History
The Kittilä siida
The Kittilä lapinkylä was a siida in Kemi Lappmark. Its people were Forest Sámi. This page rests on the 1642 map and on named studies.
The map of 1642
Olof Tresk made a map of Kemi Lappmark in 1642. On it, Kittilä is the village and market place. The map says the village had modest fishing waters, wild reindeer, other game, and beaver rivers. (Tresk 1642)
The people of Peltojärvi, the map says, already paid their tax at Markkina in Torne Lappmark, and still hunted and fished on the old grounds. One village was not one closed area. (Tresk 1642)
The same map also names Inari, Sompio, Sodankylä, Keminkylä, Kuolajärvi, Kitkajärvi, and Maanselkä. They are set out village by village on their own page. (Tresk 1642)
The Kemi Lappmark villages in 1642Tax lands
Kaisa Korpijaakko-Labba read the 16th- and 17th-century court books as showing that the Lapp tax lands passed down in families. This page relies on that study. We have not gone through those court books ourselves. (Korpijaakko-Labba 1989)
In 1673 a royal decree promised new settlers fifteen years free of taxes on land described as of no use to the Sámi. (Lappmark decree 1673)
Kittilän Lapinkylä ry says that church books and tax lists often recorded their ancestors simply as Lapp. (Kittilän Lapinkylä ry)
Sources
- Tresk 1642. Map of Kemi Lappmark. Rovaniemi City Library (in Finnish).A Finnish reading of the village notes. Our sentences are a summary. The map image is not published here.
- Tresk 1642–1643. Maps of Kemi and Torne lappmarks. Swedish National Archives.Catalog entry. The license on the image is still to be checked before we show the picture.
- Korpijaakko-Labba, Kaisa 1989. Saamelaisten oikeusasemasta Ruotsi-Suomessa. Lakimiesliiton Kustannus.We cite the book. We do not reproduce its maps.
- Lappmark decree, 27 September 1673. Charles XI.The link is a summary of the decree, not the original sheet.
- Kittilän Lapinkylä ry. History of the siida (in Finnish).The association’s own account. The sentence about church books is given as their statement.