Sauna – A Finnish national institution
Finland is the land of the sauna and the Finns are a nation of sauna-enthusiasts. Finland has a population of 5.1 million and 1.7 million saunas — one for every three inhabitants. The sauna is considered an age-old Finnish feature, although it is not a Finnish invention and certainly not the private property of the Finns. In the late 19th century, sauna-bathing was practiced in the Old World all the way from the Baltic Sea to the Ural Mountains. The sauna was also common among the other Finnic nations in the Baltic region — the Estonians, the Karelians, the Veps and the Livonians. Other traditional sauna-users include many Slavic, Baltic (Latvians, Lithuanians) and eastern Finno-Ugric peoples as well as Turkic Tatars.
The traditional sauna is a wooden building where the bathers sit on benches splashing water on the hot stones of the stove and gently beating themselves with leafy birch whisks. ‘Sauna’, the most commonly borrowed Finnish word, has spread from Finnish to several world languages, although the Finns believe not always in its original sense. The expression ‘to have a sauna’ covers the whole bathing process and includes several repeated periods of perspiring in the heat and the steam, known as löyly, produced by the water thrown on the stones. Löyly is described as the spirit of the sauna. It is a Finno-Ugric word going back 7,000 years.
The traditional sauna is a wooden building where the bathers sit on benches splashing water on the hot stones of the stove and gently beating themselves with leafy birch whisks
The Finns are not the only sauna-devotees in the world. Similar bathing houses and customs are also known among many other cultures (the Roman, Turkish and Celtic bath, the sweat lodge of the American Indians, the Japanese furo, the Russian banja, the Mexican temascal). The Finns are, however, a special nation of sauna-users in the sense that they have kept the tradition alive and adjusted it to their modern lifestyle. As conservers, developers and intermediaries they have spread the sauna round the world under the trademark ‘made in Finland’.
The history of the sauna building
Sauna is a Finnish-Sámi word. The heart of the sauna was a pile of heated rocks around which bathers sat under a temporary cover, just as the native Americans did in their sweat lodges.
It is possible that sweat baths similar to saunas were known as long ago as the Stone Age some 6,000 years back. The stoves in the dwellings at that time were round, shallow fire pits, with two or three layers of smallish stones at the bottom.
It is generally believed that the first wooden saunas were built in Finland in the 5th to 8th centuries. They were single-room log buildings, which were initially heated by fire and smoke (smoke sauna). In those early days the buildings served as both a dwelling and a sauna. They were an example of Finnish timber construction technique that Finnish emigrants always took with them wherever they travelled over the centuries. This technique is visible in the New World in the structure of the Pioneer House in New England, for example.
 | Go to the History of the stove, drawings by Erkki Helamaa. |
Smoke sauna
A smoke stove, a dome-shaped rock stove, was the original hearth in the sauna and it is still in use today in modern smoke saunas. It was excellent for heating the dwelling and the sauna but not so good for cooking and baking. In the 11th century, a closed-top oven for baking and a stove placed in front of the oven for cooking therefore became commonplace. Thus there were two different types of hearth: one for heating the dwelling and another for the sauna. This allowed the sauna to develop into a bathing house although some of the domestic chores continued to be performed in the sauna.
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Right: The sauna cleanses and heals. Cure has always been sought in the sauna for muscles and limbs sore and weary from a long day's work.
On the right the interior of the smoke sauna that Alvar Aalto, the architect, designed for himself. | |
Left: Heating a smoke sauna needs a skilled hand but most of all, an unhurried attitude. The skill of slow heating and the correct way of making whisks were passed on from one generation to the next. The pictured shows Alvar Aalto's smoke sauna in Säynätsalo.
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Towards the end of the 18th century, cased-in brick stoves which were less prone to set fire to the building first emerged in western Finland. The cased-in stoves had two or three separate sections: the lowest was for burning wood, the next for the stones and the top for the smoke before it escaped into the room.
Sauna with chimney
The sauna with chimney introduced at the end of the 18th century marked an important stage in the history of the stove and the sauna. The cased-in smoke stove acquired a chimney in a very simple way, the smoke section being extended to a conically shaped flue with a damper and led out through the roof as a chimney. A chimney laid on its own foundation and a stove next to it, initially of brick, came into use in the 19th century.
A stove with a chimney also made it possible to construct separate saunas in towns where most dwellings were built of wood, where the old smoke saunas would have been a fire hazard.
The manufacture of factory-made, metal-cased standard stoves began in the 1910s. In the 1930s, the enthusiasm of manufacturers in the ‘stove business’ gave birth to many new models and even to a totally new invention — a stove for continuous heating. In this stove the wood burns in a separate chamber and the flames and the smoke never touch the stones, as they do in the traditional stove. The fire can therefore also be kept going while bathing and the stones remain hot and provide löyly as long as wood is being burnt.
Urban saunas
In the early decades of the century, the popularity of sauna-bathing had declined, as it seemed so firmly rooted in the agrarian tradition and out of step with the new urban lifestyle. The new stove models prompted the rediscovery of the Finnish sauna tradition in the 1930s, however.
It was not until the 1880s that urbanization got under way in Finland, following the gradual construction of water and sewage systems, the introduction of electricity and the building of the first stone houses and apartment blocks. The bathroom and the great novelty in the early part of the century — the bath tub — offered Finns a touch of continental glamour which made sauna bathing seem a rather old-fashioned and countrified custom. Apartment block residents would have remained without a sauna for decades to come if public saunas had not been built for them.
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By 2000, the Kotiharju sauna was the only wood-burning public sauna still operating in Helsinki.
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Women cooling after sauna. The sauna relaxes the body and soothes the mind. It is excellent for unlocking tense negotiations and producing good, unanimous decisions.
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Sauna-bathers cooling off at the Finnish Sauna Society's sauna in Lauttasaari, Helsinki.
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The public saunas had separate sections for men and women and a private side where families could reserve a time for bathing. In addition to a washer, the biggest bathing houses had also a masseuse and sometimes even a cupper. For regular customers the sauna provided a place to meet old friends in a pleasant atmosphere with a minimum of formality, plus the occasional competition about who could stand the heat. The public saunas are in many ways a special chapter in the history of the Finnish sauna which came to an end in the 1950s. At the end of 2000, there were only two surviving public saunas in Helsinki as opposed to almost 150 at the end of World War II.
The electric stove, which followed the smoke stove and the stove with a chimney, was the third stage in the development of the sauna. Although the prototype of the electric stove had been invented by the end of the 1930s, the wars postponed large-scale industrial manufacture until the late 1940s.
The electric stove is safe and easy-to-use; all you need is to push a button and the electric resistors heat up the stones. Since the electric stove requires no smoke flue, the sauna can be installed in places where wood-burning saunas cannot. A separate sauna building is no longer necessary and a sauna can be placed right next to another room.
The electric sauna finally solved the problems of urban saunas. From the 1950s on, residential saunas were built in the basements of apartment blocks which the residents could reserve for their own use. These are now being replaced by individual saunas next to the bathroom in almost all new apartments, a speciality of Finnish town dwellings. Similar mini-saunas are now also being built off modern hotel bathrooms — a Finnish addition to international hotel life!
Heating the sauna and old customs
In bygone days the sauna was a sacred place to the Finns. Originally the sauna was built within the enclosure surrounding the farm buildings and its position on the lakeside only goes back to the early 20th century following the fashion of the gentry and upper-class villas. The sauna was usually heated only once a week. Heating a smoke sauna hot enough for several rounds of bathers took a whole day. A skilled hand was required to pick out the right wood, to lay the fire and to stock it with wood but the key quality of the fire tender was to have an unhurried attitude to the process and to making the birch-frond whisks. The slow pace of heating and correct way of making whisks were passed on from one generation to the next.
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Left: In the winter, the bravest take a dip in water kept free of ice.
Right: In the summer, a swim in a lake is the best way to cool off. Here a mother with children jumping into the refreshing water. |
Many rules of behaviour apply to bathing in the sauna. A Finnish proverb says that people should behave in the sauna as they do in church. Bathers are warned against shouting, cursing, telling tales, bad-mouthing and breaking wind in the sauna. Children were taught sauna manners though rules and warnings.
The widespread belief that mixed bathing is customary in Finland is unfounded, and runs counter to Finnish folk tradition. In a farming community, men and women took turns to bathe, and the joint family sauna is a later phenomenon. In the past, the farmer and his farmhands bathed first at the end of the day’s work in the fields and the farmer’s wife and farm women second, after they had milked the cows.
Finnish literature abounds with lively depictions of sauna scenes, one of the most famous being in Aleksis Kivi’s Seven Brothers, who were bathing and enjoying their Christmas ale on the hay of the smoke sauna until it suddenly caught fire! The novel is based on a rich folk tradition.
The sauna had many links with the passage of the agricultural year. It was the place where many key activities of the agricultural economy were performed: flax was dried, meat was cured and sausages smoked, malt was fermented and dried, seed potatoes were kept for sprouting and the laundry was washed. These seasonal events lasting several days involved the old and young of the family, working to the tune of folk poems and songs, including bawdy ballads. Tales were told, yarns spun and riddles posed.
The almanac noted special days significant in terms of the coming year’s fortunes, work and commerce, marriage agreements and the like. In Koivisto on the Karelian Isthmus, the New Year’s Eve sauna was heated very early in the morning before the dawn. The saying went that "work would get done in time all year as long as the smoke from the sauna rose up into the sky before the sun on New Year’s morning".
Pleasures of the sauna
Why do the Finns still use the sauna? Because it is an old custom and they are used to it from childhood. The sauna cleanses and heals the body, soothes the mind, and provides agreeable sensations and many other pleasures.
…cleanses. In the past, a sauna bath gave people a chance to clean themselves thoroughly at least once a week, and more often if necessary. Although the high sanitary equipment of modern dwellings replaces the sauna in this basic function, the sauna is still considered an essential part of the washing facilities in dwellings. A good sweat and a shower cleanses the skin better than normal.
…heals. The old Finnish proverb "If sauna, liquor and tar don’t help, your condition’s fatal" does not of course mean that these three potent medicines should be taken simultaneously. Cure has always been sought in the sauna for muscles and limbs sore and weary from a long day’s work.
…soothes the mind. Our Nobel prize-winning author F.E. Sillanpää said that once, tired and depressed after a long spell of writing, he visited his parents to rest in his childhood home. Bathing in the dark warm sauna on the night of his arrival, he felt his anguish and depression slowly give way. With his balance of mind and creativity restored by the sauna, he could have started writing again immediately.
After the sauna there is no hurry anywhere.The feeling is blissful. The sauna relaxes the body and soothes the mind. 'Re-created' best describes what the refreshed mind feels after bathing in the steam.
The sauna relaxes and soothes the mind. It is excellent for unlocking tense negotiations and producing good, unanimous decisions.
…provides sensations. Today, people who are ruled by tight, uncompromising schedules have a strong sensation of time standing still in the sauna. If their internal clocks measure anything, it is how long to stay in the sauna for perfect comfort. Sauna offers soothing sensations at all levels.
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After the sauna there is no hurry anywhere.The feeling is blissful. The sauna relaxes the body and soothes the mind. 'Re-created' best describes what the refreshed mind feels after bathing in the steam.
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After the sauna there is no hurry anywhere. The bathers’ thoughts and minds have risen above their daily routines and cares. Their limbs feel supple, their muscles relaxed and their whole mind and body light.
Health effects of the sauna
In the old days, people used the sauna as a place to treat illnesses. In the sauna, folk healers could concentrate on their work in peace and quiet and patients were receptive to treatment because there were many deeply held beliefs and a certain respect connected with the sauna. The belief in the healing properties of the sauna remains strong even today, although we now know that sauna bathing does not prevent or cure long-term illnesses. But it can improve the bather’s wellbeing in general, be beneficial to the health and in some cases even cure symptoms. Sauna speeds up the heartbeat, improves the breathing and circulation, raises the body temperature, stimulates the metabolism and may, at least temporarily, lower the blood pressure.
A birch whisk
Medical science believes that the sauna has considerable health benefits. Sauna bathing toughens the body and pacifies the mind. Expertise in the beneficial effects of the sauna is rooted in traditional Finnish-Karelian folk medicine, the skills of cupping, bloodletting and spinal manipulation.
Where does the healing effect of the sauna come from? According to the folk healers: "You really soak in the sauna. If you feel that your veins hurt and your sides are sore, the sauna is the remedy. If you have a headache, have a sauna. If you have a cough, don’t. After the cough has stopped, then have a sauna. If you are cold and have a sauna, the coldness will descend into your heart. You must first warm yourself inside and then have a sauna."
The sauna at different stages of life, according to folk tradition
In Finland the sauna has always been a sacred place for cleansing the body, and above all the mind, during all the stages of human life from birth to washing the dead. Without exception it was the women who performed all the lifecycle rituals in the sauna. Only if a timely move from one stage of life to another failed for some reason to succeed — say, a child or a patient was very ill — was help sought from a shaman, a seer or a folk healer. It was a crisis situation which required the family’s or community’s strongest religious leader — man or woman — to restore social order through healing rites.
As a rule, Finnish women gave birth to their children in the sauna right up to the Second World War. The sauna was a heatable, clean place, the most hygienic on a farm. The tradition of up to a weeklong confinement in the sauna, followed by the newborn being ceremoniously carried into the house, lived on until the early part of the 20th century. According to folk tradition, this was the first time the father saw his child. The pre-Christian practice in Scandinavia was that the eldest person in the family gave the child a name by sprinkling water over him or her, a custom which was later replaced by Christian baptism.
The deepest significance of the sauna
The sauna is part of the Finnish identity and a national institution which still blossoms in the 21st century. A comparison of the sauna with the bathing houses and customs of other nations provides a perspective for viewing our own traditions and understanding the ways and nature of other cultures. By learning from others, we learn to know ourselves better. Despite their differences, the native American sweat lodge, inipi, Japanese furo, and Finnish sauna have many things in common, particularly on the spiritual level. Sweating in a sauna, a sweat lodge or a furo bath is not primarily a physical act of cleansing, but a ritual that relaxes the body and soothes the mind. ‘Re-creation’ best describes what the refreshed mind experiences after bathing in the steam.
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