Sámi National Day

The Sámi National Day (Northern Sami: Sámi álbmotbeaivi,

Day of the Sámi People
Inari Sami: Säämi aalmugpeivi, Skolt Sami: Saaʹmi
meersažpeiʹvv, Southern Sami: Saemiej åålmegebiejjie,
Norwegian: Samenes nasjonaldag, Swedish: Samernas
nationaldag, Finnish: Saamelaisten kansallispäivä) is an ethnic
national day for the Sámi (Saami) people that falls on February
6, the date when the first Sámi congress was held in 1917 in
Trondheim, Norway.[1] The congress was the first time that
Norwegian and Swedish Sámi came together across national
borders to work on finding solutions to common problems.

In 1992,[1] at the 15th Sámi Conference in Helsinki, Finland, a Sámi flag

resolution was passed that Sámi National Day should be
Also called Sámi National Day,
celebrated on February 6 to commemorate the first Sámi
congress in 1917. Sami National Day is for all Sámi, regardless Sixth of February
of where they live and on that day the Sámi flag should be flown Observed by Sámi
and the Sámi anthem is sung in the local Sámi language. The Type Ethnic
first time Sami National Day was celebrated was in 1993,[1]
when the International Year of Indigenous People was Significance Celebrating the first
proclaimed open in Jokkmokk, Sweden by the United Nations. international Sámi
conference in
Since then, celebrating the day has become increasingly popular. Trondheim, Norway,
In Norway it is compulsory for municipal administrative February 6, 1917.
buildings to fly the Norwegian flag, and optionally also the Sami
flag, on February 6. Particularly notable is the celebration in Celebrations Wearing national
Norway's capital Oslo, where the bells in the highest tower of garment, attending
Oslo City Hall play the Sami national anthem as the flags go concerts and culture
up.[2] Some larger places have taken to arranging festivities also events, eating national
in the week around the Sami National Day. The National Day food, displaying flags
has been included in the almanacs published by the University of Date February 6
Helsinki since 2004.[3] The Norwegian, Swedish and Finnish
Frequency annual
authorities recommend general flagging on the day.[3]
Related to Sápmi
By coincidence, February 6[4] was also the date representatives
of the Sámi of the Kola Peninsula gathered annually to meet with Russian bureaucrats to debate and decide
on issues of relevance to them. This assembly, called the Kola Sobbar, has been dubbed the "first Sámi
Parliament" by the researcher Johan Albert Kalstad. However, the founding of the Kola Sobbar did not
influence the choice of the date for Sámi People's Day, as the assembly existed only during the late 1800s
and was largely forgotten until the early 2000s.[5]

See also
Sámi anthem
Sámi culture
References
1. "The Sami People's Day celebrated Friday" (http://www.norwaypost.no/index.php/culture/28
077-sami-national-day-celebrated). The Norway Post. February 6, 2009. Archived (https://we
b.archive.org/web/20130303051627/http://www.norwaypost.no/index.php/culture/28077-sam
i-national-day-celebrated) from the original on March 3, 2013. Retrieved February 7, 2009.
2. Aslaksen, Eilif (February 4, 2009). "Dette skjer på nasjonaldagen" (https://archive.today/201
30222195530/http://m.nrk.no/artikkel.jsp?art_id=1.6456650) [This Happens on National
Day]. NRK (in Norwegian). Archived from the original (http://www.nrk.no/artikkel.jsp?art_id=
1.6456650) on February 22, 2013.
3. "Saamelaisten kansallispäivä 6.2" (https://web.archive.org/web/20160304124333/http://ww
w.samediggi.fi/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=197&Itemid=241&lang=finnis
h). Sámediggi (in Finnish). October 24, 2013. Retrieved February 6, 2022.
4. The first Kola Sobbar meeting was on January 25, 1868 O.S., which correlates to February 6
N.S.
5. Kalstad, Johan Albert. Дорогой надежд: политика Российского государства и
положение саамского народа в России (1864–2003) [Costly expectations: The policy of
the Russian state and the situation of the Sámi people in Russia (1864–2003)] (in Russian).
Murmask, Russia: Мурманское книж. изд-во. ISBN 978-5-85510-328-1.

External links
Media related to Sami National Day at Wikimedia Commons

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