ANEXO 3
Poems
1 - 2 Ilmatar (the Virgin of the Air) descends to the waters. A pochard lays its eggs on her knee. The eggs
break and the world is formed from their pieces. The mother of the water then gives birth to Väinämöinen.
Sampsa Pellervoinen sows the forest trees. One of the trees, an oak, grows so large that it blots out both
the sun and the moon. A tiny man rises from the sea and fells the giant oak. The sun and moon can shine
once again.
3 - 4 Joukahainen challenges Väinämöinen to a contest of wisdom and is defeated. With his singing,
Väinämöinen causes Joukahainen to sink into a swamp. In order to save himself, Joukahainen promises
his sister' s hand in marriage to Väinämöinen. Upon learning of the bargain, the sister Aino mourns her
fate and finally drowns herself.
5 - 7 Väinämöinen searches the sea for Aino and catches her (she has been transformed into a fish) on his
fishing hook. However, he loses her again and sets out to woo the maiden of Pohjola, the daughter of the
North Farm. Meanwhile, eager for revenge, Joukahainen watches out for Väinämöinen on the way to
Pohjola and shoots Väinämöinen's horse from underneath him as he rides across a river. Väinämöinen
falls into the water and floats out to sea. There an eagle rescues him and carries him to Pohjola's shores.
The mistress of Pohjola, Louhi, tends Väinämöinen until he recovers. In order to be able to return home,
Väinämöinen promises that Ilmarinen the smith will forge a Sampo for Pohjola. The maiden of Pohjola,
Louhi's daughter, is promised to the smith in return for the Sampo.
8 - 9 On his way home, Väinämöinen meets the maiden of Pohjola and asks her to marry him. She agrees on
the condition that Väinämöinen carry out certain impossible tasks. While Väinämöinen carves a wooden
boat, his axe slips and he receives a deep wound in his knee. He searchers for an expert blood-
stauncher and finally finds an old man who stops the flow of blood by using magic incantations.
10 Using magic means, Väinämöinen sends the unwilling Ilmarinen to Pohjola. Ilmarinen forges the Sampo.
Louhi shuts it inside a hill of rock. Ilmarinen is forced to return home without his promised bride.
11-12 Lemminkäinen sets off to woo Kyllikki, a maiden of Saari Island. He makes merry with the other maidens
and abducts Kyllikki. He later abandons her and leaves to woo the maiden of Pohjola. With his singing he
bewitches the people of Pohjola to leave the farmhouse at North Farm. Only one person, a cowherd,
does not fall under his spell.
13-15 Lemminkäinen asks Louhi for her daughter, but Louhi demands that he first hunt and kill the Demon's elk,
then the Demon's fire-breathing gelding, and finally the swan in Tuonela River, which is the boundary
between this world and the next. There the vengeful cowherd kills Lemminkäinen and throws his body
into the river. Lemminkäinen's mother receives a sign of her son's death and goes out in search of him.
She rakes the pieces of her son's body out of Tuonela River, puts them back together and brings her son
back to life.
16-17 Väinämöinen begins to build a boat and visits Tuonela in order to ask for the magic spells needed to
finish it. He does not find them. He then seeks the missing spells from the stomach of the ancient wise
man, Antero Vipunen, who has long been dead. He finds them and finishes his boat.
18-19 Väinämöinen sets off in his boat to woo the daughter of Pohjola, but she chooses instead Ilmarinen, the
forger of the Sampo. Ilmarinen successfully performs the three impossible tasks set before him: he plows
a field full of vipers, hunts down the bear of Tuonela and the wolf of Manala and finally fishes the Great
Pike out of the Tuonela River. Louhi promises her daughter to Ilmarinen.
20-25 In Pohjola, preparations are made for the wedding and invitations are sent to all except Lemminkäinen.
The groom and his folk arrive in Pohjola, and there is great feasting. Väinämöinen entertains the wedding
guests with his singing. The bride and groom are given advice concerning marriage, and the bride bids
farewell to her people and departs with Ilmarinen for Kalevala. There a banquet is also ready for the
guests. Väinämöinen sings the praises of the wedding guests.
26-27 Lemminkäinen shows up at the banquet in Pohjola uninvited, and demands food and drink. He is offered
a tankard of beer filled with vipers. Lemminkäinen engages the master of Pohjola in a singing contest and
swordfight and kills him.
28-30 Lemminkäinen flees the people of Pohjola who are rising up in arms against him and hides on Saari
Island, living among the maidens of the island until he is forced to flee once again, this time from the
island's jealous menfolk. Lemminkäinen finds his home in ashes and his mother hiding in a cottage in the
forest. Lemminkäinen sets out to seek revenge on Pohjola, but is forced to return home because a cold
spell cast by the mistress of Pohjola has frozen his ships in the sea.