jalopeura

Compound of jalo (“noble, i.e., king of the beasts”) +‎ peura (“deer; in a primitive sense, any beast of the forest”); one of the many words first known to have been written down by Mikael Agricola when translating the New Testament to Finnish in 16th century.

• IPA^(key): /ˈjɑloˌpeu̯rɑ/, [ˈjɑ̝lo̞ˌpe̞u̯rɑ̝]
• Rhymes: -eurɑ
• Syllabification^(key): ja‧lo‧peu‧ra

jalopeura (archaic)

1. (biblical) lion

   Teidän vastustajanne, perkele, käy ympäri niinkuin kiljuva jalopeura, etsien, kenen hän saisi niellä.

   Your opponent, the Devil, is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour. (1 Peter 5:8)

Often used together with the epithet kiljuva, as it appeared in the Finnish Bible up to the 1938 translation.

• leijona

• “jalopeura”, in Kielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish]‎ (online dictionary, continuously updated, in Finnish), Helsinki: Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland), 2004–, retrieved 2023-07-02