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When were 285,946 runosong poems collected? Four centuries of Finnic folklore documentation (1560s-1970s).
The years shown here are collection dates — when each poem was recorded from oral tradition, not when it was composed. Runosongs are part of a centuries-old oral tradition; a poem collected in 1890 may preserve language and themes from much earlier periods.
ERAB (Estonian Runosong Database): 102K poems from Estonian folklore archives, peak collecting in the 1880s-1890s during the National Awakening.
SKVR (Suomen Kansan Vanhat Runot): 89K published Finnish folk poems, systematic collecting peaked in the 1910s.
JR (Julkaisemattomat Runot): 96K unpublished Finnish poems from SKS archives, peak in the 1930s.
KR (Kanteletar/Kalevala): 10K poems, peak in the 1840s around the Kalevala publication.
Words shown for each decade are those disproportionately frequent in that era compared to others (TF-IDF scoring). This may reflect the collecting focus, regional coverage, or thematic interests of each period rather than changes in the oral tradition itself.