Cristfried Ganander

Who was Cristfried Ganander?

Cristfried Ganander was a Finnish compiler of folk culture, a priest and an 18th-century lexicographer. Ganander's greatest achievement was the compilation of the first fully extensive Finnish-language dictionary which was, however, unpublished. He was also a collector of folk culture well before Elias Lönnrot. His most well-known published work is Mythologia Fennica in 1789, a reference book of folk religion. He also published some poetry and worked as a teacher.

Ganander was born in Haapajärvi in 1741 to chaplain Thomas Ganader and his wife Helena Hiden. After his father's death in 1752, he was taken in by his grandfather Henrik Hiden, who was also a chaplain in the vicarage of Kauhajoki. Ganander himself later worked as a chaplain in Rantsila from 1775 to 1790.

Ganander became a priest at the Academy of Turku and was consecrated to a post in 1763. He completed his Master's degree in 1766. While studying, he became influenced by the natural sciences and became interested in the notion of Finnishness of Henrik Gabriel Porthan. He began his literary career by publishing a collection of riddles and fairy tales. His collection Aenigmata Fennica, Suomalaiset Arwotuxet Wastausten kansa was published in 1783 and comprises 337 riddles. It is based on the folk poetry he had collected as well as the Finnish lexicon.