The Finnish epic Kalevala influenced J.R.R. Tolkien’s invented language Quenya.
Tolkien studied Finnish in his youth and drew on its sound patterns and grammatical structure when developing Quenya, one of the principal Elvish languages in his mythology. He was especially fascinated by the Finnish national epic, the Kalevala, whose songs and heroic figures helped inspire his early mythological writing.
Quenya is often called High-elven or the ancient Elven language in Tolkien’s fictional history. It is associated with the Elves who traveled to Valinor and later returned to Middle-earth. Sindarin, another major Elvish language, was influenced more strongly by Welsh.
The Kalevala itself is not a Tolkien work. It is a nineteenth-century compilation by Elias Lönnrot from Finnish and Karelian oral poetry. Readers sometimes identify Beowulf as the main source for Quenya, but Beowulf was more directly important to Tolkien’s scholarship and literary interests than to the language’s Finnish inspiration.