| Names: | Pellon Äkräs  Ähmäri  Äyri  Äyräs   Äyrävä |
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Eastern Äkräs or Western Äyräs is a haltija of multiple plants; Agricola in 1551 listen peas, beans, turnips, cabbages, flax and hemp. In runosongs, she is mostly associated with turnip, however. Since potatoes came from America, there were no potatoes in Finland yet when Agricola wrote his text. Later, Äkräs also became associated with potatoes. This should show you that the traditional faith was not dead even after Christianity had entered the country.
The idea of a male Äkräs keeps floating around, I don't really know why. Maybe because conjoined potatoes in Karelia has been called King Ägröi? In either case, Western Finnish mentions of Äyräs call her an ämmä "(honourable) mother". (In old Finnish, it's an honourable term for an old mother. In modern Finnish, it means "a bitch" as an insult. Annoying, isn't it?)
If conjoined turnips or potatoes were found, they were ritually reburied while pretending that they were almost too heavy to be carried. This was believed to increase the fertility of the field in regards to those plants. In fact, these conjoined plants themselves could be seen as manifestations of Äkräs: she was also a protector of the field and yelled if there were thieves. If a turnip had become split in the ground, it was thought that it has yelled so much it had split. On fields on hills, her "home" was the more fertile side closest to the bottom of the slope.
In Kainuu, she was called Pellon Äkräs "Äkräs of the Field", worshipped during sowing and harvest, and a large bread was offered to her at the beginning of sowing. In this case, Äkräs could've been symbolized in a sacred tree.
Western Finnish runosongs tell us some more details about her, as Ähky ("horse colic") is called her son. A rock in the field is called the "end of the palm of" Äyräs-ämmä. A Shrove Tuesday incantation also asks turnips to grow as big as the "(honourable) mother's buttock", which some have interpreted as a reference to Äyräs. Thus, in runosongs, she is mostly associated with turnips, making Agricola's initial description of her connection to all these other plants a bit difficult to see.
| Äkräs, Äyräs | Theorized to come from Proto-Germanic *akra-z "field", though Viljo Alanen interestingly proposed (in a Western Finnish view) for it to come from pellon äyräs "lower side of the field". |
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Only in Finnish, sorry. This is the source material.