Bible Encyclopedias
Lapland

The Lapps

The Lapps (Swed. Lappar; Russian Lopari; Norw. Finner) call their country Sabme or Same, and themselves Samelats - names almost identical with those employed by the Finns for their country and race, and probably connected with a root signifying "dark." Lapp is almost certainly a nickname imposed by foreigners, although some of the Lapps apply it contemptuously to those of their countrymen whom they think to be less civilized than themselves.' In Sweden and Finland the Lapps are usually divided into fisher, mountain and forest Lapps. In Sweden the first class includes many impoverished mountain Lapps. As described by Laestadius (1827-1832), their condition was very miserable; but since his time matters have improved. The principal colony has its summer quarters on the Stora-Lule Lake, possesses good boats and nets, and, besides catching and drying fish, makes money by the shooting of wild fowl and the gathering of eggs. When he has acquired a little means it is not unusual for the fisher to settle down and reclaim a bit of land. The mountain and forest Lapps are the true representatives of the race. In the wandering life of the mountain Lapp his autumn residence, on the borders of the forest district, may be considered as the central point; it is there that he erects his njalla, a small wooden storehouse raised high above the ground by one or more piles. About the beginning of November he begins to wander south or east into the forest land, and in the winter he may visit, not only ' The most probable etymology is the Finnish lappu, and in this. case the meaning would be the "land's end folk." such places as Jokkmokk and Arjepluog, but even Gefle, Upsala or Stockholm. About the beginning of May he is back at his njalla, but as soon as the weather grows warm he pushes up to the mountains, and there throughout the summer pastures his herds and prepares his store of cheese. By autumn or October he is busy at his njalla killing the surplus reindeer bulls and curing meat for the winter. From the mountain Lapp the forest (or, as he used to be called, the spruce-fir) Lapp is mainly distinguished by the narrower limits within which he pursues his nomadic life. He never wanders outside of a certain district, in which he possesses hereditary rights, and maintains a series of camping-grounds which he visits in regular rotation. In May or April he lets his reindeer loose, to wander as they please; but immediately after midsummer, when the mosquitoes become troublesome, he goes to collect them. Catching a single deer and belling it, he drives it through the wood; the other deer, whose instinct leads them to gather into herds for mutual protection against the mosquitoes, are attracted by the sound. Should the summer be very cool and the mosquitoes few, the Lapp finds it next to impossible to bring the creatures together. About the end of August they are again let loose, but they are once more collected in October, the forest Lapp during winter pursuing the same course of life as the mountain Lapp.

In Norway there are three classes - the sea Lapps, the river Lapps and the mountain Lapps, the first two settled, the third nomadic. The mountain Lapps have a rather ruder and harder life than the same class in Sweden. About Christmas those of Kautokeino and Karasjok are usually settled in the neighbourhood of the churches; in summer they visit the coast, and in autumn they return inland. Previous to 1852, when they were forbidden by imperial decree, they were wont in winter to move south across the Russian frontiers. It is seldom possible for them to remain more than three or four days in one spot. Flesh is their favourite, in winter almost their only food, though they also use reindeer milk, cheese and rye or barley cakes. The sea Lapps are in some respects hardly to be distinguished from the other coast dwellers of Finmark. Their food consists mainly of cooked fish. The river Lapps, many of whom, however, are descendants of Finns proper, breed cattle, attempt a little tillage and entrust their reindeer to the care of mountain Lapps.

In Finland there are comparatively few Laplanders, and the great bulk of them belong to the fisher class. Many are settled in the neighbourhood of the Enare Lake. In the spring they go down to the Norwegian coast and take part in the sea fisheries, returning to the lake about midsummer. Formerly they found the capture of wild reindeer a profitable occupation, using for this purpose a palisaded avenue gradually narrowing towards a pitfall.

The Russian Lapps are also for the most part fishers, as is natural in a district with such an extent of coast and such a number of lakes, not to mention the advantage which the fisher has over the reindeer keeper in connexion with the many fasts of the Greek Church. They maintain a half nomadic life, very few having become settlers in the Russian villages. It is usual to distinguish them according to the district of the coast which they frequent, as Murman (Murmanski) and Terian (Terski) Lapps. A separate tribe, the Filmans, i.e Finnmans, wander about the Pazyets, Motov and Pechenga tundras, and retain the peculiar dialect and the Lutheran creed which they owe to a former connexion with Sweden. They were formerly known as the "twice and thrice tributary" Lapps, because they paid to two or even three states - Russia, Denmark and Sweden.

The Lapps within the historical period have considerably recruited themselves from neighbouring races. Shortness of stature' is their most obvious characteristic, though in regard to this much exaggeration has prevailed. Diiben found an average of. 4.9 ft. for males and a little less for females; Mantegazza, who made a number of anthropological observations in Norway in 1879, gives 5 ft. and 4.75 ft., respectively (Archivio 1 Hence they have been supposed by many to be the originals of the "little folk" of Scandinavian legend.

per l'antrop., 1880). Individuals much above or much below the average are rare. The body is usually of fair proportions, but the legs are rather short, and in many cases somewhat bandy. Dark, swarthy; yellow, copper-coloured are all adjectives employed to describe their complexion - the truth being that their habits of life do not conduce either to the preservation or display of the natural colour of their skin, and that some of them are really fair, and others, perhaps the majority, really dark. The colour of the hair ranges from blonde and reddish to a bluish or greyish black; the eyes are black, hazel, blue or grey. The shape of the skull is the most striking peculiarity of the Lapp. He is the most brachycephalous type of man in Europe, perhaps in the world. 2 According to Virchow, the women in width of face are more Mongolian in type than the men, but neither in men nor women does the opening of the eye show any true obliquity. In children the eye is large, open and round. The nose is always low and broad, more markedly retrousse among the females than the males. Wrinkled and puckered by exposure to the weather, the faces even of the younger Lapps assume an appearance of old age. The muscular system is usually well developed, but there is deficiency of fatty tissue, which affects the features (particularly by giving relative prominence to the eyes) and the general character of the skin. The thinness of the skin, indeed, can but rarely be paralleled among other Europeans. Among the Lapps, as among other lower races, the index is shorter than the ring finger.

The Lapps are a quiet, inoffensive people. Crimes of violence are almost unknown, and the only common breach of law is the killing of tame reindeer belonging to other owners. In Russia, however, they have a bad reputation for lying and general untrustworthiness, and drunkenness is well-nigh a universal vice. In Scandinavia laws have been directed against the importation of intoxicating liquors into the Lapp country since 1723.

Superficially at least the great bulk of the Lapps have been Christianized - those of the Scandinavian countries being Protestants, those of Russia members of the Greek Church. Although the first attempt to convert the Lapps to Christianity seems to have been made in the 11th century, the worship of heathen idols was carried on openly in Swedish Lappmark as late as 1687, and secretly in Norway down to the first quarter of the 18th century, while the practices of heathen rites survived into the 19th century, if indeed they are extinct even yet. Lapp graves, prepared in the heathen manner, have been discovered in upper Namdal (Norway), belonging to the years 1820 and 1826. In education the Scandinavian Lapps are far ahead of their Russian brethren, to whom reading and writing are arts as unfamiliar as they were to their pagan ancestors. The general manner of life is patriarchal. The father of the family has complete authority over all its affairs; and on his death this authority passes to the eldest son. Parents are free to disinherit their children; and, if a son separates from the family without his father's permission, he receives no share of the property except a gun and his wife's dowry.3 The Lapps are of necessity conservative in most of their habits, many of which can hardly have altered since the first taming of the reindeer. But the strong current of mercantile enterprise has carried a few important products of southern civilization into their huts. The lines in which James Thomson describes their simple life The reindeer form their riches: these their tents, Their robes, their beds, and all their homely wealth Supply; their wholesome fare and cheerful cups are still applicable in the main to the mountain Lapps; but even they have learned to use coffee as an ordinary beverage and to wear stout Norwegian cloth (vadmal). Linguistically the Lapps belong to the Finno-Ugrian group (q.v.); the similarity of their speech to Finnish is evident though 2 Bertillon found in one instance a cephalic index of 94. The average obtained by Pruner Bey was 84.7, by Virchow 82.5.

A valuable paper by Ephimenko, on "The Legal Customs of the Lapps, especially in Russian Lapland," appeared in vol.. viii. of the Mem. of Russ. Geog. Soc., Ethnog. Section, 1878.

the phonetics are different and more complicated. It is broken up into very distinct and even mutually unintelligible dialects, the origin of several of which is, however, easily found in the political and social dismemberment of the people. Diiben distinguishes four leading dialects; but a much greater number are recognizable. In Russian Lapland alone there are three, due to the influence of Norwegian, Karelian and Russian (Lonnrot, Ada Soc. Sci. Fennicae, vol. iv.). "The Lapps," says Castren, "have had the misfortune to come into close contact with foreign races while their language was yet in its tenderest infancy, and consequently it has not only adopted an endless number of foreign words, but in many grammatical aspects fashioned itself after foreign models." That it began at a very early period to enrich itself with Scandinavian words is shown by the use it still makes of forms belonging to a linguistic stage older even than that of Icelandic. Daben has subjected the vocabulary to a very interesting analysis for the purpose of discovering what stage of culture the people had reached before their contact with the Norse. Agricultural terms, the names of the metals and the word for smith are all of Scandinavian origin, and the words for "taming" and "milk" would suggest that the southern strangers taught the Lapps how to turn the reindeer to full account. The important place, however, which this creature must always have held in their estimation is evident from the existence of more than three hundred native words in connexion with reindeer.

The Lapp tongue was long ago reduced to writing by the missionaries; but very little has been printed in it except school-books and religious works. A number of popular tales and songs, indeed, have been taken down from the lips of the people. The songs are similar to those of the Finns, and a process of mutual borrowing seems to have gone on. In one of the saga-like pieces - Pishan-Peshan's son - there seems to be a mention of the Baikal Lake, and possibly also of the Altai Mountains. The story of Njavvisena, daughter of the Sun, is full of quaint folk-lore about the taming of the reindeer. Giants, as well as a blind or one-eyed monster, are frequently introduced, and the Aesopic fable is not without its representatives. Many of the Lapps are able to speak one or even two of the neighbouring tongues.

The reputation of the Laplanders for skill in magic and divination is of very early date, and in Finland is not yet extinct. When Erik Blood-axe, son of Harold Haarfager, visited Bjarmaland in 922, he found Gunhild, daughter of Asur Tote, living among the Lapps, to whom she had been sent by her father for the purpose of being trained in witchcraft; and Ivan the Terrible of Russia sent for magicians from Lapland to explain the cause of the appearance of a comet. One of the powers with which they were formerly credited was that of raising winds. "They tye three knottes," says old Richard Eden, "on a strynge hangyng at a whyp. When they lose one of these they rayse tollerable wynds. When they lose an other the wynde is more vehement; but by losing the thyrd they rayse playne tempestes as in old tyme they were accustomed to rayse thunder and lyghtnyng" (Hist. of Trauayle, 1577). Though we are familiar in English with allusions to "Lapland witches," it appears that the art, according to native custom, was in the hands of the men. During his divination the wizard fell into a state of trance or ecstasy, his soul being held to run at large to pursue its Witch= inquiries. Great use was made of a curious divining drum, oval in shape and made of wood, 1 to 4 ft. in length. Over the upper surface was stretched a white-dressed reindeer skin, and at the corners (so to speak) hung a variety of charms - tufts of wool, bones, teeth, claws, &c. The area was divided into several spaces, often into three, one for the celestial gods, one for the terrestrial and one for man. A variety of figures and conventional signs were drawn in the several compartments: the sun, for instance, is frequently represented by a square and a stroke from each corner, Thor by two hammers placed crosswise; and in the more modern specimens symbols for Christ, the Virgin, and the Holy Ghost are introduced. An arpa or divining-rod was laid on a definite spot, the drum beaten by a hammer, and conclusions drawn from the position taken up by the arpa. Any Lapp who had attained to manhood could in ordinary circumstances consult the drum for himself, but in matters of unusual moment the professional wizard (naid, noide or noaide) had to be called in.

History

The Lapps have a dim tradition that their ancestors lived in a far eastern land, and they tell rude stories of conflicts with Norsemen and Karelians. But no answer can be obtained from them in regard to their early distribution and movements. It has been maintained that they were formerly spread over the whole of the Scandinavian peninsula, and they have even been considered the remnants of that primeval race of cave-dwellers which hunted the reindeer over the snow-fields of central and western Europe. But much of the evidence adduced for these theories is highly questionable. The contents of the so-called Lapps' graves found in various parts of Scandinavia are often sufficient in themselves to show that the appellation must be a misnomer, and the syllable Lap or Lapp found in many names of places can often be proved to have no connnexion with the Lapps.' They occupied their present territory when they are first mentioned in history. According to Diiben the name first occurs in the 13th century - in the Fundinn Noregr, composed about 1200, in Saxo Grammaticus, and in a papal bull of date 1230; but the people are probably to be identified with those Finns of Tacitus whom he describes as wild hunters with skins for clothing and rude huts as only means of shelter, and certainly with the Skrithiphinoi of Procopius (Goth. ii. 15), the Scritobini of Paulus Warnefridus, and the Scridifinni of the geographer of Ravenna. Some of the details given by Procopius, in regard for instance to the treatment of infants, show that his informant was acquainted with certain characteristic customs of the Lapps.

In the 9th century the Norsemen from Norway began to treat their feeble northern neighbours as a subject race. The wealth of Uttar, "northmost of the northmen," whose narrative has been preserved by King Alfred, consisted mainly of six hundred of those "deer they call hrenas" and in tribute paid by the natives; and the Eigils saga tells how Brynjulf Bjargulfson had his right to collect contributions from the Finns (i.e. the Lapps) recognized by Harold Haarfager. So much value was attached to this source of wealth that as early as 1050 strangers were excluded from the furtrade of Finmark, and a kind of coast-guard prevented their intrusion. Meantine the Karelians were pressing on the eastern Lapps, and in the course of the i ith century the rulers of Novgorod began to treat them as the Norsemen had treated their western brethren. The ground-swell of the _Tatar invasion drove the Karelians westward in the 13th century, and for many years even Finmark was so unsettled that the Norsemen received no tribute from the Lapps. At length in 1326 a treaty was concluded between Norway and Russia by which the supremacy of the Norwegians over the Lapps was recognized as far east as Voljo beyond Kandalax on the White Sea, and the supremacy of the Russians over the Karelians as far as Lyngen and the Malself. The relations of the Lapps to their more powerful neighbours were complicated by the rivalry of the different Scandinavian kingdoms. After the disruption of the Calmar Union (1523) Sweden began to assert its rights with vigour, and in 1595 the treaty of Teusina between Sweden and Russia decreed "that the Lapps who dwell in the woods between eastern Bothnia and Varanger shall pay their dues to the king of Sweden." It was in vain that Christian IV. of Denmark visited Kola and exacted homage in 1599, and every year sent messengers to protest against the collection of his tribute by the Swedes (a custom which continued down to 1806). Charles of Sweden took the title of "king of the Kajans and Lapps," and left no means untried to establish his power over all Scandinavian Lapland. By the peace of Kna.red (1613) Gustavus Adolphus gave up the Swedish claim to Finmark; and in 1751 mutual renunciations brought the relations of Swedish and Norwegian (Danish) Lapland to their present position. Meanwhile Russian influence had been spreading westward; and in 1809, when Alexander I. finally obtained the cession of Finland, he also added to his dominions the whole of Finnish Lapland to the east of the Muonio and the Kiingama. It may be interesting to mention that Lapps, armed with bows and arrows, were attached to certain regiments of Gustavus Adolphus in Germany during the Thirty Years' War.

The Lapps have had the ordinary fate of a subject and defenceless people; they have been utilized with little regard to their own interest or inclinations. The example set by the early Norwegians was followed by the Swedes: a peculiar class of adventurers known as the Birkarlians (from Bjark or Birk, " trade") began in the 13th century to farm the Lapps, and, receiving very extensive privileges from the kings, grew to great wealth and influence. In 1606 there were twenty-two Birkarlians in Tornio, seventeen in Lule, sixteen in Pite, and sixty-six in Ume Lappmark. They are regularly spoken of as having or owning Lapps, whom they dispose of as any other piece of property. In Russian Lapland matters followed much the same course. The very institutions of the Solovets monastery, intended by St Tryphon for the benefit of the poor neglected pagans, turned out the occasion of much injustice towards them. By a charter of Ivan Vasilivitch (November 1556), the monks are declared masters of the Lapps of the Motoff and Petchenga districts, and they soon sought to extend their control over those not legally assigned to them (Ephimenko). Other monasteries were gifted 1 The view that the Lapps at one time occupied the whole of the Scandinavian peninsula, and have during the course of centuries been driven back by the Swedes and Norwegians is disproved by the recent investigations of Yngvar Nielsen, K. B. Wiklund and others. The fact is, the Lapps are increasing in numbers, as well as pushing their way farther and farther south. In the beginning of the 16th century their southern border-line in Norway ran on the upper side of 64° N. In 1890 they forced their way to the head of the Hardanger Fjord in 60° N. Tn Sweden the presence of Lapps as far south as Jamtland (or Jemtland) is first mentioned in 1564. In 1881 they pushed on into the north of Dalecarlia, about 61° 45'N.

with similar proprietary rights; and the supplication of the patriarch Nikon to Alexis Mikhaelovitch, for example, shows clearly the oppression to which the Lapps were subjected.

It is long, however, since these abuses were abolished; and in Scandinavia more especially the Lapps of the present day enjoy the advantages resulting from a large amount of philanthropic legislation on the part of their rulers. There seems to be no fear of their becoming extinct, except it may be by gradual amalgamation with their more powerful neighbours. In Norway the total number of Lapps was 20,786 in 1891, and in Sweden in 1904 it was officially estimated that there were 7000. Add to these some 3000 for Russian Lapland, and the total Lapp population approximates to 30,000. In Sweden the Lapps are gradually abandoning their nomadic habits and becoming merged in the Swedish population. The majority of the Norwegian Lapps lead a semi-nomadic existence; but the number of inveterate nomads can scarcely reach 1500 at the present day. In Sweden there are about 3500 nomads.

Authorities.-G. von Diiben, Om Lappland och Lapparne (Stockholm, 1873), with list of over 200 authorities; C. Rabot, "La Laponie suedoise d'apres les recentes explorations de MM. Svenonius et Hamberg," La Geographie, Soc. Geog. de Paris VII. (1903); S. Passarge, Fahrten in Schweden, besonders in Nordschweden and Lappland (Berlin, 1897); Bayard Taylor, Northern Travel (London, 1858); E. Rae, The White Sea Peninsula (London, 1882), and Land of the North Wind (London, 1875); P. B. du Chaillu, Land of the Midnight Sun (London, 1881); S. Tromholt, Under the Rays of the Aurora Borealis (London, 1885); Y. Nielsen, Det Norske geogr. Selskabs Aarbog (1891); H. H. Reusch, Folk og natur i Finmarken (1895); K. B. Wicklund, De Svenska nomadlapparnas flyttningar till Norge i cilore och nyare tid (Upsala, 1908); see also Sweden. Among older works may be mentioned Scheffer, Lapponia (Frankfurt, 1673, English trans. Oxford, 1674); Regnard, Voyage de Laponie, English version in Pinkerton's Voyages, vol. i.; Leem, Beskrivelse over Finmarkens Lapper (Copenhagen, 1767), in Danish and Latin; see also Pinkerton, loc. cit.; Sir A. de C. Brooke, A Winter in Lapland (London, 1827); Laestadius, Journal (1831).

As to the language, J. A. Friis, professor of Lapp in the university of Christiania, has published Lappiske Sprogprover: en samling Lapp. eventyr, ordsprog, og gilder (Christiania, 1856), and Lappisk mythologi eventyr og folkesagn (Christiania, 1871). See also G. Donner, Lieder der Lappen (Helsingfors, 1876); Poestion, Lappldndische Mi rchen, &c. (Vienna, 1885). Grammars of the Lapp tongue have been published by Fjellstrom (1738), Leem (1748), Rask (1832), Stockfleth (1840); lexicons by Fjellstrom (1703), Leem (1768-1781), Lindahl (1780), Stockfleth (1852). Among more recent works may be mentioned a dictionary (1885), by J. A. Friis; a reader, with German translations (1888), by J. Qvigstad; a dictionary (1890) and two grammars (1891 and 1897) of the Lulea dialect, and a chrestomathy of Norwegian Lappish (1894), by K. B. Wiklund; a dictionary of Russian Lappish, or the Kola dialect (1891), by A. Genetz; readers of different dialects (1885-1896), by J. Halasz; and a grammar of Norwegian Lappish (1882), by S. / s lielsen; further, a comparative study of Lappish and Finnish by Qvigstad in the Acts of the Finnish Academy of Science, vol. xii., 1883; the same author's Nordische Lehnworter im Lappischen (1893); Wiklund, Entwurf einer urlappischen Lautlehre (1896); see also various articles by these writers, Paasonen and others in the Journal de la Societe Finno-Ougrienne and the FinnischUgrische Forschungen; Qvigstad and Wiklund, Bibliographie der lappischen Literatur (1900).

The older literature on the Lapps received a notable addition by the discovery in 1896, among the letters of Linnaeus preserved in the British Museum, of a MS. diary of a journey made in 1695 to the north of Swedish Lappmark by Olof Rudbeck the younger. On missionary work see Stockfleth, Dagbog over mine missions Reiser (1860); E. Haller, Svenska Kyrkans mission i Lappmarken (1896). It was not until 1840 that the New Testament was translated into Norwegian Lappish, and not until 1895 that the entire Bible was printed in the same dialect. In the Russian dialect of Lappish there exist only two versions of St Matthew's gospel.