The Birth of the Snake
I know the moment of your birth,
Your terrible birth on earth,
From where you were born into the world,
A worm blessed upon the earth:
Hiisi ran across the land,
Hiisi ran, the earth sweated,
He ran through the marshes, he ran across the fields,
Across Lapland’s vast wilderness,
Sweat dripping from his hair,
Foam dripping from his beard.
Slag dripped from the toad's mouth,
From the wicked toad’s mouth,
Foam from a sturdy nose,
A can from Lemmon’s trash can,
On the old man’s new rock,
Onto the rough rock.
In the old tradition of spells, the snake was not seen merely as an animal, but as a dangerous creature whose power people sought to control through words. The idea behind the "Birth of the Snake" spell is clear: once you know where something evil or frightening originated, you can also command, restrain, or ward it off.
The spell describes the serpent’s origins in grotesque and powerful terms. The serpent is born from the sweat, foam, and saliva of the Giant, and from dark forces. It does not, therefore, appear in nature as an innocent animal, but as a creature raised by the underworld, stones, cliffs, and evil spirits. That is precisely why the spell is so powerful: it shows how ancient folklore explained fear through poetic and wild imagination.
The spell can be found in the collection edited by Elias Lönnrot Ancient Spell Poems of the Finnish People under the heading “21. The Birth of the Serpent.” The work was published by the Society of Finnish Literature in 1880.