Kalevala characters
Aino is, along with Kullervo, the most independent composition of Lönnrot among the characters in the Kalevala. The starting point is a Viennese poem about a hanging girl, "Anni tyttö, Aino neito". While collecting ants in the forest, he meets Osmoinen, or Kalevalainen, whose conversation causes him to run into a barn and strangle himself with gold belts. Three rivers are born from mother's tears, three birches on their banks, three cuckoos fall in them. Lönnrot connected Aino with Joukahaisen's sister and Osmoinen with Väinämöinen, who had been promised a sister. The motive for the suicide thus became the suitor's old age. When hanging was transformed into drowning, the strange fish girl of Vellamo's fishing was also suitable as Aino, whom the lovelorn Väinämöinen tried to claim again in the 5th poem - in vain. As a lyrical tragedy, Aino's tale has fascinated artists and art psychologists.
Ilmarinen i.e. Ilmari, the blacksmith, "forge iänkikuinen", appears in 27 of the 50 poems of the Kalevala. His most important roles are taming iron, forging Sampo, wooing and celebrating the maiden of the North, preparing the golden maiden, participating in the sampro trip and the search for the spark, and releasing the skylights from the rock of Pohjola.
Joukahainen is in the 3rd poem of the Kalevala as Väinämöinen's adversary and unlucky rival. His knowledge turns out to be worthless compared to Väinämöinen's, and when Väinämöinen sings him into the swamp, he has to promise his sister Aino as ransom to the old knower. In the 6th poem, Joukahainen shoots Väinänmöinen into the sea.
Kullervo, Kalervo's son, the main character of poems 31-36, who survives Untamo's assassination attempts as a child, does destruction work, is sold as a slave to Ilmarinen, sent as a shepherd, cuts his knife on a stone that the evil mistress has baked into his dinner bread, raises beasts in revenge to tear Ilmarinen's mistress apart, finds his dead relatives, seduces his unknown sister, takes revenge on the Untamo tribe and throws himself on his sword.
Lemminkäinen, of which the names Kaukomieli and Ahti Saarelainen are also used in the Kalevala, robs and abandons Kyllik, in order to get the North maiden to ski Hiide's moose and harness the fiery gelding, is swept into the Tuonela river himself, from which his mother saves him, kills the host of Northland as an uninvited guest, becomes a refugee to the joys of the island's dreams and a revenge trip to North , participates in a sampore trip.
quarry, The Mistress of the North is one of the main characters of the Kalevala, but is missing from the epic folk poems. Lönnrot found the name either from Ganander's Mythologia Fennica or from spells he heard from Kesälahti's Juhana Kainulainen. In the sampo poems he knew, it was replaced by Portto Pohjola's mistress or Pohja akka sparse-toothed or black or blind Pohja akka or Pohjola's mistress herself. Lönnrot used the name Louhi only for the dirty, evil and hostile Pohjola hostess in poems 7-15 and 38-49 of the Kalevala, but not, for example, for the hostess of Pohjola weddings.
Antero Vipunen, a great scientist who died a long time ago, from whom Väinämöinen takes the words, or confidence, he needs to sculpt the boat. The 17th poem tells how Vipunen swallows Väinämöinen and recites a 356-verse spell to expel the blacksmith-turned-intruder from his stomach. Väinämöinen demands Vipu to hand over the secret words: "might does not fall into the cracks of the earth, even if the mighty go". The cheerful Vipunen sings his deepest knowledge, and Väinämöinen leaves his mouth and gets his boat ready.
Väinämöinen, Väinö, the central character of the Kalevala, appears in poems 1-10, 16-21, 25 and 35-50. His regular epithet is "old" or "steady old", less often "wise". The refrain is "knower iänkiuinen" or "singer iänkiuinen". In different contexts, he is characterized as a good-born, great man, a holy male. He has participated in the early creations. If he were killed, "joy would disappear from the air, song would fall from the earth". Väinämöinen's name comes from the word väinä, which meant a wide, slow-flowing river or strait. (e.g. Väinäjoki in Latvia and "Saaremaa väin" between the Estonian mainland and Saaremaa). Väinämöis images can be grouped into four basic types: creator-god of the first sea, cultural hero, Samanian hero, sea hero and suitor.