Three centuries on, a shaman's precious rune drum returns home
Instrument confiscated by the Danes is given back to the Sámi people after a lengthy campaign
The sacred Sámi shaman drum returned by the Danish authorities to the Karasjok Museum in the far north of Norway. Photograph: Helge Mikalsen/VG
Charlotte Higgins in Karasjok
Sun 13 Mar 2022 03.30 EDT
On 7 December 1691, a precious rune drum, created to help a noaidi, or shaman, to enter a trance and walk among spirits, was confiscated by the authorities. The owner, Anders Poulsson – or Poala-Ánde in the name’s Sámi form – was tried for witchcraft the following year.
Poulsson told the court, according to official records, that his mother had taught him how to use the rune drum, because “he wanted to help people in distress, and with his art he wanted to do good, and his mother said that she would teach him such an art”.
Before a verdict was reached, he was murdered, with an axe, by a man who had “taken leave of his senses”.
Poulsson’s drum entered the Danish royal collection, and later became the property of the National Museum of Denmark – until now. The drum has officially been handed back to the Sámi people, after what Jelena Porsanger, director of the Sámi Museum in Karasjok, northern Norway, called “a 40-year struggle”.
An indigenous people of northern Europe, the Sámi inhabit Sapmi, a territory straddling northern Norway, Finland, Sweden and Russia’s Kola peninsula. “It’s a precious object for us that is a symbol of our history, values and culture – and at the same time a symbol of colonisation and unequal power relations,” said Porsanger.
. . .
A Sámi indigenous family group outside their home in the north of Norway around 1880.
Photograph: Pump Park Vintage Photography/Alamy
More:
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2022/mar/13/three-centuries-on-a-shamans-precious-rune-drum-returns-home
~ ~ ~
~ ~ ~
Finland to examine injustices suffered by Sámi people
By Pekka Vanttinen | EURACTIV.com Nov 2, 2021
Part of the commission’s task is to find out how injustices affect the Sámi people and their communities today, to promote links between the Sámi and the state of Finland, and to raise awareness about the Sámi as indigenous people whose status is guaranteed by the Constitution.
The process began in 2017 when the former government signed an agreement with the Sámi Parliament to fund the commission with €200,000. The body consisting of five members should deliver its report by 30 November 2023.
. . .
Tuomas Aslak Juuso, President of the Sámi Parliament said, “There are still barriers to the recognition and implementation of the rights of the Sámi as an indigenous people in Finland. I hope that this difficult process will result in concrete measures that genuinely advance the status of the Sámi in Finnish society.”
Similar truth commissions for indigenous people have been launched in around 40 countries. The Norwegian Sámi commission is currently working, and Sweden is about to establish its own. Unlike Norway and Denmark, Finland and Sweden have not ratified ‘The Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention’ from 1989. There are around 10,000 Sámi people living in Finland.
https://www.euractiv.com/section/politics/short_news/finland-to-examine-injustices-suffered-by-sami-people/
= new reply since forum marked as read
Wow! Ty for sharing this story & the lovely pix!
We will need hundreds of lives to learn nearly as much as we want to know of what seems to be all around us!
Hooray for learning about Saami people! I had never heard of them until relatively recently! Thanks.
I learn so much from your posts! Ty!
Her sound is mystical, in my opinion, has elements which remind me of the First Nation people of the Americas, too.
I never saw that coming! Will be looking up more of her music.
Thanks for breaking the silence of my ignorance by introducing this complete artist!
(I looked through some photos, saw one image which said she started this career in the 1970's, and had originally wanted to be a visual artist! I'm sure glad she gave music her attention!
Thank you!
