Väinämöinen

Attestation

Agricola's list of 1551 says that Väinämöinen 'forged songs'. In folk poetry he is the eternal sage (tietäjä iänikuinen), a singer whose words have creative and magical force: he sings the world into order, sings rivals into the ground, and knows the 'origins' of things, the charms that give power over iron, fire, and wounds. In many folk variants he is himself the one on whose knee the world-egg is laid.

In the Kalevala

Lönnrot made him the epic's central figure. Born old from Ilmatar after centuries in the womb, he clears and sows the land, defeats the young Joukahainen in a singing contest by singing him into a swamp, and loses the promised bride Aino, who drowns herself rather than marry an old man. Stranded in Pohjola, he sends his brother-smith Ilmarinen to forge the Sampo. He builds a boat by singing, seeks lost words from the dead giant Antero Vipunen, makes the first kantele from the jawbone of a giant pike, and plays it so beautifully that every creature comes to listen and he weeps. He leads the raid that takes the Sampo from Louhi.

Departure

In the last rune, a virgin named Marjatta bears a son who is baptized king of Karelia over Väinämöinen's objection. The old sage sails away in a copper boat, leaving his kantele and songs to the people, a close echo of Christianity supplanting the old ways.