COSMOLOGY
The demiurge of the ancient Finns was Väinämöinen. In a cosmogonic myth Väinämöinen enters the primeval sea and while floating in the waters involuntarily creates first the sea bottom with shallow reefs and abysses.
He then creates the universe from the egg of an eagle. The bird lays an egg of gold on the knee of Väinämöinen who, feeling the heat on his knee moves his leg with the result that the egg falls down and breaks to pieces. Then Väinämöinen creates the univers from these pieces. The firmament is made from the lower part of the egg, the sky from the upper side, the daylight from the white, the moon from the yolk and the stars from the mottled matter.
In the New Kalevala we find another slightly different version of this creation myth. According to scholars the New Kalevala version is a more recent one. In this tale the bird is a sea bird called sotka, or the Common Goldeneye. See here.
There has been debate whether Väinämöinen was a god or not. On the one hand, the old cosmogony states that he created the world. On the other hand, the Kalevala portrays him more as a hero, often asking help from gods.
In the old days the lands of the peoples were considered to be surrounded by waters.
Above the land arched the mighty vault of the sky which was held up by a cosmic column, tree or mountain located at the center of the world. This center column was attached to the Pole Star around which the universe rotated. The Pole Star was also regarded as a kind of heavenly hinge, the 'noth pin'. Below all this was the Underworld of the Dead.
The lands of the living were surrounded by a stream (Tuonelan virta, the Stream of Tuonela) which was regarded as the border between the living and the dead of the Underworld.
This stream had to be crossed by the dead in the far North where the village of Pohjola and the intersection of the sky and earth were also located. Before Pohjola, the dead reached a no-man`s-land, the land of Lintukotolainen, dweller in the Home of the Birds.
And that was the beginning of all.