ABSTRACT
Finnish sacred springs have so far received little scholarly attention. Among sacred natural sites, springs are the most common in southwest Finland (also known as Finland Proper). This chapter considers characteristics of sacred springs and examines the tradition of spring-side youth gatherings to focus on the cultural, geographic and social spatiality of springs in the village landscape. Spring-side revelry on St. John’s Eve in previous centuries was associated with the young who gazed into prophetic springs at midnight to learn the identity of their future spouses. The springs considered in this essay lay on the outskirts of villages or at parish boundaries, where young people could revel beyond the social control of farm masters and other adult authority figures.
