Karelian is a Finnic language spoken mainly in the Russian Republic of Karelia. Linguistically, Karelian is closely related to the Finnish dialects spoken in eastern Finland, and some Finnish linguists have even classified Karelian as a dialect of Finnish, though in the modern day it is widely considered a separate language. Karelian is not to be confused with the Southeastern dialects of Finnish, sometimes referred to as karjalaismurteet in Finland. In the Russian 2020–2021 census, around 9,000 people spoke Karelian natively, but around 14,000 said to be able to speak the language. There are around 11,000 speakers of Karelian in Finland. And around 30,000 have atleast some knowledge of Karelian in Finland.
Ruokolahti is a municipality of Finland, situated in south-eastern Finland, in the region of South Karelia. Neighbouring municipalities are Imatra, Lappeenranta, Taipalsaari, Puumala, Sulkava, Punkaharju, Parikkala and Rautjärvi. Ruokolahti covers an area of 1,219.85 square kilometres (470.99 sq mi) of which 23% is water.
Suomussalmi is a municipality in Finland and is located in the Kainuu region about 90 kilometres (56 mi) northeast of Kajaani, the capital of Kainuu and 120 kilometres (75 mi) south of Kuusamo. The municipality has a population of 7,172 (31 December 2023) and covers an area of 5,857.60 square kilometres (2,261.63 sq mi) of which 587.03 km2 (226.65 sq mi) is water. The population density is 1.36 inhabitants per square kilometre (3.5/sq mi). The municipality is unilingually Finnish. Ämmänsaari is the biggest built-up area in the municipality.
Karelians are a Baltic Finnic ethnic group who are indigenous to the historical region of Karelia, which is today split between Finland and Russia. Karelians living in Russian Karelia are considered a distinct ethnic group closely related to Finnish Karelians, who are considered a subset of Finns. This distinction historically arose from Karelia having been fought over and eventually split between Sweden and Novgorod, resulting in Karelians being under different cultural spheres.
Oulainen is a town and a municipality of Finland. It is located in the Northern Ostrobothnia region, 101 kilometres (63 mi) south of the city of Oulu. The municipality has a population of 6,978 (31 December 2023) and covers an area of 597.53 square kilometres (230.71 sq mi) of which 10.01 km2 (3.86 sq mi) is water. The population density is 11.87 inhabitants per square kilometre (30.7/sq mi). Oulainen is founded in 1865, and it received township rights in 1977.
Rauma dialect is a Southwestern dialect of Finnish spoken in the town of Rauma, Finland.
The two main official languages of Finland are Finnish and Swedish. There are also several official minority languages: three variants of Sami, as well as Romani, Finnish Sign Language, Finland-Swedish Sign Language and Karelian.
Finnish is a Finnic language of the Uralic language family, spoken by the majority of the population in Finland and by ethnic Finns outside of Finland. Finnish is one of the two official languages of Finland, alongside Swedish. In Sweden, both Finnish and Meänkieli are official minority languages. Kven, which like Meänkieli is mutually intelligible with Finnish, is spoken in the Norwegian counties of Troms and Finnmark by a minority of Finnish descent.
The Karelian language is spoken in Russia, mostly in the Karelian Republic and in a small region just north of Tver, though most residents there were expelled in 1939. Karelian has seen numerous proposed and adopted alphabets over the centuries, both Latin and Cyrillic. In 2007, the current standardized Karelian alphabet was introduced and is used to write all varieties of Karelian, including Tver Karelian which adopted it in 2017.
In Finland, the usual way of writing dates in normal text is with the months spelled out. The format varies according to the language used. In Finnish, a full stop is placed after the day to indicate an ordinal: 31. toukokuuta 2002; furthermore, the month is in the partitive case, always marked by -ta. The month can also be written first, now in genitive case : toukokuun 31. pnä 2002. In Swedish, the full stop is not used and the month is in nominative : den 31 maj 2002.
Tver Karelians are a people who inhabit regions of Tver, Saint Petersburg, and Moscow. Their dialect is remarkable in that it does not borrow from other Balto-Finnic languages due to centuries of geographical isolation. Although the number of Tver Karelian people was about 14,633 in 2002, very few named the dialect as their primary language. The number of Tver Karelians was 7,394 in 2010 and 2,764 in 2020.
Southwest Finnish dialects are Western Finnish dialects spoken in Southwest Finland and Satakunta.
Tavastian dialects are Western Finnish dialects spoken in Pirkanmaa, Päijät-Häme, Kanta-Häme, and in parts of Satakunta, Uusimaa and Kymenlaakso. The dialect spoken in the city of Tampere is part of the Tavastian dialects. The Tavastian dialects have influenced other Finnish dialects.
Karelians, also known as Finnish Karelians or Karelian Finns, are a subgroup of the Finnish people, traditionally living in Finnish Karelia. Karelians speak eastern dialects of the Finnish language: the South Karelian dialects are spoken in South Karelia, while the eastern Savonian dialects are spoken in North Karelia. The South Karelian dialects were spoken in the Karelian Isthmus prior to the Winter War. Karelians are traditionally Lutheran Christians, with an Orthodox Christian minority, belonging to either the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland or the Orthodox Church of Finland respectively.
Kemie is a village and administrative center of the Tohmajärvi municipality in North Karelia, Finland. At the end of 2020, the village had 1,445 inhabitants. It is located along the Highway 9, and like several North Karelian human settlements, Kemie has developed on top of a large, forested hill called vaara.
Karelian Proper is a supradialect of the Karelian language, which is a Finnic language. Karelian Proper is one of two/three Karelian dialects, along with Livvi-Karelian and Ludic. Karelian Proper is a direct descendent of the Old Karelian language, compared to Livvi-Karelian and Ludian supradialects which were formed through interactions between the Old Karelian and the Old Veps languages. Karelian Proper is situated in all of White Karelia and Central Karelia.
South Karelian is the most spoken of the two dialects of Karelian Proper, and it is spoken in the Republic of Karelia and in the Tver Oblast. South Karelian was also previously spoken in Border Karelia when it was apart of Finland. Many speakers of the South Karelian dialect were evacuated from Finnish Karelia into other areas of Finland during the 20th century, where a number of speakers are still retained. South Karelian displays a higher degree of regional variation than any other Karelian dialect.
Northern Karelian is one of the two dialects of Karelian Proper. Northern Karelian is spoken in White Karelia, and is spoken by some in Hietajärvi, Kuivajärvi and Kuhmo in Finland. Northern Karelian is the most mutually intelligible Karelian dialect to Finnish Language speakers.
The Karelian language is a Baltic Finnic language spoken mostly in the Republic of Karelia (Russia) and Finland. The earliest book of the Bible to be translated in Karelian dates to the 19th century, however the Lord's Prayer is known to have been translated already in the 16th century into Karelian. There have been recently new efforts to create translations into the Karelian language, and there exists two full New Testament translations in Karelian: "Uuzi Sana" in Livvi-Karelian and "Uuši Šana" in Northern Karelian.
Proto-Karelian, also known as the Old Karelian was a language once spoken on the western shore of Lake Ladoga in Karelia, from which the dialects of the Karelian language, Ludic, the Ingrian language, as well as the South Karelian and Savonian dialects of the Finnish language have developed. It was spoken around the 12th and 13th centuries, and the language was likely quite uniform with little regional variance. Old-Savonian developed from Proto-Karelian when the language of the inhabitants who had moved to the area around present-day Mikkeli mixed with western, likely Tavastian, speakers of Finnish. The Livvi-Karelian dialect and Ludic developed from the mixture of the old Vepsian language spoken by the Vepsians of the Olonets Isthmus and Proto-Karelian.
