| Names: | Juoletar  and/or 
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Juoletar was called by Ganander the King of Water and the husband of the Mother of Otters, Hillervo. That's all despite the fact that Juoletar is an explicitly feminine name. Furthermore, it appears in Karelia as Lady Kuolari in an otter-hunting incantation.
The above-mentioned facts have lead to the theory that Juoletar is, in fact, herself the Mother of Otters. There is a non-zero chance that Juoletar's male identity came from being associated with Saint George (as in Ganander's version) or with Saint Christopher (seen as a river deity, as in a Karelian otter-hunting incantation). Hillervo has been theorized to actually be Tellervo, and/or maybe even originally the Mother of Polecats (hillerit), animals which lived in Finland between the 13th and 17th centuries (before coming back in the 1800s). That polecat part is just speculation, though.
As the name Juoletar looks to be having a connection to juolua "river fork", I am going to present my own theory and say that the Karelian river goddess of otter-hunting incantations, Jokiatar or Nokiatar, is the same figure. There are claims that Nokiatar and Nokeainen is the Mother of Martens, but the name Nokiatar appears only in an otter-hunting incantation, and Nokeainen only in a fox-hunting incantation. A connection between Hillervo and Tellervo doesn't seem so weird either when you remember that it is also possible that Saint Christopher's name might've also affected a forest goddess's name elsewhere in another Karelian runosong (Ristoppi -> Ristikko). Of course, there are claims that Nokiatar is the original version over Jokiatar, but even then, it has a connection to foxes, never martens.
After going through the lines of Juoletar's otter incantation, I noticed it's filled with general lines connected to fishing and hunting. Juoletar's epithet "Golden King" clearly comes from Ahti, and Hillervo's "generous Lady of Water" from Vellamo. Juoletar is the river goddess and could be the Mother of Otters. However, there is not much basis for Hillervo. Either that name here refers to Juoletar herself, to Tellervo as a hunting related goddess, or to Vellamo as a water related goddess. My further diving into this incantation has made me doubt theories about any polecats. I'm glad to have figured out who the original river deity was before Saint Christopher, though! "Ristoppi, haltija of the river" appears in runosongs from Kainuu.
| Juoletar | Theorized to come from juolua "river fork which periodically dries up" or juolukka "bog bilberry" (in Swedish, utterbär "otter berry"). Martti Haavio thought these two words could be connected to each other. |
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Only in Finnish, sorry. This is the source material.