## Sami

The Sami people are considered to be the native population of northern Norway, Sweden, Finland and West Russia (the Kola Peninsula). More information can be found at samer.se and in the Sami people article in Wikipedia.

### Sources

Stellarium's Sami sky culture is based on the work of Bo Lundmark Bæi'vi mánno nástit (Swedish title: Sol- och månkult samt astrala och celesta föreställninga bland samerna [Sun and Moon cult and astral and celestial concepts among the Sami], 1982), who based much of his work on the writings of the Sami artist and author Johan Turi.

This sky culture is a conglomeration of at least three slightly different cultures from the people of the South-Sami, North-Sami and Russian Sami. Each of these groups have slightly different languages and as such there may be small differences with some references.

Sami constellations can be observed on Sami artifacts connected to the old religion, suggesting that the night sky played an important cultural role for Sami peoples in years gone by.

The Sami sky culture has a lot in common with other arctic and sub-arctic cultures in Eurasia. One unfortunate similarity is that much of the culture was lost before it was recorded properly.

### Constellations and Stars

The Sami constellations are probably very old but were recorded in writing during the 19th century. In is unclear if the written record is complete. The constellations and stars included here are all connected to the dominant constellation, Sarva — the elk. Sarva is the Sami name for elk, an alternative name is Sarvvis — Bull elk. The origin of this constellation probably dates back to the old hunter culture before reindeer were domesticated.

Sarva consists of the Western constellations Cassiopeia, Perseus and parts of Auriga. Constellations and stars surrounding Sarva represent hunters of the elk. Favdna (also transcribed as Favtna) is the star Arcturus, and represents the Hunter who aims at the elk with his bow and arrow (Fauna davgge — the Big Dipper). Favdna must aim well, for if he hits the Sky Support Boahjenaste (the star Polaris), legend has it that the world will come to an end.

Favdna has a number of helpers: Galla (Procyon1) and his sons Gallabarneck (Orion's belt), the "Ski Runners", Cuoigahægjek (Castor and Pollux) and "The Runner" (Vega). The Pleiades are called Rougot (dog pack) or Miese-cora (calfpack).

The Milky Way is called Lodde-raiddaras (lit. bird path) or Jakke-mærka (lit. year mark). The name used depends on the season. In the sky chart of Johan Turi, one can observe a star Guovso-naste, morning star, that can be identified as Venus, but this is not certain as it can also be identified as Altair, a star showing the morning is approaching (similar to Arcturus in the Norse skyculture).

The Sami sky culture does not have a large number of constellations. This is thought to be mainly because of the high Northerly latitude of the Sami people's range. Two factors contribute to this: that the Southern sky stays below the horizon to a large extent, and that the Aurora Borealis is frequently bright enough to obscure many stars.

### Notes

1. The exact star which represents Galla is uncertain. it is probably Procyon, Rigel or Sirius - Procyon was chosen as Galla for this sky culture since Sirius is very hard to spot from the latitude where the Sami live.

### Author

Jonas Persson (jonas.persson@physics.org)