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THE LAPPS OP SWEDEN.
183
tongue had died out, and been superseded by a kind of old Finnish, from
which both modern Finnish and the Lapp language have developed. Although"
these languages are thus sister tongues, the Lapps and Finns, are not closely
related ethnologically. It is not possible to determine exactly the date at which
the Lapps emigrated into the Swedish province of Lappland; but, on the ground
of foreign words in their language, it is assigned to the centuries immediately
preceding and following the birth of Christ. Their dissemination at a later
period south of the present Lappland proceeded rather slowly. It is not till the
16th century that they are found in the mountain districts of central Jämtland,
and not till the 17th and 18th centuries that they are found in Härjedalen.
Even if stray families at a very early date roved with their reindeer herds far
into Hälsingland and Dalarne, it was not till 1881 that a Lapp obtained legal
rights of pasture in a small part of Dalarne.
After the Snow-storm.
From a painting by Johan Tirén.
The ethnography of the Swedish Lapps is entirely founded on their nomad
existence. Their dwellings, their dress, their goods and chattels are all adapted
to the management of reindeer. Evidently, this admirably practical development
has a long history behind it. Except those who have afterwards adopted a settled
mode of life (or those that have degenerated), the Swedish Lapps are either
Moun-iain Lapps, who make regular migrations between the forest and the mountain
Tegions, sometimes going right down to the coast of Norway, or else Forest
Lapps, who keep with their herds to particular districts of the province of
Lappland or the adjacent parts of Västerbotten. When the migrations to the
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