the dark lands of Pohjola to find a better wife, to ask for Louhi’s daughter to marry. She broke her promise, yes, but is this really the fate she deserves after having sacrificed so much for Lemminkäinen?

Mother of Lemminkäinen

“Now I’ve lost a husband!” cries Kyllikki, and when Lemminkäinen’s mother sees the blood dripping from the comb her son left she too falls to her knees to mourn her loss. But it doesn’t take her long until she wipes away the tears and leaves after her son to Pohjola, for she is determined to find out what fate has met her dear son.

She ran all the way to Pohjola, where Louhi, the ruler of the dark realm did her best to avoid the mother’s inquiries of Lemminkäinen’s fate. Eventually Louhi does tell her how she was displeased that a married man would ask her daughter to marry and how she then set Lemminkäinen to hunt the moose of Hiisi, tame the golden horse and shoot the swan fromthe river ofTuonela. It was the last task from where the man hadn’t come back. Hopeful that her son might still be alive, the mother sets to find him. For a week she searches before hearing from the sun that Lemminkäinen lays in pieces in the bottom of the river of Tuonela.

With a powerful spell, the mother puts to sleep the whole realm of Tuonela and goes to the river. Ilmarinen has forged her a rake of iron, with which she fishes every last piece of her son from the nasty river. She is relentless in finishing her task, she puts together the pieces of Lemminkäinen like a puzzle by the riverbank and with spells and incantations she weaves her son back together until the only thing missing from the body is the breath of life. She asks a bee to fly all the way to Heaven and get honey from God’s storage and with this salve Lemminkäinen finally comes back to life.

His mother takes him back to their home, where Kyllikki still waits for her husband.

Louhi

Louhi is not gentle, nor is she kind, but she is fierce and strong and the cold and dark lands which she rules have taught her in many ways. She is resourceful, cunning, used to hardship and to overcoming bad times. Behind her back, Louhi is dubbed as the harlot of Pohjola, blind matron, sparse tooth and the dark woman.

After Väinämöinen’s horse was shot by Joukahainen, he himself was left drifting on the waters until he came to at the shores of Pohjola, Louhi’s kingdom. Louhi takes in the weary traveller and tells that she will take the man safely back to his own land, but only after Väinämöinen has promised her the Sampo; a mythical machine that will create wealth itself. Väinämöinen tells Louhi that he himself is not skilled enough to make the Sampo, but the smith Ilmarinen might very well be able to make such a machine although he might not be willing to make it without a proper price. Louhi promises the smith one of her daughters to marry and with that, Väinämöinen leaves Pohjola only to come back later with Ilmarinen who indeed is able to forge the Sampo.

But Louhi deceives the men of Kalevala; she has no intention whatsoever to force any of her daughters to marry, even less so when the girls themselves don’t want to. To Louhi the only thing that matters is the well being of her people and family, she’s only glad to cast Ilmarinen out of Pohjola. She would use any means necessary to achieve her goals and she really doesn’t take shit from anyone. Louhi makes her daughters’ suitors go through hellish tasks in order to prove their worth and even if they would succeed, she might still cross them.

Annikki

One bright morning when Annikki, the sister of Ilmarinen, is in the middle of washing clothes by the shore she spots a stranger coming closer on a boat. Who else is it but the old wise Väinämöinen, going who knows where. Annikki asks him where he’s headed but the man wont give her the truth. He says he’s off to fishing, but there are no nets nor hooks and line in the boat. He says he’s going to hunt birds, off to war, but Annikki is not so easy to fool. “Come sit next to me, sweet young lady, and I’ll tell you the truth” Väinämöinen tries to sweet talk Annikki but she doesn’t yield. Quite the contrary; she threatens to turn the whole boat upside down if the man doesn’t spill the truth immediately.

Annikki hears that Väinämöinen is yet again off to Pohjola to ask for Louhi’s daughter to marry. She’s infuriated by this, Louhi’s daughter was promised to her brother Ilmarinen for the Sampo and the woman had turned Ilmarinen down! This wasn’t right! She hurried to tell her brother of Väinämöinen’s plans.

Ilmarinen is at first reluctant to go and ask for Louhi’s daughter’s hand again, but after bathing in the sauna he’s a whole new man. Annikki sees that her brother is dressed accordingly, wishes him well and shoos him on his way. Her righteousness pushed Ilmarinen to pursue the woman he had wanted to marry.

Louhen tytär / Ilmarisen emäntä

Louhi’s daughter hasn’t been able to get Ilmarinen out of her head since her mother turned him down after the making of the Sampo. Her mind is infested with the thought that maybe she has made a terrible mistake in not marrying him, maybe the smith could have been the man of her dreams?

So when Väinämöinen and Ilmarinen one day show up at the gates of Pohjola to both ask for her hand in marriage it’s clear who she would rather have her. Louhi is not too happy about her daughter’s choice, like Aino’s mother Louhi too thinks Väinämöinen is the better choice out of the two; he has fame and is a skilled shaman and a warrior. But her daughter is set on Ilmarinen.

Louhi’s daughter does everything she can to help Ilmarinen pass the tests Louhi sets for him. Ilmarinen passes them all and Louhi can’t do but set up their wedding and as hard as it is for Louhi to give her beautiful daughter away to the smith she lets her go anyway; she has her happily-everafter ahead of her.

That happily-everafter only doesn’t last too long for the daughter. Ilmarinen buys a slave, Kullervo, fromUntamo, his previous owner. One day when the youngling goes out to shepherd, Ilmarinen’s wife has baked a stone inside his bread and when Kullervo’s knife breaks upon hitting the rock he conjures the wild beasts of the forest to rip the woman apart before he flees.

Louhi’s daughter got the man she wanted and died because she insulted her husband’s slave. In the poems she is described to have baked the stone in Kullervo’s bread out of malice, with the intention of hurting the youngling. Maybe there was more of her mother’s blood in her veins after all, although the love between her and Ilmarinen must have been great and true for Ilmarinen is clearly left with a void in him after his wife dies. He asks Louhi for another of her daughters to marry, but Louhi declines his requests. In his agony Ilmarinen forges a maiden of gold and silver to replace his late wife. But this golden bride is cold to the touch, stiff and lifeless.

Pohjan neiti

On his journey homewards from Pohjola, having been rejected by yet another woman Väinämöinen sees the fair maiden of Pohjola and being the man he is, tries to entice her to be his wife. But Pohjan neiti is not so easy to lure, she tells Väinämöinen that it was only the other day when she had had a conversation about the subject of marriage with a thrush. “Marriage is a shackle” the thrush had chirruped “a married woman is a slave to her husband, and when has a slave ever been loved by their master?”

It’s time for Väinämöinen’s man-ego to take a hit; he rises from his sleigh and commands the maiden to come to his house and be his wife. “Only after marriage can a girl be a woman!” he storms. Pohjan neito goes Louhi and gives Väinämöinen task after task to fulfil before she can make her decision of whether this is a worthy suitor. After the old man has succeeded in three tasks Pohjan neito challenges Väinämöinen to build a boat without using his hands or his feet. Väinämöinen is full of himself; he knows he’s the best boat builder in the world and his knowledge of words and spell chanting is beyond compare. So lost he is in his thoughts that the ax he has chanted to do his work slips, hits a rock, bounds off of it into his knee and falls on his toe.

Blood oozing from his knee, Väinämöinen takes off on his sleigh and leaves the maiden behind. She doesn’t even raise an eyebrow to help the man.

Marjatta

Virgin maiden Marjatta, shepherding in the woods sits down on the forest bed. So it happens that she picks a single lingonberry and becomes pregnant of it unknowingly. Soon her clothes don’t fit her and she does her best to cover up her pregnancy from her parents.

After ten months when Marjatta feels that the baby is about to be born, her own mother throws her out of the house, calling her impure and disgusting. Her father too casts her aside, even though Marjatta feels that her son is to be a great man and tries her best to explain what had happened to her, that she had not laid with a man but just ate a lingonberry in the woods.

Soon the whole town is against her, no one is willing to let such a woman give birth in their sauna, so she ends up giving birth in the stables. Not long after the baby boy has been born he already goes missing, and Marjatta in her anguish seeks him for a whole week before finally finding her son at the swamp. She takes him home and they start seeking for someone to baptise the baby, but no one is willing to baptise a baby who doesn’t have a father, so they call for Väinämöinen to see into the matter, to decide over the two-week-old child’s faith.

Väinämöinen is cruel in his words, he says the boy should be drowned in the swamp from where he came from. But the baby boy starts to speak of the wise old man’s past sins. He tells of Aino’s drowning, of how Väinämöinen himself doesn’t really have a father. And so the boy is baptised the king of Karjala and Väinämöinen leaves, filled with anger and remorse. The great shaman sails away on his boat, leaving behind his kantele, saying that he will return again when the land needs him.

Marjatta, the symbol of Virgin Mary in the last poem of the Finnish national epic, was without a doubt just as much of an iconic woman as Mary. An outcast and a pariah, celebrated only when her son was realised to be a great man. The whole 50th poem is but a symbolic story about the adopting of Christianity as the common religion and of waving farewell to the old, pagan ways. Yet I wanted to introduce Marjatta here as well for after all, she is a woman of Kalevala.

Ilmatar

The world is young, there is only air and sea and the ever-present gods. The daughter of air, Ilmatar, is bored of her life sailing the skies and descends onto the waters. A tearaway burst of wind dances Ilmatar wildly on the foam topped waves and she becomes pregnant.

The pregnancy takes long, far too long, and after nine years, when her stomach is rock hard and her pain unbearable Ilmatar calls for the high god Ukko to release her of this torment. But no help comes to her aid, only a stray duck flies over the waters and mistaking Ilmatar’s knee for an island stays on top of it. The duck makes its nest and lays seven eggs; six golden and one of iron. For three days the duck incubates the eggs until the heat of it is too much for Ilmatar; she shakes her knee and the eggs fall and break. One after another the shells shatter to pieces that form the sun, the moon, the stars and the clouds on the sky.

Ilmatar still swims in the ocean, floating on her back and her stomach, on her left side and right side, stretching her arms and legs. Where her fingers point are capes formed and where her feet touch the bottom of the ocean become deep basins. Along her sides stack shores of sand, salmon catches form against her feet, gulfs circle her head, rivers come to be of her hair. Islets, islands and rocks rise out of the water around her. The world is created by a woman.

Thirty years after Ilmatar has made this all, the anguish of her pregnancy comes to an end. The child she has been carrying in her womb is Väinämöinen, the first man, and he crawls out of his mother’s womb to see daylight in the world Ilmatar has created for him and for all the people to come.

The women of Kalevala can still teach us some brilliant life lessons today and there are many things we can learn from them. Be it Louhi’s stark nature or Annikki’s sense of justice, Aino’s delicacy or Kyllikki’s self-sacrifice for the sake of making her own happiness, I think the women of Kalevala are quite an amazing bunch.

This blog post was majorly inspired by Riikka Juvonen’s book Louhen hymy (2013) and if you can find it in your local library, I warmly encourage you to read it! If not for the stories, at least take a look at the beautiful illustrations!