Minority languages in Sweden: Sami – prehistory to the 17th century

Wow, it's cold. There is ice all over the north of Europe. It's the ice age. No one can live here. But then...

about 10,000 years ago, the ice retreats. And look! There are some people coming. One group from the east and one group from the west. This is the Stone Age and they hunt and collect berries and other edibles things from where the ice has gone.

Then after a while they start to keep reindeer. The reindeer become their most important animal. From the reindeer they get skins and furs, meat, sinews for thread; and horn for carving lots of stuff. Then about 2,200 years ago these two groups have hung out together so much that they become one people: the Sami. And this is where the Sami have lived ever since.

In the northern parts of what one day will become Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Russia. They call their land Sapmi. Since the Sami were here before everyone else we say they are an indigenous people. Just like the indigenous peoples of America, Greenland, and Australia. The Sami live alone in the north for a long while.

The reindeer need different pastures in summer than in winter. Because of this, the people move every spring and autumn. When they travel they live in a kind of tent called: kåta. The Sami are in contact with people further south. Around the year 700 - that is about one hundred years before the viking era - the Sami meet a group of northerners living here.

But do they speak the same language? No. The Sami speak a language that developed here by the Ural Mountains in Asia. It belongs to the Uralic language family and is related to Finnish - it belongs to the Finno-Ugric language group. The Northerners speak a language that belongs to the Indo-European language family, it's called Proto-North Germanic, and belongs to the Germanic language group.

The Sami learn some words from the northerners and add these words to their own language. They become loanwords. Most of these words concern livestock and farming but some also concern boats and life on the sea. In the twelfth century The Viking Era is over. The Nordic countries become Christian.

But not the Sami. They stick to their old religion. Invisible spirits, ancestors, and forces of nature that affect those alive. This kind of religion is called Shamanism. The world has three parts: the sky, the earth - where the people live, and the underworld - where the dead live.

All three parts have their own gods and spirits. It's possible to travel between the worlds. Those who do this are a kind of religious leader: the Noaide. To make their spirits travel between the worlds, or to other countries on earth, the Noaide play on shamanic drums. On the drum there are symbols of the three worlds.

The drum sounds make the noaide go into a deep meditation -- a trance -- and experience their spirit to be traveling to another place. Certain places in nature are more sacred than others. Like big stones with unusual forms such as this; siedis. Every time the Sami have had a successful hunt they offer part of their catch next to a seidi. They do this to make sure that their next hunt will be as successful.

During the Middle Ages the Sami are more or less alone in Sapmi. But this will change during the 17th century.