Sami Languages - History

History

The Proto-Sami language is believed to have formed in the vicinity of the Gulf of Finland between 1000 B.C. to 700 A.D. derived from a common Proto-Sami-Finnic language (M. Korhonen 1981). However reconstruction of any basic proto-languages in the Uralic family have reached a level close to or identical to Proto-Uralic (Salminen 1999). The language is believed to have expanded west and north into Fennoscandia during the Iron Age reaching central-Scandinavia during the Proto-Scandinavian period (Bergsland 1996.). The language assimilated several layers of unknown Paleo-European languages from the early hunter gatherers, first during the Proto-Sami phase and second in the subsequent expansion of the language in the west and the north of Fennoscandia that is part of modern Sami today. (Aikio 2004, Aikio 2006).

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