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[IcyTea31]

Nonetheless struck by their entreaties, the Heavenly King personally intervened to give each a bundle of mugwort and 20 cloves of garlic, saying that if they remained in a cave for 100 days with no company and no sunlight eating only those things, they would become human.

I really hope he gave them some mouthwash as well. I'm pretty sure that you could kill people by breathing on them after living on mugwort and garlic for over three months.

[Hanslanda]

I wish I still had Asraen's character sheet to impart to you Greatorder. He was an Afflicted Half Celestial Werebear paladin + some other synergistic class in wild half plate with a super-smitey greatsword. Basically an avenging winged angel-bear-man.

He could accidentally big bads.

https://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=460935

Behold! Possibly a big good or maybe just a random npc

[Gentlefish]

As for the cursed immortal, aren't the classic Draugr literally that? Intelligent, unkillable shadows of the warriors they used to be, but twisted into something evil?

[scriver]

Ye but they're not Finnish

[Trekkin]

There's also evidence that they had more native iron smelting than you'd think, but that's down to local ore availability anyway.

It's more a paucity of weaponry, tools, and armour specifically for fighting other people. Spears are commonplace because they can be easily used to kill animals of various kinds. Axes and knives are commonplace too, because they're very useful tools and using them as a weapon isn't all that difficult.

Also as mentioned, decent swords and such require more skill. And yeah, bog iron's gonna be damn near everywhere that there are bogs.

Fair enough; I had meant that you can tune the availability of goethite through essentially invisible changes in bog microbiology, so you could justify everything from Dark Sun levels of metal rarity up through Bronze Orientation Day -- in contrast to what was once believed about pre-Roman Scandinavian ironworking -- and still be broadly consonant with the history of at least some part of Iron Age Finland. Going with weapon heads and finery hearths is a perfectly sensible take.

Incidentally, you could always fit bards into the setting as professional liars-to-bears.

[wierd]

"sir"
"Ma'am"
"Big guy"
"master"
"lordship"

etc.

Personal pronouns used for people would be adequate, as the intention is to be respectful.

[Trekkin]

Well, the actual Finns called them meadpaws, but if you felt like a pun you could call them the Fur Folk.

[IcyTea31]

Real Finnish euphemisms, particularly common ones in bold (very incomplete list, over 200 are known to history):

• Hän: the singular third-person pronoun. Spoken in whispers: "I saw Him at the field last night, heading for the neighbours' house."
• Jumalanvilja: God's Grain
• Kontio: loanword, or possibly derived from 'kontata', "to move low to the ground on four limbs"
• Kultaherra: Golden Lord
• Lehmänpelko: Cow's Fear
• Mesikämmen: Dew-palm
• Metsä: the Woods
• Metsän kuningas: King of the Woods
• Metsän kultaomena: Golden Apple of the Woods
• Metsän ukko: Old Man of the Woods
• Mörkö: Boogeyman
• Nalle: a human first name (worth noting: in modern Finnish, nalle refers to a teddy bear)
• Nokinen poika: Sooty Boy
• Otso: a human first name
• Vieras: Stranger
• Äijä: Dude

The 'real' name that's taboo is "karhu".

Other dangerous animals also had euphemisms, such as 'metsänkissa', "cat of the woods" for the lynx or 'paskasilmä', "shit-eye" for the wolf, but those weren't as widely used.

[Digital Hellhound]

Most of Finnish bear names are a bit difficult to translate. Meadpaw is one, indeed. I’ve also come across honey-thief. You also had bears called things like Brother, Man, Him. The word for forest and its variants were used to refer to the bear, but I can see that being tricky to get across. There’s ’king of the forest’ and ’apple of the forest’ (no idea what that means). I think names that refer to its qualities like fur would work well, in general - fur, paws, etc.

English also has some alternative names for bears, like ’bruin’ and, uh... that might be it? I’m sure there’s more folk names for bears from English-speaking countries.

FAKE EDIT: aand IcyTea says all that and more while I’m writing. ’Karhu’ isn’t the taboo though I’m pretty sure, just one of the euphenisms that survived.

[Culise]

Fun fact: "bear" is itself a taboo term: descending like "bruin" from "brown", referring to them as "brown ones" was a way to avoid using the original term which descended from PIE's *rkto (reference Greek arktos/Latin ursus).  "Brownie" could thus work if you're trying to be cute.  Bee-wolf isn't Finnish, but it's another option thanks to Beowulf; their love for sweet honey is rather well-attested in various languages, such as the aforementioned honey-paws, honey pig, honey-eater...

[scriver]

Potential Swedish names:

• Hin(/Han) Store = The Great (More literally translated to "Him the Great")
• Hin(/Han) Brune = The Brown (also more literally "Him the Brown")
• Storfar = Greatfather
• Gulfot = Yellowfoot (or Yellowpaw)
• Brum = it feels like it is closely connected to "brun" (brown") by etymology, but as used it is the sound a bear makes, or the verb for making that sound.
• Mjödhuvud = Meadhead. Possibly more accurately "honey head" as the word for mead is derived from a word for honey.

• Nalle: a human first name (worth noting: in modern Finnish, nalle refers to a teddy bear)

no is our werd gib bac

Other dangerous animals also had euphemisms, such as 'metsänkissa', "cat of the woods" for the lynx or 'paskasilmä', "shit-eye" for the wolf, but those weren't as widely used.

Also, perhaps, "(the) Glutton" for wolverine, maybe? I've thought lingered on how Unreal Word calls it that.

In Sweden we also have a host of similar names for the wolf. I like "shit-eye" though.

[IcyTea31]

Also, perhaps, "(the) Glutton" for wolverine, maybe? I've thought lingered on how Unreal Word calls it that.

Ahma, 'glutton', is in fact the proper Finnish word for the wolverine, not a euphemism. It's so in several other languages as well, and even its scientific name: Gulo gulo.

[Trekkin]

FAKE EDIT: aand IcyTea says all that and more while I’m writing. ’Karhu’ isn’t the taboo though I’m pretty sure, just one of the euphenisms that survived.

Clearly there needs to be a secret society dedicated to recovering the True Name of Bear and using it to being about Bearmageddon, during which even the oldest bears will hear it and awaken, thereby collapsing the hills and mountains that have accreted over them in their long hibernation.

[scourge728]

So, did ancient people just go around using fake names? They seemed to really hate using real names for other things

[scriver]

Names have power