The Etiology of an Etiology
The idea that the cosmos was born from several eggs laid by a bird is found in the oldest Balto-Finnic myths that have been preserved thanks to the conservative form of runo song. Different versions of the Balto-Finnic creation song were known among the Estonians, the Finns of Ingria, the Votes, and...
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| Format: | Text |
| Language: | English |
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| Online Access: | http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.496.9804 http://journal.oraltradition.org/files/articles/15i/8_valk.pdf |
| Summary: | The idea that the cosmos was born from several eggs laid by a bird is found in the oldest Balto-Finnic myths that have been preserved thanks to the conservative form of runo song. Different versions of the Balto-Finnic creation song were known among the Estonians, the Finns of Ingria, the Votes, and the Karelians.1 The Karelian songs were used by Elias Lönnrot in devising his redaction of the myth in the beginning of the epic Kalevala. Mythical thinking is concerned with questions about the origin of the world and its phenomena; etiologies provide the means to discover and transmit these secrets and to hold magical power over everything. The “quest for origins ” has also determined the research interests of generations of scholars employing a diachronic approach. The evolutionist school has tried to reconstruct the primary forms of religion, while the structuralist school of folklore has attempted to discover the basic structures that lie latent behind the narrative surface. The etymologies of Max Müller were aimed at explaining the origin of myths; the geographic-historical or Finnish school once aimed at establishing the archetypes of different items of folklore. That endeavor to elucidate the primary forms and origins of phenomena as the main focus of scholarship can be seen as an expression of neo-mythical thinking. It has become clear that the etiological approach provides too narrow a frame for scholarship, since it cannot explain the meanings of folklore for tradition-bearers themselves, the processes of its transmission in a society, and other aspects that require synchronic interpretation. Thanks to long traditions of research, a large body of knowledge has been accumulated about the prehistory of Balto-Finnic runo songs and their relationship with the oral traditions of other peoples. In this article, I ask |
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