The Hanged Maid - LYRICS
1. Poor Girlie
How at such time is one to speak, and how should one interrogate when a time of danger is at hand, a day of jeopardy impends? Already I, poor, wretched maid, have met with some embar rassment, with toilsome tasks, with a very difficult work, (when summoned) to eject attacks of sickness, to relieve from pain, to banish ailments wrought by spells, and overcome the en emy. Now they have need of me, they need me, and require that I divine an origin profound, and a great injury remove. Shall I begin, make venture now, shall I catch hold, shall I make bold to grip with hands a pestilence, to attack a devil (Perkele) with my hands, to give a hideous one a squeeze, and trample a gigantic one?
The Magic Songs of The Finns, translated by John Abercromby 1898, p. 53, § Preliminary: A
2. Refusing an Old Man
When a girl would not agree to marry an old man, the man became angry. He headed for his barn and grabbed a handful of feathers off a rooster’s tail, citing the Lord’s Prayer as he did so. When done, the man minced the feathers to fine pulver and stashed the pulver in his pocket. He went to his neighbour’s sauna, knowing how the neighbour’s recently-passed grandfather was laid there, waiting to be buried. The old man grabbed a wooden stick and scraped and scratched it inside the dead man’s mouth. When he was done, he then deposited the stick firmly in his pocket. He bought some coffee grounds and wrapped some of it in a brown handkerchief, depositing that as well in his pocket. After sundown the old man stalked outside the girl’s house, circling the girl’s room nine times counterclockwise. Next morning the old man went to visit the house nearest to where the girl lived. He brewed some coffee with the grounds in the handkerchief and sent someone to fetch the girl to partake in it. In the meanwhile the old man mixed the powdered feathers to the coffee using the stick he had run in the dead man’s mouth. Drinking that coffee made the girl lose her mind! And any time she passed the church or heard the peal of the church bells, she felt a pounding on her head and her legs would start to sink into the ground. And every night after sundown she became most restless and felt wretched.
Original story: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seuran Arkisto: D 825 Keuruu. Akseli Salokannel b) 259. 1911. < Kulkeva akka Keuruulta. Partly by Pauliina Kauppila
Translation by Piiastiina Tikka & Janne-Pekka Manninen
I do not know at all just now, the reason I cannot surmise, why, Hiisi, thou hast entrance made, hast, devil (Perkele) made thyself at home in a guiltless heart, in a belly free of blame. From waters of witches hast thou come, from the lilies on a landlocked lake, from Nixies' (lummekoira) haunts, from a water Hiisi's hole, from the sea's black mud, a thousand fathoms deep, or from the heath of death (kalma), from the interior of the earth, from a dead man's belly, from the skin of one departed for eternity, from the armpit of a spectral form (kalmalainen), from beneath the liver of a shade (manalainen), hast thou been torn from a cross's base, been conjured up from women's graves, beside a decorated church, from the edge of a holy field, or from great battle fields, from the slaughter fields of men?
The Magic Songs of The Finns, translated by John Abercromby 1898, p. 53
Where doth thou carry from the church what belongs to the church, there will the spirits of the dead follow and create within you a great unease.
Original: Kaarina Koski, Kuoleman voimat - Kirkonväki suomalaisessa uskomusperinteessä, ebook, 2019, p. 191-194, p. 200. Translation by Piiastiina TIkka
Where I command, there get thee gone, to the fiery rapids' centre point, into the violent Vuoksi falls, into the space between two rocks, into the awful midstream broil, whence all thy life thou won't escape, thou wilt never get away, unless by the Creator freed, without the Almighty's providence. If thou raise thy head from there or exalt thy snout, may Ukko pain thy head with sharply pointed needles, with packing needies or with iron hail.
The Magic Songs of The Finns, translated by John Abercromby 1898, Exorcisms, p. 68, F
3. Time and Again, You Misty One
Time and again, I feel the mist, the mist
Time and again, a misty child am I
With sadness in my heart, with sorrow under my feet,
Lower than low, deeper than deep am I.
Time and again, a misty child am I
Time and again, I feel the mist
My thoughts as low as trodden on, as torn as dragged through thickets
My heavy heart is milled in mulch, stumbling in the ditches
My thoughts as low as can be, my heart no brighter than pitch
Time and again, you misty one, you misty child
You shed your tears, weep and wet your face
Sadness stretching this ardent face, gentle caresses stroking my cheek
End note:
All the village knew of my bathing, of brother bringing the water
But there I bathed in tears, poulticing my pain with my weeping.
Original poem: Trad Kanteletar II: 128. Partly modified Pauliina Kauppila. Translation by Piiastiina TIkka & Janne-Pekka Manninen
Synopsis:
Upon her marriage a maiden had to leave her family and relatives and join the family of her husband. Sometimes this meant crossing a great distance, geographically speaking as well, away from her own home. Leaving behind dear and important people and turning away from her previous life was a change that often brought sadness and grief, sometimes also the anguish of having a violent husband, or a mean and malicious mother-in-law.
Translation of the synopsis by Piiastiina TIkka & Janne-Pekka Manninen
4. Please Grant Sleep
Sleepless in the bed I lay
Lay and toss and turn and curse
Counting seconds, even sheep
Dreamgiver find me please, flipping pillow, breathing
Bird of slumber I summon, flipping cover, untwisting
Longing for rest, to ease my weary bones
The swells of my mind’s waters
I wish to tame
Crack my thoughts like sheets of ice upon my breast
Reaching for you
perchance to dream
Please grant me sleep?
Rest my head in softness still
Carry my body to its lanes
By the berry troves of bedtime, please lay me down to sleep
To sweet slumber in sleepy grass
Reaching for you
perchance to dream
Please grant me sleep?
Do bring me sleep from Dreamland
Permit my lawful rest
Grant the burden to break
Surrender me to sleep, give me sleep
Grant the burden to break
And a peace to claim my weary mind
Lyrics by Pauliina Kauppila Translation by Piiastiina Tikka & Janne-Pekka Manninen
5. Burn the Circle!
Once upon a time a man from Korpilahten Särkijoin village came to seek Vihimäin Juho to tell him that his wife is turning forlorn. He pleaded with Juho to come with him and indeed Juho did come. As soon as the husband’s horse came to a halt at their house Juho went to the sauna where he remained for an hour. What he did there no one knows. After he came out again,he told the husband and his dayworker to take one truss of rye straws and stick them upright to form an oval ring in his field, leaving the circle open at one point. Then Juho went into the house, took the wife by her hand and walked her to the centre of the circle and stayed there himself. Then he told the husband: Set the circle on fire all around! The flames erupted over Juho and the wife but not a thread in their clothing was singed. Then Juho walked the wife to the house and said there will be no darkness on her mind for as long as she may live. The wife did survive and lived a long life and never was she troubled with said gloom.
Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seuran Arkisto: D 617 Synkistynyt emäntä: Petäjävesi. KT 61. Friiman Waldemar 4. 1938. < Koneta Ahonen
Translation by Piiastiina Tikka & Janne-Pekka Manninen
6. Endless Night
Cold grates at the palms of my hands, tearing with its claws,
Cold grates at the palms of my hands, numbing me as it goes,
Chill journeys through my body, not missing an inch,
Bullying and punishing, cutting with its scythe
The dark enfolds the toughest to its bosom
Bending the quenched wanderer to its will
The dark lures you into its realm, seducing you
Casting its blackness on my journey
Solitary in the face of night drifting e'er lower
How to ascend from mind's misery back to bright
Solitary in the face of night will curl and hide
But how to climb up quick, lift your face to the light
Lord of frost skulks around, staking his claim
Twisting and turning, setting fields to slumber
Splashing water on the bones of babes
Slithering deep under bones of babes
The Spell:
Wizards there are in every dell, and sorcerers at every gate, diviners are at every fence, soothsayers are on every path. But I am not at all alarmed, I am not in the least afraid. I clip the wool from off a stone, fluff from a stone that has lain a winter there, I break the hair from off a rock, and from the gravel pluck coarse hair. A shirt of defence I make of that, 'neath which I sojourn every night and occupy myself by day, lest the sorcerer eat too much, lest the witch should wound o'ermuch. If that is not enough, ten adders shall I yoke, set saddles on a hundred snakes, here at my side to glide along; from his chains I'll slip a bear, from his headstall loose a wolf, to rush in front of me, to course in rear of me, to gobble up the village spells, to overwhelm the envious, the sorcerers in every dell, the witches in every lake, the soothsayers on every path. the envious in every place.)
The shackles of this endless night stifle even joy and light,
Wind grabs its coat tails, turns away any rider in the night
Sapping strength from a stance, mauling mettle,
Making heavy steps, weighing down even love.
Guard them, kind Wisdom / O Creator, guard too the happenstance
Let some sympathy coincide with temerity to love.
Guard them, kind Wisdom / O Creator, guard too the happenstance
Do grant us your blessings to this oppression of our age.
Lyrics by Pauliina Kauppila, except the spell: The Magic Songs of The Finns, translated by John Abercromby 1898, s. 54, §2, Defensive Measures: C
Translation of Pauliina´s lyrics by Piiastiina TIkka & Janne-Pekka Manninen
7. Trilogy - The Hanged Maid
Part one - The Thicket
The girl Anni, matchless girl
went to the wood for bath-whisks
to the thicket for bath-whisks:
broke off one for her father
another for her mother
a third she gathered
for her youngest brother, the
best in the family.
Osmonen slipped from the dell
Kalevainen from the clearing:
"Grow, maid, to please me
not the other young people
the fair young people:
grow in narrow, in neat things
grow tall in dresses of cloth."
The girl Anni, matchless girl
went weeping homeward
wailing to the farm.
"There is cause for my weeping:
the cross has slipped from my breast."
Mother on the shed step was
washing butter in a pail:
"Why do you weep, Anni girl
you girl Anni, matchless girl?"
"I went to the wood for whisks
to the thicket for bath-whisks
broke off one for my father.
Osmonen called from the dale
Kalevainen from the clearing:
'Grow, maid, to please me
not the other young people
the fair young people:
grow in narrow, in neat things."
Part Two - The Storehouse
"You girl Anni, matchless girl
don't weep, Anni girl.
Three are the sheds on the hill.
Step to the shed on the hill
open the best shed:
there eat butter for a year
and grow plumper than others
another year, pork
and a third, fish pies.
Stand trunk upon trunk case on top of case:
open the best trunk make the bright lid slam open
put on the best things
the most gorgeous on your breasts."
The girl Anni, matchless maid
stepped to the shed on the hill
opened the worst shed
became prettier than others
became plumper than others
opened the worst trunk
found six golden belts
eight swaddling-girdles
strangled herself with the belts
choked herself with the girdles
she staggered, she slumped
hanged herself with her own thread:
then she dropped upon the case
fell on the trunk-lid.
Singer unknown Uhtua, Archangel Karelia E. Lönnrot, 1834, original. SKVR I1 233
Translation: Finnish folk poetry epic : an anthology in Finnish and English:410 -412, nro 104 Hirttäytynyt neito I (The Hanged Maid I)
osa 3 Weep Not, Mother Dear
Mother
Rock the child to Tuonela
the child to the planks' embrace
under turf to sleep
underground to lie
Daughter
Cry you not, mother dear
Give away your daughter dear
Cry you not, mother dear
Give away your Anni dear
MOTHER
For Death's children to sing to
for the grave's maidens to keep!
For Death's cradle is better
and the grave's cot is fairer
DAUGHTER
Remember not your sadness
Or nurture sorrow in your heart
Worry not of days to come
Nor carry longing on your sleeve
Original Poem Tuuti lasta tuonelahan (Mother´s parts) Kanteletar II: 178; Daughter´s parts by Pauliina Kauppila
MOTHER´S PARTS translated by Kate Bosley World’s Classic The Kanteletar II:178, s. 64, 1992
DAUGHTER´S PARTS translated by Piiastiina Tikka & Janne-Pekka Manninen