The Hero with a Thousand Faces

A strange representation of this figure is to be found in the mythology of the Finns. In Runo I of the Kalevala^[1] it is told how the virgin daughter of the air descended from the sky mansions into the primeval sea, and there for centuries floated on the everlasting waters.

Then a storm arose in fury,

From the East a mighty tempest,

And the sea was wildly foaming,

And the waves dashed ever higher.

Thus the tempest rocked the virgin,

And the billows drove the maiden,

O’er the ocean’s azure surface,

On the crest of foaming billows,

Till the wind that blew around her,

And the sea woke life within her.^[2]

For seven centuries the Water-Mother floated with the child in her womb, unable to give it birth. She prayed to Ukko, the highest god, and he sent a teal to build its nest on her knee. The teal’s eggs fell from the knee and broke; the fragments formed the earth, sky, sun, moon, and clouds. Then the Water-Mother, floating still, herself began the work of the World-Shaper.

When the ninth year had passed over,

And the summer tenth was passing,*

From the sea her head she lifted,

And her forehead she uplifted,

And she then began Creation,

And she brought the world to order,

On the open ocean’s surface,

On the far extending waters.

Wheresoe’er her hand she pointed,

There she formed the jutting headlands;

Wheresoe’er her feet she rested,

There she formed the caves for fishes;

When she dived beneath the water,

There she formed the depths of ocean;

When towards the land she turned her,

There the level shores extended;

Where her feet to land extended,

Spots were formed for salmon netting;

Where her head the land touched lightly,

There the curving bays extended.

Further from the land she floated,

And abode in open water,

And created rocks in ocean,

And the reefs that eyes behold not,

Where the ships are often shattered,

And the sailors’ lives are ended.^[3]

But the babe remained in her body, growing towards a sentimental middle age:

Still unborn was Väinämöinen:

Still unborn the hard immortal.

Väinämöinen, old and steadfast,

Rested in his mother’s body

For the space of thirty summers,

And the sum of thirty winters,

Ever on the placid waters,

And upon the foaming billows.

So he pondered and reflected

How he could continue living

In a resting place so gloomy,

In a dwelling far too narrow,

Where he could not see the moonlight,

Neither could behold the sunlight.

Then he spake the words which follow,

And expressed his thoughts in this wise:

“Aid me Moon, and Sun release me,

And the Great Bear lend his counsel,

Through the portal that I know not,

Through the unaccustomed passage.

From the little nest that holds me,

From a dwelling-place so narrow,

To the land conduct the roamer,

To the open air conduct me,

To behold the moon in heaven,

And the splendor of the sunlight;

See the Great Bear’s stars above me,

And the shining stars in heaven.”

When the moon no freedom gave him,