Miniature sheet Lönnrot 2002

Elias Lönnrot

This year is the jubilee year of Elias Lönnrot. The 200th anniversary of his birth was celebrated in April. Finland Post issued a miniature sheet of four stamps on Elias Lönnrot (1882-1884).
The face value of each stamp is 60 cents. The stamps were designed by graphic artist Pecca Loiri.

Physician and health instructor

One of the Elias Lönnrot stamps depicts the plantain, which is know as a medical herb. The theme refers to Elias Lönnrot as a physician and health instructor, who was also well acquinted with utilisation and folk medicine. Elias Lönnrot was also a keen botanist, who wrote the basic work of Finnish botany, the Flora Fennica.

Miniature stamp sheet

The subject of the stamps in the middle of the miniature sheet refer tot Elias Lönnrot as a collector of folk poetry, a linguist and the compiler of Kalevala, the Finnish national epic. The stamps include the opening and closing lines of the Kalevala. The fourth stamp of the sheet depicts Elias Lönnrot himself, the great Finn of the period of the national awakening. Designer Pekka Loiri says that he used among others, the 1872 portrait of Elias Lönnrot by Bernhard Reinhold (1824-1892) as a model for the picture of the stamp.

Stamps symbol of Elias Lönnrot's life achievement

On top of the miniature sheet there are two birds flying upwards, a symbol of Elias Lönnrot's life achievement, the poor son of a tailor graduating as Master of Arts and Doctor of Medicine and becoming professor of Finnish language and literature. According to the designer, the feathers in the miniature sheet refer to the writing of poems, while the 5-string kantele refers to rune-singing.
Postage stamp issue: Finland, 6 March 2002

More information

Stamps of Finland
Postage Stamps 2002
Flying witch on Easter stamp
Finnish landscapes and swan
Flowers from Finland
Finnish lion and flag

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