Peijaiset (in dialectal forms peijahaiset, peijaat or peijaajaiset) is a Finnish concept, dating to pre-Christian times, denoting a memorial feast (akin to a wake) that was held to honour a slain animal, particularly the bear, the animal mo…
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Peijaiset (in dialectal forms peijahaiset, peijaat or peijaajaiset) is a Finnish concept, dating to pre-Christian times, denoting a memorial feast (akin to a wake) that was held to honour a slain animal, particularly the bear, the animal…
01 · What it is
Living Tradition
Documented cultural tradition on record; family classification awaits an editor.
02 · Where & name
Finland
Written in its own script on record as jaktfester.
03 · How it is doing
□□□□ (Not yet assessed)
Documented in open cultural records, but no cited field assessment of its current vitality has been added here yet.
04 · Proof & reuse
1 cited source
Every claim links to a public record below. Free to quote, teach, and share under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Common Questions Answered on Record
What is Peijaiset in plain words?
Peijaiset (in dialectal forms peijahaiset, peijaat or peijaajaiset) is a Finnish concept, dating to pre-Christian times, denoting a memorial feast (akin to a wake) that was held to honour a slain animal, particularly the bear, the animal… In local script on record, it is written jaktfester.
Where is Peijaiset practised or documented?
Sources on this page place Peijaiset in Finland.
What is the current condition of Peijaiset today?
□□□□ (Not yet assessed): Documented in open cultural records, but no cited field assessment of its current vitality has been added here yet.
How do I cite or share this Peijaiset entry?
Cite as: "Peijaiset." folkroom, https://folkroom.org/art-forms/peijaiset, text CC BY-SA, with attribution.
Peijaiset (in dialectal forms peijahaiset, peijaat or peijaajaiset) is a Finnish concept, dating to pre-Christian times, denoting a memorial feast (akin to a wake) that was held to honour a slain animal, particularly the bear, the animal most sacred to ancient Finns. In modern-day usage, it often refers to the celebrations following a successful elk hunt, or a feast at the end of a hunting season. It may also be used in a figurative sense, denoting any memorial held for things that have come to an end ("peijaiset" over e.g. bankrupt companies). Traditionally, it referred to wakes for humans and animals, but also other celebrations, depending on the region in question.
Karhunpeijaiset (lit. a bear wake) is a celebration held for the soul of a slain bear after a successful bear hunt. Traditionally, a bear was never "hunted" but was merely "brought down". A single man could claim to have hunted and killed a bear, but when the entire community was involved, the bear was simply said to have died. The bear's spirit had to be told that it had fallen into a pit or that it had otherwise killed itself by accident, not by the hunters, to appease the bear's spirit so that it would not be offended, and possibly exact revenge upon the hunters. The ceremony was always a much more elaborate affair than what the most influential member of the community would have merited.
The text above is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Peijaiset”, available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 licence.
Peijaiset is Finnish funeral ritual for hunted animals, according to the structured record cited below. This entry was generated automatically from that record and has not yet been reviewed by a person familiar with the tradition. 1
The source record links this tradition to 2 external registers, which can be verified through the citation. 1