Päivitetty 1.1.2002  –  Palautteet

Virittäjä-lehti  >  Hakemistot  >  Kirjoitukset ja tiivistelmät: 1995 (99)

Alpo Räisänen (University of Joensuu; Department of Finnish; address: PL 111, FIN-80101 Joensuu)

Kainuu place-names of Saami origin

The writer has earlier discussed Kainuu place-names that date from before the present settlement in the area (Räisänen 1990). The present settlement of Kainuu dates from the 16th and 17th centuries, and came mainly from Savo. In the previous study, three strata were distinguished in the older place-names: (1) Saami names, (2) Karelian names, and (3) Ostrobothnian names.

The present article discusses additional Kainuu place-names that the writer argues to be of Saami origin. In addition to linguistic factors, particular attention is paid to the naming motive, i.e. the actual nature of the places referred to. For example, names with the form Änätti- in Kainuu and Änä- and Änäkkä- in East Finland often mean large lakes or bodies of water. These names can thus be linked to the Saami word ædne- 'big' (compare Finnish enä-). The four Finnish Jaappa(a) names denote bodies of water. They can be related to the Saami word cap'pâd 'black' (cf. Nielsen), because the colour of the water or the shadow of the surrounding forest often motivated such Finnish names as Mustalampi 'black pool' and Mustalahti 'black bay'. There are about 40 names in Finland of the form Laatas, Laattaa, and they all originate in the Saami adjective láhtes 'level'. The Laattaa-names in North Savo and Kainuu nevertheless require the original form *laattaga, so they cannot come directly from the Saami form láhtes but from its g-form derivative.

Of particular interest are the two Juolunka names in Kuhmo and the Juolu names in Central Ostrobothnia and western Lapland, whose source is Saami cuollo 'salmon-dam bar, fence'. Both the Kuhmo names originally denoted a long, narrow peninsular between two lakes. In Central Ostrobothnia Juolu often means a narrow sandy ridge. Such sites were good places to trap wild deer. This evidence from place-names confirms the suggestion made by A. Nesheim (1947: 159, 174-177) that Saami cuollo was not only a fishing term but also related to deer hunting.

The Kuhmo name Jämäs (the only occurrence in Finland) is linked to Saami jámes 'dead, deceased'. The problem with this association is that the Saami word has a central a (á), for which the Finnish equivalent is usually a or aa, as in the word saame < Saami sabme. The writer nevertheless assumes that á could also have been replaced by ä in Karelian areas. Alongside the Jämäs name he cites Säämäjärvi (a large lake in Olonets) and Sääminki (Sääminginsalo in documents as early as 1364; the same place is probably meant by the name Samosalo in the 1323 peace treaty of Pähkinäsaari). These names are then linked to Saami sabme.

The name Näljänkä is assumed to contain the numeral njeallja 'four' or the ordinal njealját 'fourth'. There are many Aska names in the region between Puolanka and Sodankylä. With some hesitation, the writer links these names to the word aske 'lap, etc.' (= Niels. âs'ke), because the velar a is usually matched by Finnish i. Another possibility is that the place-name contains an unknown personal name; this is suggested by the fact that most Aska names begin with genitive segments.

The name Hossa is entirely Finnish in West Finland, (< hosia 'horsetail'), but at least the Suomussalmi Hossa seems to originate from Saami hoas'sa 'horsetail' (the Saami word is a fairly recent loan from the Finnish one): near Hossanjärvi in Suomussalmi there is a place called Huosiusjärvi, a form that contains the East-Finnish/Karelian equivalent huosia. Hossanjärvi and Huosiusjärvi are clearly related, and the names were probably given by the Lapps. It therefore appears that the Russian Karelians translated the Huosius name into their own language, but the name of the larger lake has kept the original Saami form Hossa.