a song from Utsjoki, from Otto Donner, Lappalaisia lauluja (1876)
A joik for the halibut, the great flatfish of the northern sea, from Utsjoki at the northern tip of Finland. J. Fellman, who served as pastor there from 1819 to 1833, wrote it down, and Otto Donner printed it in his 1876 book of Sámi songs. It praises the fish as precious, big and strong, and says that once it is hooked even a strong man can hardly haul it into the boat.
Translation
The halibut swims
along the bottom of the sea,
and it is a precious fish,
big and strong.
When it has seized the hook,
hardly can
a mighty (? strong) man
haul it into the boat.
Colophon
Translated from the North Sámi of Otto Donner, Lappalaisia lauluja (Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura, 1876), no. 25, a song written down at Utsjoki by J. Fellman, who served there from 1819 to 1833. Donner printed a Finnish translation after each song; it was not consulted. The text used is the Project Gutenberg transcription of Donner's book, with the Sámi lines proofed against the Sámi of his German edition, Lieder der Lappen, 1876. Words were checked in the Sámi–Norwegian glossary that J. A. Friis printed in his Lappiske Sprogprøver (1856) and in his larger Ordbog over det lappiske Sprog (1887): the halibut is Friis's baldës, genitive balda, a halibut (1856), which gives Palda in the title; vụäddja is from vuogjat, to swim (1856), whose 1887 example mi bagjelist vuogjá, "which swims on top", has the same form; Mǟra is mærra, the sea (1887), and podńīmielt is bodne, bottom, with mielde, along (1887, which also gives mærra-bodne, the sea bottom); tiurās is divres or divras, dear, costly, precious (1887); kuälli is guölle, a fish (1856); "big" is Friis's stuores (1856), and kieurra is gjevra, strong (1856); vuggī is from vuogga, a fish-hook (1856, 1887), and toppi from doppit, to seize (1856, 1887); illạ is illa, hardly, scarcely (1887); vǟddja is from vægjet, to be able, to have the strength for (1887); olmai is a man (1856, 1887); vadnasī is vadnas, a boat (1856), "into the boat"; keässīt is gæsset, to pull or haul (1856). Vǟkka is Friis's vækka, might, strength (1887), here standing before "man", so "a mighty man"; Friis gives the same word for a crew or company, which would make it "a crew man", but Donner's own bracketed alternative, kieuras, is the form of gjevra, strong, that stands before a noun, and it points to strength. The English keeps that bracket and Donner's question mark: "a mighty (? strong) man". The title's juoigam is from juoiggat, to joik, to sing in the Sámi way, and Friis has the noun juoiggam, singing, a song, joiking (1887); it can be read as the act of joiking, as here, or as "I joik", which would make the title "I Joik the Halibut". Toppi is a past tense ("seized") beside the present vǟddja ("can"), and the English joins them as "when it has seized ... hardly can".
No English translation of this song is known to us.
© 2026 Tianmu Anglican Church. This English translation is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0: you may share and adapt it for non-commercial use with credit to the Good Works Library, tianmu.org. The source text keeps its own terms. For other uses, see Rights and Reuse.
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Source Text: Palda juoigam
The Sámi text as printed by Donner (1876), no. 25, from the Project Gutenberg transcription, proofed against his German edition.
Pǟltīs vụäddja
Mǟra podńīmielt,
Ja son lǟ tiurās kuälli
Stuörīs ja kieurra.
Ko vuggī toppi,
Illạ su vǟddja
Vǟkka (? kieuras) olmai
Vadnasī keässīt.
Source Colophon
Otto Donner, Lappalaisia lauluja (Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura, 1876), no. 25, written down at Utsjoki by J. Fellman. Public domain. Text from the Project Gutenberg transcription of the book (PG #73262, 2024), with the Sámi lines proofed against the Sámi of Donner's German edition, Lieder der Lappen (1876; Internet Archive identifier liederderlappen00unkngoog). The words in brackets, (? kieuras), are Donner's: an alternative reading for Vǟkka, with his question mark. Donner numbers every tenth line in his longer songs; no number falls within a song of eight lines, so none is left out here. Donner's phonetic letters are kept as printed, including ǟ, ā, ī, ń, and the dotted ụ and ạ.
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