Porthan, a Finnish scholar of great attainments, born in 1766, continuing the work of Juslenius, accumulated a great number of national songs and poems, and by his profound enthusiasm for the promotion of Finnish literature, succeeded in founding the Society of the Fennophils, which to the present day, forms the literary centre of Finland.  Among his pupils were E. Lenquist, and Chr.  Ganander, whose works on Finnish mythology are among the references used in preparing this preface.  These indefatigable scholars were joined by Reinhold Becker and others, who were industriously searching for more and more fragments of what evidently was a great epic of the Finns.  For certainly neither of the scholars just mentioned, nor earlier investigators, could fail to see that the runes they collected, gathered round two or three chief heroes, but more especially around the central figure of Wainamoinen, the hero of the following epic.

The Kalevala proper was collected by two great Finnish scholars, Zacharias Topelius and Elias Lonnrot.  Both were practicing physicians, and in this capacity came into frequent contact with the people of Finland.  Topelius, who collected eighty epical fragments of the Kalevala, spent the last eleven years of his life in bed, afflicted with a fatal disease.  But this sad and trying circumstance did not dampen his enthusiasm.  His manner of collecting these songs was as follows:  Knowing that the Finns of Russia preserved most of the national poetry, and that they came annually to Finland proper, which at that time did not belong to Russia, he invited these itinerant Finnish merchants to his bedside, and induced them to sing their heroic poems, which he copied as they were uttered.  And, when he heard of a renowned Finnish singer, or minstrel, he did all in his power to bring the song-man to his house, in order that he might gather new fragments of the national epic.  Thus the first glory of collecting the fragments of the Kalevala and of rescuing it from literary oblivion, belongs to Topelius.  In 1822 he published his first collections, and in 18317 his last.

Elias Lonnrot, who brought the whole work to a glorious completion, was born April 9, 1802.  He entered the University of Abo in 1822, and in 1832, received the degree of Doctor of Medicine from the University of Helsingfors.  After the death of Castren in 1850, Lonnrot was appointed professor of the Suomi (Finnish) language and literature in the University, where he remained until 1862, at which time he withdrew from his academical activity and devoted himself exclusively to the study of his native language, and its epical productions.  Dr. Lonnrot had already published a scholarly treatise, in 1827, on the chief hero of the Kalevala, before he went to Sava and Karjala to glean the songs and parts of songs front the lips of the people.  This work was entitled:  De Wainainoine priscorum Fennorum