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Today I want to start up a column «History stories» in my paper!


And why not start with an historical event in Norway which happened on this day exactly 100 years ago! Today february the 6th , the Sami people in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia (Kola Pensinula) celebrate the 100th anniversary of the first Sami congress in Trondheim, discussing poltical issues concerning the Sami people. And on this date, 6th February 1917 they conducted the first sami political meeting ever. It was a lot to talk about, because throughout centuries this people and culture was very marginalized towards Norwegian, Swedish, Finnish and Russian rule.


Who is the Sami? Many do think its only reindeer herders, but through the history, they have also been fishermens, farmers, craftsmen and merchants, just like the most other peoples in the world. Archaeological artefacts indicate a long presence, at least two thousand years ago. The first writings about them was by the roman historian Tacitus, about AD 100. Later on, the Viking merchant Ottar (the northernmost living norseman) told about Northern Norway, and Sapmi, to the English king Alfred The Great about AD 890. The old norse sagas also tells a lot about the interactions between the norse and Sami.


Medieval image of Sami hunters

The Norwegian Kingdom and later on, the Denmark/Norway union, fought for the northern territories towards Sweden and Russia through centuries. The last borderline was settled as late as 1826 between Norway and Russia. By this the Sami peoples was forced to live between four states. Contradictions between this four states was an important reason for urging national uniformity inside these countries. In Norway it was not allowed for Sami children to speak their own language either in the classrooms or in the schoolyards, they had to speak Norwegian! The consequence of this is that older sami People, still today, do have a difficult approach to their own ancestors culture and language. This is the background for the sami congress in 1917.



One People inside four states

Many years after the congress, it was still inappropriate to speak Sami in public occasions, even when the school restrictions toward Sami was eased during the 1950ies and 60ies. The big occasion for the Sami awakening was the building of a big electrical power dam in Sapmi in 1979-81. This triggered a storm of protests because this dam would flood and destroy several Sami villages. This event also attracted internal and also international attention, and this ignite political processes toward separate Sami Parliaments in Norway (1989), Sweden (1993) and Finland (1996).



Sametinget/Samediggi/the Sami Parliament in Karasjok, Norway

This is the situation today. We do see a lot more of the Sami language and cultural expressions in public life. In these days we also do see more and sami nameplates on places around. Not without controversiality, some years ago, some liked to target the signs, but it has been more seldom nowadays.

Traditional Sami customes


What footprints has Sami set in international awareness and culture? First we have to mention the word “tundra”, an original sami-russian word for this landscape. It should be well known I think. Because of Sami cultures knowledge about northern climate, several Arctic and Antarctic expeditions had Sami personell and experience as precondition for their success, like for instance the first crossing of Greenland, passing the North-West Passage and Southern Cross expeditions. In popular culture we all know “Balto” the hero-dog from Alaska, bringing diphtheria medicine to Nome. Not so much known; Balto was a Sami name and his owner an Sami immigrant to Alaska. This story has been on film several times. Speaking about film, perhaps the most famous Sami/Norwegian, and Oscar nominated film, was “Ofelaš” (Pathfinder 1987) . A very exiting story on screen indeed. So there are some footprints.




This was a short story of a history of this date. Hope you enjoyed, and hopefully triggered more interest about this story!


Lihkku beivviin Sapmi!
(Happy anniversary, sami!)


The Sami Flag of today



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