ITKUVIRRET (LAMENTATIONS), a body of folk music found mainly among the Orthodox population in Karelia, in eastern Finland and Ingria, and in northwestern Russia.
Although the practice of singing lamentations has only recently died out, its roots go back probably further than those of any other type of poetry. The earliest poetry anywhere was possibly a short, spontaneous exclamation of sorrow from the depths of the soul, and it formed a nucleus for the later development of long poetic wailing...