a tale from the Ulfsfjord in Karlsøy, from J. A. Friis, Lappiske Sprogprøver (1856)

The rauga is the draug of the northern coast, a ghost of the sea; Friis's 1887 dictionary calls it the ghost of one who has drowned. Told in North Sámi at Moskovuodna, the Ulfsfjord in Karlsøy, and printed by Jens Andreas Friis in 1856, in Sámi only, this short tale is told by one who was in the boat: talking, a bell, weeping and laughter are heard one after another, a white bird comes aboard, and something holds the boat fast until the skipper strikes fire.

Translation

Once my father and I were coming from Finkrogen, and when we came to Ulfstinden we heard talking; and when the sound of the talking ended, we heard a bell ringing; and when the sound of the bell ended, we heard weeping; and when the sound of the weeping ended, we heard laughing; when the sound of the laughing ended, we saw a bird; and the bird was as white as snow.

And the bird came to the boat, and it went into the stern, and then it left there and went into the sea, and it set three fingers straight up along the side of the boat, and it began to hold the boat. Then the skipper had to strike fire, and with that tinder-fire he got the boat moving forward again.

Then we rowed half a mile, and the same Rauga came to the boat, and took the boat, and carried it the same distance back again. Then the skipper did not know what to do. Then he tried to strike fire with the tinder, and to put sulphur into the tinder to burn; and when he had made the tinder and the sulphur ready, he was able to go on, and a voice was heard, as if saying: "Farewell!"

Then the boat went forward; but the skipper came to harm, and had to lie down, and he lay all the way home, and it was still a mile's journey home. And he became well again when he came home.

Colophon

Translated from the North Sámi of Lappiske Sprogprøver: en Samling af lappiske Eventyr, Ordsprog og Gaader, edited by J. A. Friis (Christiania: J. W. Cappelen, 1856), p. 91, from the group told at Moskovuodna (Mosko-vuodna), which Friis's glossary names as the Ulfsfjord in Karlsøy. Friis printed it in Sámi only. The text was transcribed from the page images of the New York Public Library copy; Friis's list of misprints has no correction for this page. Words were checked in the Sámi–Norwegian glossary that Friis printed at the back of the same book, and in his larger Ordbog over det lappiske Sprog (1887): a rauga (ravga) is a draug or water-troll, in the 1887 dictionary the ghost of a drowned person; boagostet is to laugh, and a biello is an angular bell; the skota or skottas is the fore or after end of a boat, and maŋŋe-skota the stern; borde is a board, here the boat's side, and ceggi is "straight up"; dola gaskat is to strike fire; nivsak or nivsat is tinder, made, says the 1887 dictionary, from the fungus of the birch; rišša (riša) is sulphur; vikka is a mile and vikka-bælle half a mile, the Norwegian mile of Friis's day being about seven English miles; the hævedsmanne is the skipper of a boat; varrës is "well, sound"; and mana dærvan! is "Farewell!", said by the one who stays behind. Oaǯoi bahaid, literally "got bad things" (bahha, "bad, evil"), is rendered "came to harm", as the 1887 dictionary has the phrase (bahaid oaǯǯot, faa ondt). The place names Nokkoin and Agjegin are given in the English by the Norwegian names Friis's glossary supplies for them, Finkrogen (Nokko(m)) and Ulfstinden (Agje(gin)); the case endings, read as "from" and "to", follow the sense. The Sámi tells "the skipper does not know what to do" in the present tense; the English keeps to the past. The Sámi does not say whether the skipper is the narrator's father, and neither does the English.

No complete English translation of Friis's collection 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.

🌲

Source Text: Rauga

North Sámi text as printed by Friis (1856), p. 91, in his orthography; his list of misprints has no correction for this page; the one line-end hyphen is joined. Friis's single paragraph is divided here at the same places as the English.

De læime ovta gærde boattemen moaj ačin Nokkoin, ja dego moaj bođin Agjegin, de moaj gulain sardnomen; ja dego dat sardnom-jedna nogai, de moaj gulain biellon skillamen; ja dego dat biello-jedna nogai, de moaj gulain čierromen; ja dego dat čierrom-jedna nogai, de moaj gulain boagastæme; dego dat boagostam-jedna nogai, de moaj ojnin ovta lodde; ja de dat lodde læi nu vielgad go muotta.

Ja de son bođi dat lodde vânci, ja de son manai maŋŋje skottasin, ja de son vulgi dobbe ja manai merri, ja de son bijai golbma suorbma ceggi vânca borde mielde bajas, ja de son algi doallat vânca. De hevedsmannë ferti gaskat dola, ja deina nivsat-dolain oaǯoi vasten vânca jottët oudas.

De moaj sugain vikka-bæle, de bođi sæmme rauga vânci, ja de valdi vânca, ja de doalvoi sæmme matke vasten ruoktot. De hevedsmannë i dieđe rađđën meidege. De gæččali gaskat dola nivsain ja bigjat riša sisa dan nivsahan buöllët, ja dego son læi dan ǹivsahan ja riša rakadam, de son bæsai jottët, ja de gullui jedna nugo dagjamen: „Mana dærvan!“

De manai vânca oudas; mutto hevedsmannë oaǯoi bahaid ja šaddai vællahët ja vællahi sida ragjai, ja vikka matke læi vela sida ragjai. De šaddai vasten varrës, go siddi bođi.

Source Colophon

J. A. Friis (ed.), Lappiske Sprogprøver (Christiania: J. W. Cappelen, 1856), p. 91, under the heading Mosko-vuodna; Friis's list of misprints has no correction for this page. Public domain. Transcribed from the page images of the New York Public Library copy, digitized by Google (Internet Archive identifier lappiskesprogpr00friigoog); a former owner's handwritten marks in that copy are not part of the text. Friis's letters are kept as printed, including â, ö, ë, č, đ, š, ŋ and ǯ, which he distinguishes from plain ʒ, and the grave accent printed over the n of ǹivsahan.

🌲