According to shaman belief tradition a shaman was able to make journeys either to the upper or to the lower world. There were pleasures, pork, grain etc. This is why people put in the graves not only various valuables but also requisites like knives, clothes and household articles. It was believed that the deceased needed them in the lifeafter. L nnrot included in the Kalevala several poems that the later research of 20th century has proved to be based on shaman culture.
Some poems describe the experiences of a shaman in trance.
Hymn of Vipunen and Lemmink inen s journey to the feast of P iv l . In these poems a shaman goes to Tuonela, meats deceased people, different kind of spirits and encounters dangers etc. The target of the journeys was that the shaman would get information for example on how to heal diseases or remove any crisis related to the community. T he shaman poems in the Kalevala are often myths of the first shaman, V in m inen, who made journeys either to the lower or the upper world. V in m inen s visit in Tuonela describes so in detail a shaman s visit in the kingdom of the deceased that the poem portrays something like a mythical map of the topography of Tuonela.