Finnish paganism
The Bear was considered a holy animal. If a bear was hunted down, he or she was celebrated with a ritual called Peijainen, usually a big celebration involving food and drink. The purpose of the ritual was to pacify the soul of the bear. A happy soul would then be reincarnated into another bear, so that people could eat bears in the future. The swan was a holy bird and people believed that killing a swan would cause the killer to die.