The Great Pike

Aground on a fish

In Rune 40 of the Kalevala, as the heroes sail toward Pohjola, their ship comes to a halt in the rapids, stuck fast on something beneath the water. Lemminkäinen probes with his sword and finds they are resting on the shoulders of an enormous pike. Lemminkäinen and Ilmarinen try to kill it and fail; Väinämöinen thrusts his sword into the water and lifts the fish out, and they cut it up and eat it.

The first kantele

Looking at the bones left from the meal, Väinämöinen wonders whether something marvelous could be made from them. When no one else will try, he makes a kantele himself, with the frame from the pike's jawbone, the pegs from its teeth, and the strings from the hair of Hiisi's gelding. None of the others can play it, but when Väinämöinen does, all creation comes to listen.

The kantele

The kantele, a plucked zither, is Finland's national instrument, and its origin in the Kalevala has made the pike a symbol of Finnish music. Another giant pike, the pike of Tuonela, is caught by Ilmarinen with an eagle of fire as one of his bridal tasks in Rune 19.