Loviatar

Poem 45 describes Loviatar as a daughter of Death’s Domain. After an east wind leaves her pregnant, she carries the children for months but cannot deliver in the places she tries, including rocks, marshy ground and rapids. The Creator then tells her to go to a sauna at North Farm. Louhi secretly prepares it, smearing its doors and hinges with beer so they will not make a sound.

There Loviatar gives birth to nine sons in one summer night. The poem gives eight names associated with diseases, then says Louhi orders those sons toward the misty headland at the end of the foggy island. The youngest remains unnamed; Loviatar sends him toward the water and marshland to become a sorcerer or wizard. The poem next turns to Vainamoinen’s charms and attempt to cure the afflicted people, a separate episode beyond this account.