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Illustration of Kodukäija
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Kodukäija

Maqaa biraa: kodukäijad, home-wanderer, Estonian revenant
Seenaa aadaa fi afoolaDu'aa ka'eGaragaraDu'a ykn awwaalcha hamaa1500 hanga 1899

The kodukäija is the restless dead of Estonian folk belief, a deceased person who returns to the farm outside the sanctioned autumn 'time of souls'. It ranges from a worried parent checking on children to a hostile corpse that wrestles travellers by moonlight and kills livestock. Estonian funerals carried a whole apparatus against it, from sweeping away the mourners' footprints to burying the body face down. It is the Baltic-Finnic counterpart of the Scandinavian gjenganger and the German Wiedergänger, and it remained a living belief into the 20th century.12

Lolsiisi
Yeroo jalqabaaf kan galmeeffame
1860
Systematic records begin with Jakob Hurt's folklore collection (1860-1906); the belief itself is older
Ka'umsa
Estonian
Istooniyaa
Maaltu isa fida
Du'a ykn awwaalcha hamaa
Folklorist Eha Viluoja traces most returns to a flaw in the passage out of life: a violent or lonely death, a botched or missing funeral, or the dead person's last wishes being ignored.
Akkamitti isa taata
Spiteful people, suspected witches, misers, the murdered, and anyone buried carelessly or mourned too hard were expected to 'walk home'.
Akkamitti sochoo'a
Garagara
Usually walks, with a normal or a bobbing gait, in its own likeness or grave clothes; it can also come as a dog, cat or other animal, or as a moving haystack, sack or whirlwind.
Beekumsa
Beekumsa muraasa
Bakkeewwan laafoo
  • wolves, which were held to be as deadly to it as lightning
  • a beating with a rowan or juniper stick or a nine-knotted whip
  • a silver bullet or quicksilver
  • crosses, knives, salt or flax seed at thresholds and gates
  • binding or crippling the corpse, or burying it face down
  • a cock's crow, which halts it for the night

Yoom jalqaba mul'ate?

Systematic records begin with Jakob Hurt's folklore collection (1860-1906); the belief itself is older

yaadannoo dirree

Maddoonni maal jedhu

1

The name means 'home-walker': a dead person who comes home at the wrong time12

2

It is cold to the touch and can pinch, strike, scratch or try to strangle12

3

It lets cattle loose, rumbles in the loft and imitates the sounds of work12

4

Dogs with spots over the eyes ('four-eyed' dogs) can see it12

5

The Estonian Folklore Archives hold about 3,600 records of it, seven times more than for the ordinary autumn visit of ancestral souls12

6

Viluoja notes that blood-drinking, vampire-type dead are not part of the Estonian tradition12

Fiigdee isa jalaa ba'uu dandeessaa?

Sadarkaa saffisaa akkaataa maddoonni itti ibsan irraa (garagara), safara miti.

Ati, deemaa gara 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
Ati, suuta fiigaa gara 10 km/h (6.2 mph)
Kodukäija gara 10 km/h (6.2 mph)
Ga'eessa qaamaan jabaa kan ariitiin fiigu gara 24 km/h (15 mph)
Saayikilii oofaa ariifataa gara 37 km/h (23 mph)

Maddoota

  1. Eha Viluoja, 'Manifestations of the Revenant in Estonian Folk Tradition', Folklore 2
  2. Eha Viluoja, 'Relations Between the Living and the Dead in Estonian Folk Religion', Folklore 4

Dhugaan fuula kana irra jiru hundi maddoota kana irraa dhufe, jechoota keenyaan barreeffame. Dogoggora argitee? [email protected] irratti nutti himi.

Tuuta nyaachisi. Beeksisa hin jiru, hordoftuun hin jiru, nama tokkoon kaffalama. Gumaachi toora irra akka turu godha.Gumaacha kenni

Bara wal fakkaataa: 1500 hanga 1899

Tuuta nyaachisiGumaacha kenni