Finnish Tradition (Kalevala)Underworld
Tuonela
The land of the dead in Finnish tradition, ruled by Tuoni, lying beyond a black river on which the swan of Tuonela swims and across which Tuoni's daughter ferries the dead.
About Tuonela
The land beyond the river
Finnish and Karelian tradition places the dead in Tuonela, also called Manala, the land 'under the ground', reached by crossing a dark river. In the Kalevala it has its own household: Tuoni, the lord; Tuonetar, the mistress; Tuoni's daughter, the ferrywoman; and a son who is a killer. On the river swims the swan of Tuonela.
Visitors
Väinämöinen travels to Tuonela in Rune 16 to seek three magic words and barely escapes by turning into a steel serpent to slip through the iron nets Tuoni's son stretches across the river; he warns the young never to go there. Lemminkäinen dies at its river in Rune 14, and his mother rakes his body from its waters in Rune 15. Ilmarinen, as one of his bridal tasks, catches the great pike of Tuonela.
Belief and practice
The idea of Tuonela as a separate world of the dead, with its own river and rulers, coexisted in folk belief with the idea that the dead lived on in the grave and returned to visit their families at the autumn Kekri feast.
Sources and further reading
Source notes
These references are recorded in the catalog. Their passage wording and translation have not been checked, so quotations are not displayed here.
- Kalevala, Rune 16 (paraphrase)
About this entry
By Elizabeth Stein for Mythos Atlas. About the author. Editorial notes are grounded in the site's cited sources and can be challenged through the contact page.
Coordinates mark where the myths place a site, or where the tradition locates it today. Mythic realms are left off the map or marked as symbolic placements.