montrith

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Petrodactyl spotter in exile


Okay, so chances are this is a bit of a niche topic that doesn't interest a large audience, but since lately I've been working on some mythology related stuff I thought it might interest at least one person to hear more about the Finnish pantheon.

See, in Finnish mythology we can basically said to have three different types of "gods". I put "gods" in quotes because there's arguments to be made about how much the supposed divinity of these gods is influenced by Christian beliefs, since the roots of Finnish mythology lean more towards shamanism and spirit worship type of religious practice. Anyway, for the purposes of this post I will be referring to everyone as gods just for simplicity's sake. One must also remember that a lot of what we know about Finnish mythology today is based on oral tradition, so the division of domains and classification is by no means simple: one god can take on different aspects in different context.

First we have what one could classify broadly as Primal Gods. These are gods are personify natural forces and concepts that are greater than any single human could fully understand. These include gods like Luonnotar (basically Finnish Mother Nature), Ilmatar (goddess of air and sky) and Ukko (the god of thunder). Now the thing about the primal gods is that they generally don't give a fuck about humans. I don't mean to say that they HATE humans, but they just generally exists as awesome powers who will keep on doing what they do without much regard of humanity in particular. Ahti is more concerned about his fishies than humans, and Tapio would much rather talk to trees and wolves than any random human. A person could pray to a primal god and they often did, but there was no real guarantee one would feel like listening to you. A lot of these gods would not necessarily even appear in human form, but they were just generally considered to be around.

After Primal Gods we have what I'm calling Humanoid Gods. Now these are gods that took a special interest in humans in particular and we're directly involved in daily human life. This was not always a good thing, as a LOT of these gods very specifically had to do with things like pain, death and suffering. Now it was really great if you could get a blessing from someone like Pellervo, the god of agriculture, but a lot less great if you happened to catch the eye of someone like Loviatar, the Mother of Diseases. Humanoid Gods really don't differ that much from Primal Gods when it comes to their powers and influence, but they were more often thought of as actually possessing a human form and personalities that possessed more human-like properties than Primal Gods. Humanoid Gods and Primal Gods are not always that distinct from each other, and in different stories one god could be seen more as an actual god in human form and in another more of a concept or an idea representing an aspect of reality. The category of Humanoid Gods also includes powerful spirits of nature and creatures that posses humanoid form, but are not human in their way of thinking and existing, such as the ancient giant Antero Vipunen.

Lastly we have the Hero Gods. Now, Hero Gods differ from the other two types of gods in that they were seen as definitely human in form and personality. They could have a divine origins and posses powers much above those of regular humans, but they pretty much lived their lives in the style of normal humans and we're also prone to human weaknesses. For example one of the mightiest heroes, Väinämöinen, was a shaman and sorcerer that had no equal in the world who could tame the winds and bend nature to his will, but his quest to find a bride brought forward several tragedies where he was either rejected or tricked by the women he tried to woo. Lemminkäinen on the other hand was the mightiest of warriors, but also extremely arrogant and hot-tempered, which ultimately lead to his doom. Hero Gods were not strictly bound to the same rules as normal humans, but they would often suffer when trying to go against mightier gods embodying the powers of nature. They lived surrounded by magic and divine powers and we're sometimes worshipped (or associated with another god's worship), but they were not infallible or deeply connected to nature and the realities of life the same way as Primal and Humanoid Gods. Again though we have to consider that there is some overlap in the categories and one story might present a Hero God more in the form of a Humanoid God and vice versa.

If you made it this far thank you for indulging my ramblings. In the end I must add that much of what I've written here is based on my own interpretations of what I've read and cannot be considered any kind of academic or deeply researched article on the topic. This is just something that I've been thinking about and what I thought might be interesting enough to write down.


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