79-554: The Kalevala ( IPA: [ˈkɑleʋɑlɑ] ) is a 19th-century compilation of epic poetry , compiled by Elias Lönnrot from Karelian and Finnish oral folklore and mythology , telling an epic story about the Creation of the Earth , describing the controversies and retaliatory voyages between the peoples of the land of Kalevala called Väinölä and the land of Pohjola and their various protagonists and antagonists , as well as
158-469: A call and response fashion. Ingrian runic singing includes additional choralists. Vocal ranges usually correspond with the range of a kantele . The term "runic song" does not include Livonian or Vepsian song, though they are related. Though runic song has existed for at least a millennium, it only began to be transcribed in 1797. Efforts to write down runic song acquired new urgency in Finland after
237-530: A British-born Canadian literature enthusiast, translated selections of the Kalevala in 1869. He read them before the Literary and Historical Society of Quebec on 17 March 1869. Francis Peabody Magoun published a scholarly translation of the Kalevala in 1963 written entirely in prose. The appendices of this version contain notes on the history of the poem, comparisons between the original Old Kalevala and
316-693: A Finnish epic in a similar vein to the Iliad , Ossian and the Nibelungenlied compiled from the various poems and songs spread over most of Finland. He hoped that such an endeavour would incite a sense of nationality and independence in the native Finnish people. In 1820, Reinhold von Becker [ fi ] founded the journal Turun Wiikko-Sanomat (Turku Weekly News) and published three articles entitled Väinämöisestä ( Concerning Väinämöinen ). These works were an inspiration for Elias Lönnrot in creating his masters thesis at Turku University. In
395-451: A doctor; a 10-day jaunt into Viena. This trip resulted in 49 poems and almost 3,000 new lines of verse. It was during this trip that Lönnrot formulated the idea that the poems might represent a wider continuity, when poem entities were performed to him along with comments in normal speech connecting them. On the fifth field trip, Lönnrot met Arhippa Perttunen who, over two days of continuous recitation, provided him with some 4,000 verses for
474-410: A duo, each person singing alternative verses or groups of verses. This method of performance is called an antiphonic performance, it is a kind of "singing match". Despite the vast geographical distance and customary spheres separating individual singers, the folk poetry the Kalevala is based on was always sung in the same metre . The Kalevala ' s metre is a form of trochaic tetrameter that
553-689: A logical plot. Similarly, as was normal in the preliterate conventions of oral poetry —according to the testimony of Arhippa Perttunen—traditional bards in his father's days would always vary the language of songs from performance to performance when reciting from their repertoire. The Finnish historian Väinö Kaukonen suggests that 3% of the Kalevala 's lines are Lönnrot's own composition, 14% are Lönnrot compositions from variants, 50% are verses which Lönnrot kept mostly unchanged except for some minor alterations, and 33% are original unedited oral poetry. The first version of Lönnrot's compilation
632-406: A master's degree in 1832. In January 1833, he started as the district health officer of Kainuu and began his work on collecting poetry and compiling the Kalevala . Throughout his career Lönnrot made a total of eleven field trips within a period of fifteen years. Prior to the publication of the Kalevala , Elias Lönnrot compiled several related works, including the three-part Kantele (1829–1831),
711-536: A period of 40 years. They have archived 65,000 items of poetry that remain unpublished. By the end of the 19th century this pastime of collecting material relating to Karelia and the developing orientation towards eastern lands had become a fashion called Karelianism , a form of national romanticism . The chronology of this oral tradition is uncertain. The oldest themes, the origin of Earth, have been interpreted to have their roots in distant, unrecorded history and could be as old as 3,000 years. The newest events, e.g.
790-408: A second version, the Kalevala . This New Kalevala , published in 1849, contains fifty poems, with a number of plot differences compared with the first version, and is the standard text of the Kalevala read and translated to this day. (Published as: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seuran Toimituksia. 14 Osa. KALEVALA.) The word Kalevala rarely appears in the original folk songs. The first appearance of
869-619: Is a rhyming verse stanza form that consists of an interlocking three-line rhyme scheme. An example is found in the first lines of the Divine Comedy by Dante , who originated the form: Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita (A) mi ritrovai per una selva oscura (B) ché la diritta via era smarrita. (A) Ahi quanto a dir qual era è cosa dura (B) esta selva selvaggia e aspra e forte (C) che nel pensier rinnova la paura! (B) In ottava rima , each stanza consists of three alternate rhymes and one double rhyme, following
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#1732766141603948-718: Is a couplet), as well as long prose passages, so that at ~1.8 million words it is roughly twice the length of Shahnameh , four times the length of the Rāmāyaṇa , and roughly ten times the length of the Iliad and the Odyssey combined. Famous examples of epic poetry include the Sumerian Epic of Gilgamesh , the ancient Indian Mahabharata and Rāmāyaṇa in Sanskrit and Silappatikaram and Manimekalai in Tamil,
1027-641: Is as follows: Old English, German and Norse poems were written in alliterative verse , usually without rhyme . The alliterative form can be seen in the Old English " Finnsburg Fragment " (alliterated sounds are in bold): Ac on w acnigeað nū, w īgend mīne e alra ǣ rest e orðbūendra, But awake now, my warriors, of all first the men While the above classical and Germanic forms would be considered stichic , Italian, Spanish and Portuguese long poems favored stanzaic forms, usually written in terza rima or especially ottava rima . Terza rima
1106-466: Is credited with discovering and cataloguing the majority of the Kullervo story. Of the dozens of poem singers who contributed to the Kalevala , significant ones are: The poetry was often sung to music built on a pentachord , sometimes assisted by a kantele player. The rhythm could vary but the music was arranged in either two or four lines in 4 metre. The poems were often performed by
1185-504: Is essential that the translation of Kalevala into any language follows the Kalevala metre, for that was how these runes were sung in times immemorial. So that readers get the full impact of these ancient runes, it is imperative that they be presented in the same chanting style." Kaarina Brooks is also the translator of, An Illustrated Kalevala Myths and Legends from Finland, published by Floris Books UK. Modern translations were published in
1264-542: Is generally polyphonic when practiced among the Seto . Runic song usually does not contain rhyming couplets , but is frequently heard in alliterative trochaic tetrameter , or Kalevala meter . Runic song is usually sung in 4 , though quadruple metre and sextuple metre singing also exists. In addition to their musical character, runic singers also are required to follow certain practices as they sang, such as Karelian runic singers holding hands while singing in
1343-400: Is not a complete biography of Roland, but picks up from the plot of Orlando Innamorato , which in turn presupposes a knowledge of the romance and oral traditions . Epic catalogues and genealogies are given, called enumeratio . These long lists of objects, places, and people place the finite action of the epic within a broader, universal context, such as the catalog of ships . Often,
1422-487: Is now known as the Kalevala metre . The metre is thought to have originated during the Proto-Finnic period. Its syllables fall into three types: strong, weak, and neutral. Its main rules are as follows: There are two main types of line: Traditional poetry in the Kalevala metre uses both types with approximately the same frequency. The alternating normal and broken tetrameters is a characteristic difference between
1501-408: Is perhaps Catullus 64 . Epyllion is to be understood as distinct from mock epic , another light form. Romantic epic is a term used to designate works such as Morgante , Orlando Innamorato , Orlando Furioso and Gerusalemme Liberata , which freely lift characters, themes, plots and narrative devices from the world of prose chivalric romance . Long poetic narratives that do not fit
1580-434: Is the most popular. In Serbian poetry, the decasyllable is the only form employed. Balto-Finnic (e.g. Estonian, Finnish, Karelian) folk poetry uses a form of trochaic tetrameter that has been called the Kalevala meter. The Finnish and Estonian national epics, Kalevala and Kalevipoeg , are both written in this meter. The meter is thought to have originated during the Proto-Finnic period. In Indic epics such as
1659-601: The Iliad ) or both. Epics also tend to highlight cultural norms and to define or call into question cultural values, particularly as they pertain to heroism . In the proem or preface, the poet may begin by invoking a Muse or similar divinity. The poet prays to the Muses to provide them with divine inspiration to tell the story of a great hero. Example opening lines with invocations: An alternative or complementary form of proem, found in Virgil and his imitators, opens with
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#17327661416031738-641: The epyllion (plural: epyllia), a brief narrative poem with a romantic or mythological theme . The term, which means "little epic ", came into use in the nineteenth century. It refers primarily to the erudite, shorter hexameter poems of the Hellenistic period and the similar works composed at Rome from the age of the neoterics ; to a lesser degree, the term includes some poems of the English Renaissance , particularly those influenced by Ovid . The most famous example of classical epyllion
1817-611: The Baltic Finnic peoples . It includes the Finnish epic poems Kalevala and Kanteletar , as well as the Estonian Kalevipoeg . Estonian and Finnish researchers suggest the term runosong for English translation, or local terms, such as Estonian regilaul , Seto leelo or Finnish runolaulu when it is about regional tradition. Runic song is typically monophonic among most Baltic Finnic groups, though it
1896-519: The Kalevala . Elias Lönnrot (9 April 1802 – 19 March 1884) was a physician, botanist , linguist , and poet. At the time he was compiling the Kalevala he was the district health officer based in Kajaani responsible for the whole Kainuu region in the eastern part of what was then the Grand Duchy of Finland . He was the son of Fredrik Johan Lönnrot, a tailor, and Ulrika Lönnrot; he was born in
1975-466: The Kalevala . He also met a singer called Matiska in the hamlet of Lonkka on the Russian side of the border. Although this singer had a somewhat poor memory, he did help to fill in many gaps in the work Lönnrot had already catalogued. This trip resulted in the discovery of almost 300 poems at just over 13,000 verses. In the autumn of 1834, Lönnrot had written the vast majority of the work needed for what
2054-405: The Kalevala . Scholars to this day still argue about how much of the Kalevala is genuine folk poetry and how much is Lönnrot's own work – and the degree to which the text is 'authentic' to the oral tradition. During the compilation process it is known that he merged poem variants and characters together, left out verses that did not fit and composed lines of his own to connect certain passages into
2133-494: The Neo-Sumerian Empire . The poem details the exploits of Gilgamesh , the king of Uruk . Although recognized as a historical figure, Gilgamesh, as represented in the epic, is a largely legendary or mythical figure. The longest written epic from antiquity is the ancient Indian Mahabharata ( c. 3rd century BC –3rd century AD), which consists of 100,000 ślokas or over 200,000 verse lines (each shloka
2212-523: The Old Kalevala (1835) and the Kanteletar (1840). Lönnrot's field trips and endeavours helped him to compile the Kalevala , and brought considerable enjoyment to the people he visited; he would spend much time retelling what he had collected as well as learning new poems. Before the 18th century, Kalevala poetry, also known as runic song , was common throughout Finland and Karelia, but in
2291-456: The Ramayana and Mahabharata , the shloka form is used. The primary form of epic, especially as discussed in this article, is the heroic epic , including such works as the Iliad and Mahabharata . Ancient sources also recognized didactic epic as a category, represented by such works as Hesiod 's Works and Days and Lucretius's De rerum natura . A related type of poetry is
2370-502: The impair (odd number) as a formal device and letting the stresses fall where they would." Most recently, Finnish/Canadian author and translator Kaarina Brooks translated into English the complete runic versions of Old Kalevala 1835 (Wisteria Publications 2020) and Kalevala (Wisteria Publications 2021). These works, unlike some previous versions, faithfully follow the Kalevala meter (Trochaic tetrameter) throughout and can be sung or chanted as Elias Lönnrot had intended. Brooks says, "It
2449-653: The performative verb "I sing". Examples: This Virgilian epic convention is referenced in Walt Whitman 's poem title / opening line "I sing the body electric". Compare the first six lines of the Kalevala : These conventions are largely restricted to European classical culture and its imitators. The Epic of Gilgamesh , for example, or the Bhagavata Purana do not contain such elements, nor do early medieval Western epics that are not strongly shaped by
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2528-528: The 16th century the Spenserian stanza and blank verse were also introduced. The French alexandrine is currently the heroic line in French literature, though in earlier literature – such as the chanson de geste – the decasyllable grouped in laisses took precedence. In Polish literature, couplets of Polish alexandrines (syllabic lines of 7+6 syllables) prevail. In Russian, iambic tetrameter verse
2607-461: The 16th century the clergy forbade all telling and singing of pagan rites and stories. In conjunction with the arrival of European poetry and music this caused a significant reduction in the number of traditional folk songs and their singers. Thus the tradition faded somewhat but was never totally eradicated. In total, Lönnrot made eleven field trips in search of poetry. His first trip was made in 1828 after his graduation from Turku University, but it
2686-539: The 1849 version, but omits more than half of the verses. Of the few complete translations into English, it is only the older translations by John Martin Crawford (1888) and William Forsell Kirby (1907) which attempt to strictly follow the original ( Kalevala metre ) of the poems. A notable partial translation of Franz Anton Schiefner 's German translation was made by Prof. John Addison Porter in 1868 and published by Leypoldt & Holt . Edward Taylor Fletcher ,
2765-454: The 18th century it began to disappear in Finland, first in western Finland, because European rhymed poetry became more common in Finland. Finnish folk poetry was first written down in the 17th century and collected by hobbyists and scholars through the following centuries. Despite this, the majority of Finnish poetry remained only in the oral tradition. Finnish-born nationalist and linguist Carl Axel Gottlund (1796–1875) expressed his desire for
2844-547: The 19th century, collecting became more extensive, systematic and organised. Altogether, almost half a million pages of verse have been collected and archived by the Finnish Literature Society and other collectors in what are now Estonia and Russia's Republic of Karelia . The publication Suomen Kansan Vanhat Runot ( Ancient Poems of the Finns ) published 33 volumes containing 85,000 items of poetry over
2923-461: The ABABABCC rhyme scheme . Example: Canto l'arme pietose, e 'l Capitano Che 'l gran sepolcro liberò di Cristo. Molto egli oprò col senno e con la mano; Molto soffrì nel glorioso acquisto: E invan l'Inferno a lui s'oppose; e invano s'armò d'Asia e di Libia il popol misto: Chè 'l Ciel gli diè favore, e sotto ai santi Segni ridusse i suoi compagni erranti. The sacred armies, and
3002-520: The Homeric epics, the earliest works of Western literature, were fundamentally an oral poetic form. These works form the basis of the epic genre in Western literature. Nearly all of Western epic (including Virgil's Aeneid and Dante's Divine Comedy ) self-consciously presents itself as a continuation of the tradition begun by these poems. In his work Poetics , Aristotle defines an epic as one of
3081-663: The Kainuu border regions and then on to the north and finally from Kainuu to the south-east along the border. For the expedition into the north he was accompanied by Juhana Fredrik Cajan . The first part of the trip took Lönnrot all the way to Inari in northern Lapland . The second, southern part of the journey was more successful than the northern part, taking Lönnrot to the town of Sortavala on Lake Ladoga then back up through Savo and eventually back to Kajaani. Although these trips were long and arduous, they resulted in very little Kalevala material; only 1,000 verses were recovered from
3160-595: The Kalevala metre and other forms of trochaic tetrameter. There are four additional rules: There are two main schemes featured in the Kalevala : The verses are sometimes inverted into chiasmus . Verses 221 to 232 of song forty. Vaka vanha Väinämöinen itse tuon sanoiksi virkki: "Näistäpä toki tulisi kalanluinen kanteloinen, kun oisi osoajata, soiton luisen laatijata." Kun ei toista tullutkana, ei ollut osoajata, soiton luisen laatijata, vaka vanha Väinämöinen itse loihe laatijaksi, tekijäksi teentelihe. Väinämöinen, old and steadfast, Answered in
3239-468: The Karelian and Urdu languages between 2009 and 2015. Thus, the Kalevala was published in its originating Karelian language only after 168 years since its first translation into Swedish. As of 2010, the Kalevala had been translated into sixty-one languages and is Finland's most translated work of literature. The Kalevala begins with the traditional Finnish creation myth , leading into stories of
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3318-671: The Mongols , the Kyrgyz Manas , and the Malian Sundiata . Epic poems of the modern era include Derek Walcott 's Omeros , Mircea Cărtărescu 's The Levant and Adam Mickiewicz 's Pan Tadeusz . Paterson by William Carlos Williams , published in five volumes from 1946 to 1958, was inspired in part by another modern epic, The Cantos by Ezra Pound . The first epics were products of preliterate societies and oral history poetic traditions. Oral tradition
3397-1152: The Persian Shahnameh , the Ancient Greek Odyssey and Iliad , Virgil 's Aeneid , the Old English Beowulf , Dante 's Divine Comedy , the Finnish Kalevala , the German Nibelungenlied , the French Song of Roland , the Spanish Cantar de mio Cid , the Portuguese Os Lusíadas , the Armenian Daredevils of Sassoun , the Old Russian The Tale of Igor's Campaign , John Milton 's Paradise Lost , The Secret History of
3476-685: The Russian victory in the 1808–1809 Finnish War and its subsequent annexation of Finland. This led to the publication of the Kalevala by Elias Lönnrot in 1835. Similarly, runic song largely began to be recorded in Estonia in 1888 as part of the country's national revival, though the first transcriptions reach as far back as Johann Gottfried Herder 's 1778–1779 publication of Folk Songs . The 1888 runic song transcription process in Estonia largely began following an appeal by Jakob Hurt to collect written Estonian folklore. Karl August Hermann subsequently called on Estonians to collect folk tunes. However,
3555-515: The arrival of Christianity, seem to be from the Iron Age , which in Finland lasted until c. 1300 CE . Finnish folklorist Kaarle Krohn proposes that 20 of the 45 poems of the Kalevala are of possible Ancient Estonian origin or at least deal with a motif of Estonian origin (of the remainder, two are Ingrian and 23 are Western Finnish). It is understood that during the Finnish reformation in
3634-546: The caste system of Indian society and the life of the lower levels of society, such as cobblers and shepherds, see C.N. Ramachandran, "Ambivalence and Angst: A Note on Indian folk epics," in Lauri Honko (2002. p. 295). Some Indian oral epics feature strong women who actively pursue personal freedom in their choice of a romantic partner (Stuart, Claus, Flueckiger and Wadley, eds, 1989, p. 5). Japanese traditional performed narratives were sung by blind singers. One of
3713-653: The classical traditions, such as the Chanson de Roland or the Poem of the Cid . Narrative opens " in the middle of things ", with the hero at his lowest point. Usually flashbacks show earlier portions of the story. For example, the Iliad does not tell the entire story of the Trojan War, starting with the judgment of Paris , but instead opens abruptly on the rage of Achilles and its immediate causes. So too, Orlando Furioso
3792-421: The construction and robbery of the epic mythical wealth-making machine Sampo . The Kalevala is regarded as the national epic of Karelia and Finland , and is one of the most significant works of Finnish literature along with J. L. Runeberg 's The Tales of Ensign Stål and Aleksis Kivi 's The Seven Brothers . The Kalevala was instrumental in the development of the Finnish national identity and
3871-487: The creation of the earth, plants, creatures, and the sky. Creation, healing, combat and internal story telling are often accomplished by the character(s) involved singing of their exploits or desires. Many parts of the stories involve a character hunting or requesting lyrics (prayers) to acquire some skill, such as boatbuilding or the mastery of iron making. As well as prayer casting and singing, there are many stories of lust, romance, kidnapping and seduction. The protagonists of
3950-509: The culture more completely. The seventh field trip took him on a long winding path through the southern and eastern parts of the Viena poem singing region. He was delayed significantly in Kuhmo because of bad skiing conditions. By the end of that trip, Lönnrot had collected another 100 poems consisting of over 4,000 verses. Lönnrot made his eighth field trip to the Russian border town of Lapukka where
4029-501: The current version, and a detailed glossary of terms and names used in the poem. Magoun translated the Old Kalevala , which was published six years later entitled The Old Kalevala and Certain Antecedents . Eino Friberg 's 1988 translation uses the original metre selectively but in general is more attuned to pleasing the ear than being an exact metrical translation; it also often reduces the length of songs for aesthetic reasons. In
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#17327661416034108-453: The epic as received in tradition and add to the epic in their performances. Later writers like Virgil , Apollonius of Rhodes , Dante , Camões , and Milton adopted and adapted Homer's style and subject matter , but used devices available only to those who write. The oldest epic recognized is the Epic of Gilgamesh ( c. 2500–1300 BCE ), which was recorded in ancient Sumer during
4187-499: The forms of poetry, contrasted with lyric poetry and drama (in the form of tragedy and comedy). Harmon & Holman (1999) define an epic: Harmon and Holman delineate ten main characteristics of an epic: The hero generally participates in a cyclical journey or quest, faces adversaries that try to defeat them in their journey, and returns home significantly transformed by their journey. The epic hero illustrates traits, performs deeds, and exemplifies certain morals that are valued by
4266-503: The godly knight, That the great sepulchre of Christ did free, I sing; much wrought his valor and foresight, And in that glorious war much suffered he; In vain 'gainst him did Hell oppose her might, In vain the Turks and Morians armèd be: His soldiers wild, to brawls and mutines prest, Reducèd he to peace, so Heaven him blest. From the 14th century English epic poems were written in heroic couplets , and rhyme royal , though in
4345-495: The great singer Arhippa Perttunen had learned his trade. In correspondence he notes that he has written down many new poems but is unclear on the quantity. Elias Lönnrot departed on the first part of his ninth field trip on 16 September 1836. He was granted a 14-month leave of absence and a sum of travelling expenses from the Finnish Literary Society . His funds came with some stipulations: he must travel around
4424-412: The importance of line consistency and poetic meter. Ancient Greek epics were composed in dactylic hexameter . Very early Latin epicists, such Livius Andronicus and Gnaeus Naevius , used Saturnian meter. By the time of Ennius , however, Latin poets had adopted dactylic hexameter . Dactylic hexameter has been adapted by a few anglophone poets such as Longfellow in " Evangeline ", whose first line
4503-417: The intensification of Finland's language strife that ultimately led to Finland's independence from Russia in 1917. The work is known internationally and has partly influenced, for example, J. R. R. Tolkien 's legendarium (i.e. Middle-earth mythology). The first version of the Kalevala , called the Old Kalevala , was published in 1835, consisting of 12,078 verses. The version most commonly known today
4582-461: The introduction to his 1989 translation, Keith Bosley stated: "The only way I could devise of reflecting the vitality of Kalevala metre was to invent my own, based on syllables rather than feet. While translating over 17,000 lines of Finnish folk poetry before I started on the epic, I found that a line settled usually into seven syllables of English, often less, occasionally more. I eventually arrived at seven, five and nine syllables respectively, using
4661-506: The most famous, The Tale of the Heike , deals with historical wars and had a ritual function to placate the souls of the dead (Tokita 2015, p. 7). A variety of epic forms are found in Africa. Some have a linear, unified style while others have a more cyclical, episodic style (Barber 2007, p. 50). People in the rice cultivation zones of south China sang long narrative songs about
4740-604: The origin of rice growing, rebel heroes, and transgressive love affairs (McLaren 2022). The borderland ethnic populations of China sang heroic epics, such as the Epic of King Gesar of the Mongols , and the creation-myth epics of the Yao people of south China. Runic song Runic song , also referred to as Rune song , Runo song , or Kalevala song , is a form of oral poetry and national epic historically practiced among
4819-494: The performer has the license to recontextualize the story to a particular audience, often to a younger generation. The English word epic comes from Latin epicus , which itself comes from the Ancient Greek adjective ἐπικός ( epikos ), from ἔπος ( epos ), "word, story, poem." In ancient Greek , 'epic' could refer to all poetry in dactylic hexameter ( epea ), which included not only Homer but also
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#17327661416034898-548: The poem variants; one poem could easily have countless variants, scattered across rural areas of Karelia and Ingria . Lönnrot was not really interested in, and rarely wrote down the name of the singer except for some of the more prolific cases. His primary purpose in the region was that of a physician and of an editor, not of a biographer or counsellor. He rarely knew anything in-depth about the singer himself and primarily only catalogued verse that could be relevant or of some use in his work. The student David Emmanuel Daniel Europaeus
4977-706: The poet is also paying homage to the ancestors of audience members. Examples: In the Homeric and post-Homeric tradition, epic style is typically achieved through the use of the following stylistic features: Many verse forms have been used in epic poems through the ages, but each language's literature typically gravitates to one form, or at least to a very limited set. Ancient Sumerian epic poems did not use any kind of poetic meter and lines did not have consistent lengths; instead, Sumerian poems derived their rhythm solely through constant repetition and parallelism , with subtle variations between lines. Indo-European epic poetry, by contrast, usually places strong emphasis on
5056-489: The society the epic originates from. Many epic heroes are recurring characters in the legends of their native cultures. In the Indian mahākāvya epic genre, more emphasis was laid on description than on narration. Indeed, the traditional characteristics of a mahākāvya are listed as: Classical epic poetry recounts a journey, either physical (as typified by Odysseus in the Odyssey ) or mental (as typified by Achilles in
5135-427: The southern half and an unknown quantity from the northern half. The tenth field trip is a relative unknown. What is known however, is that Lönnrot intended to gather poems and songs to compile into the upcoming work Kanteletar . He was accompanied by his friend C. H. Ståhlberg for the majority of the trip. During that journey the pair met Mateli Magdalena Kuivalatar in the small border town of Ilomantsi . Kuivalatar
5214-607: The stories often have to accomplish feats that are unreasonable or impossible which they often fail to achieve, leading to tragedy and humiliation. Epic poetry An epic poem , or simply an epic , is a lengthy narrative poem typically about the extraordinary deeds of extraordinary characters who, in dealings with gods or other superhuman forces , gave shape to the mortal universe for their descendants. With regard to oral tradition , epics consist of formal speech and are usually learnt word for word, and are contrasted with narratives which consist of everyday speech where
5293-605: The town of Akonlahti, which proved most successful. This trip yielded over 3,000 verses and copious notes. In 1833, Lönnrot moved to Kajaani where he was to spend the next 20 years as the district health officer for the region, living in the Hövelö croft located near the Lake Oulujärvi in the Paltaniemi village, spending his spare time searching for poems. His fourth field trip was undertaken in conjunction with his work as
5372-568: The traditional European definition of the heroic epic are sometimes known as folk epics. Indian folk epics have been investigated by Lauri Honko (1998), Brenda Beck (1982) and John Smith, amongst others. Folk epics are an important part of community identities. The folk genre known as al-sira relates the saga of the Hilālī tribe and their migrations across the Middle East and north Africa, see Bridget Connelly (1986). In India, folk epics reflect
5451-835: The village of Sammatti , Uusimaa . At the age of 21, he entered the Imperial Academy of Turku and obtained a master's degree in 1826. His thesis was entitled De Vainamoine priscorum fennorum numine ( Väinämöinen, a Divinity of the Ancient Finns ). The monograph 's second volume was destroyed in the Great Fire of Turku the same year. In the spring of 1828, he set out with the aim of collecting folk songs and poetry. Rather than continue this work, though, he decided to complete his studies and entered Imperial Alexander University in Helsinki to study medicine. He earned
5530-478: The wisdom poetry of Hesiod , the utterances of the Delphic oracle , and the strange theological verses attributed to Orpheus . Later tradition, however, has restricted the term 'epic' to heroic epic , as described in this article. Originating before the invention of writing, primary epics, such as those of Homer , were composed by bards who used complex rhetorical and metrical schemes by which they could memorize
5609-613: The word in folk songs was recorded in April 1836. Lönnrot chose it as the title for his project sometime at the end of 1834, but his choice was not random. The name "Kalev" appears in Finnic and Baltic folklore in many locations, and the Sons of Kalev are known throughout Finnish and Estonian folklore. Lönnrot produced Lyhennetty laitos , an abridged version of the Kalevala, in 1862. It was intended for use in schools. It retains all 50 poems from
5688-461: The words which follow: "Yet a harp might be constructed Even of the bones of fishes, If there were a skilful workman, Who could from the bones construct it." As no craftsman there was present, And there was no skilful workman Who could make a harp of fishbones, Väinämöinen, old and steadfast, Then began the harp to fashion, And himself the work accomplished. Very little is actually known about Elias Lönnrot's personal contributions to
5767-616: Was entitled Kalewala, taikka Wanhoja Karjalan Runoja Suomen Kansan muinoisista ajoista ("The Kalevala, or old Karelian poems about ancient times of the Finnish people"), also known as the Old Kalevala . It was published in two volumes in 1835–1836. The Old Kalevala consisted of 12,078 verses making up a total of thirty-two poems. Even after the publication of the Old Kalevala Lönnrot continued to collect new material for several years. He later integrated this additional material, with significantly edited existing material, into
5846-405: Was first published in 1849 and consists of 22,795 verses, divided into fifty folk stories (Finnish: runot ). An abridged version, containing all fifty poems but just 9,732 verses, was published in 1862. In connection with the Kalevala , there is another much more lyrical collection of poems, also compiled by Lönnrot, called Kanteletar from 1840, which is mostly seen as a "sister collection" of
5925-480: Was not until 1831 and his second field trip that the real work began. By that time he had already published three articles entitled Kantele and had significant notes to build upon. This second trip was not very successful and he was called back to Helsinki to attend to victims of the Second cholera pandemic . The third field trip was much more successful and led Elias Lönnrot to Viena in east Karelia where he visited
6004-455: Was that oral epics tend to be constructed in short episodes, each of equal status, interest and importance. This facilitates memorization, as the poet is recalling each episode in turn and using the completed episodes to recreate the entire epic as he performs it. Parry and Lord also contend that the most likely source for written texts of the epics of Homer was dictation from an oral performance. Milman Parry and Albert Lord have argued that
6083-573: Was to become the Old Kalevala ; all that was required was to tie up some narrative loose ends and complete the work. His sixth field trip took him into Kuhmo, a municipality in Kainuu to the south of Viena. There he collected over 4,000 verses and completed the first draft of his work. He wrote the foreword and published in February of the following year. With the Old Kalevala well into its first publication run, Lönnrot decided to continue collecting poems to supplement his existing work and to understand
6162-458: Was used alongside written scriptures to communicate and facilitate the spread of culture. In these traditions, poetry is transmitted to the audience and from performer to performer by purely oral means. Early 20th-century study of living oral epic traditions in the Balkans by Milman Parry and Albert Lord demonstrated the paratactic model used for composing these poems. What they demonstrated
6241-607: Was very important to the development of the Kanteletar . The eleventh documented field trip was another undertaken in conjunction with his medical work. During the first part of the trip, Lönnrot returned to Akonlahti in Russian Karelia, where he gathered 80 poems and a total of 800 verses. The rest of the trip suffers from poor documentation. Lönnrot and his contemporaries, e.g. Matthias Castrén , Anders Johan Sjögren, and David Emmanuel Daniel Europaeus collected most of
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