The ice sheet covering northern europe started to melt away, and with that we got what is called "glacial erratics". Rocks had traveled from once place to another, and then settled. In Sweden we call those "giants throw", because it was assumed that the only way those big rocks could be where they are was if a giant had thrown it.

[–] lauha@lemmy.one 11 points 6 months ago (1 children)

In Finland those are called siirtolohkare (moved boulder) or hiidenkivi (devil's rock)

[–] pmk@lemmy.sdf.org 4 points 6 months ago (2 children)

I think we have the same terminology then, we also call them "flyttblock". Is there a story behind them being called Devil's rock? It sounds very finnish to me to be honest.

[–] Dasus@lemmy.world 7 points 6 months ago

Well "hiisi" translates to "devil" but that's very much a political translation as far as such things existed back then.

Translating "Hiisi" as "the Devil" is quite a fuck-the-pagans translation.

Hiisi (Finnish pronunciation: [ˈhiːsi]; plural hiidet [ˈhiːdet]) is a term in Finnic mythologies, originally denoting sacred localities and later on various types of mythological entities

Hiisi was originally a spirit of hill forests (Abercromby 1898). In Estonian hiis (or his) means a sacred grove in trees, usually on elevated ground. In the spells ("magic songs") of the Finns the term Hiisi is often used in association with a hill or mountain, as a personage he also associated with the hills and mountains, such as the owner or ruler of the same. His name is also commonly associated with forests, and some forest animals.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiisi

I think "the Fae" would be a more accurate translation, theology-wise.

[–] lauha@lemmy.one 5 points 6 months ago

It's not literally devil (paholainen) but Hiisi, which is something similar in finnish mythology which obviously doesn't have a translation.

It's likely simply "only devil could have brought that stone here"