a Pite Sámi legend from Arjeplog, from Ignácz Halász, Svéd-lapp nyelv V (1893)

A short legend told in Pite Sámi by Sámi of Arjeplog parish and taken down by Ignácz Halász at Saltdalen in Norway in 1891. A man who prays to the Father, the god of the old heathen times, comes as a guest to a rich herd-owner whose reindeer are sick; he breaks his clay pipe in three and throws it three ways, thunder and storm scatter the herd three ways, and the herd is saved. The teller ends by saying that the stranger was the Father himself.

Translation

There was a man who prayed to the Father. This Father is the god of those heathen times. Then that same man went to another man, who was very rich. He came there. It was still summertime when he was on his way.

When he came there as a guest, he went, too, to look at the herd about midday. That other man had a great sickness in his herd: all the teats had been seized by the spekle. But he said nothing at all there to the stranger, only gave him a milking pail, so that he should milk with them as a helper.

But when he had tried one milch-doe, he went on to another doe, and from that other to a third. When he had tried those, the stranger said to the owner of the herd: "Is your whole herd like this?" The rich man said: "My whole herd is like this."

Then the stranger got up and went to the field, or the reindeer fence. The herd, you see, was cōpcan. When the stranger came to the reindeer fence, he broke his clay pipe in three and threw it into three places as well.

A little while after that, thunder began to be heard, and it began to storm hard, and it scattered the whole herd into three places too, just as he had thrown the ends of the pipe. It began to pour hard as well, and the herd scattered. Then the stranger told the owner of the herd that he should let his herd go so. And so that herd of his was saved from that sickness.

For that strange man was the Father himself, who could do such things.

Colophon

Translated from the Pite Sámi of Ignácz Halász, Svéd-lapp nyelv V: Népköltési gyűjtemény a Pite-lappmark arjepluogi egyházkerületéből (Budapest: Magyar Tudományos Akadémia, 1893), no. 21, pp. 26–27, in the section of primeval legends. Halász took these texts down in 1891 at Saltdalen from Sámi of Arjeplog parish, and printed a Hungarian translation after each, which was not consulted: it was masked out of the page images before translation.

The words that decide the reading were checked in K. B. Wiklund's Lule-lappisches Wörterbuch (1890), in Lindahl and Öhrling's Lexicon Lapponicum (1780), in Halász's South Sámi dictionary (Svéd-lapp nyelv IV, 1891) and in Joshua Wilbur's A Grammar of Pite Saami (2014). Āčēk, Āčēhkau is "the Father" (Lindahl–Öhrling s.v. ATTJE, "pater, fader"), here a name: the text itself calls him jupmēl, "god" (Wiklund s.v. jupmele-, "gott"; Lindahl–Öhrling s.v. JUBMEL, "Deus"), of the heathen times. Ponnṭa, ponnṭe is "rich", "the rich man" (Wiklund s.v. pǫnta-, with pǫntu-, "reich werden"). Koʼiku is "to (someone)", the postposition that Halász IV gives as ḳoaikā, koaiku, kuoiku, "zu": muppēn koʼiku, "to another man". Kᵘœssēn is "as a guest" (Wiklund s.v. kuase-, "gast"). Tawṭa, taʼuṭa is "sickness" (Wiklund s.v. tau'ta-, "krankheit"). Späklūṭam is "had been seized by the spekle", a disease of reindeer (Lindahl–Öhrling s.v. SPEKLE, "morbi species rangiferorum … et slags sjukdom hos renar", and SPEKLOT, "dicto morbo corripi"); spekle is kept in the English as the name of the disease. Ńiččē are the teats (Lindahl–Öhrling s.v. NIDTJE, "uber, mamma, spene", where they add that reindeer often suffer sores of the teats in summer). Aināt is "only, but" (Wiklund s.v. ainat, "sondern, aber"). Nahpē is a milking pail (Lindahl–Öhrling s.v. NAPPE, "mulctra, mjölkstäfva"), and pohhčēt is "to milk" (Lindahl–Öhrling s.v. PÅTTJET, "mulgere, mjölka"). Ačai and ačasa, before an infinitive, are the auxiliary that Halász IV gives as ača-, "auxiliare cum infinitivo = «ut» finale": "so that he should milk", "that he should let his herd go". Ālṭū, allṭui is a milch-doe (Wiklund s.v. altu-, "rennkuh, die für gewöhnlich jedes jahr kalbt"). Eikāṭ, ēikāṭ is "owner" (Halász IV s.v. iéikete, "eigentümer"). Tōjēst is "broke" (Lindahl–Öhrling s.v. TÅJET, "frangere, bryta"), and poddo "a while" (Lindahl–Öhrling s.v. PÅDDÅ, "tempus, tid"). Aďďā is "thunder" (Wiklund s.v. aɪᶜa-, "grossvater; donner"). Rīṭeḳōtī is "began to storm" (Wiklund's loanword list s.v. rɪᶜtu-, "N.F. riddo"). Poððānī is "scattered" (Lindahl–Öhrling, Swedish index s.v. Skingra, "påddetet", and Skingras, "be scattered", "påddanet"). Ēhča is "himself" (Wiklund s.v. ęča-, "selbst"). Käč, rendered "you see", is taken as the interjection that Halász IV gives as keähč', "siehe!" (Lule keähča).

Read from context, or not settled by the dictionaries, and named here: hētnik is "heathen", from the Swedish hednisk. Viddi, "gave", is read as a past form of vaddēt, "give". Kullṭalam, "had tried", is a frequentative of kullāt, "hear" (in no. 20 the same stem is "heed"); the sense "try, look over" is read from context. Lannṭai, "to the field", is taken from Wiklund's lanta-, "land" (Swedish land), and pōcuj-raʼbĕda, "the reindeer fence", from pōcu, "reindeer", with a second element not found in the dictionaries. Čuhkėṭī, "came to", sparrali, "scattered", raššūḳōti, "began to pour", jäbᵉda kukte, "just as", and šụ̄hka, "sickness" (Swedish sjuka), are read from context. Laʼirē-pipō is a clay pipe (laʼirē, clay, as in Lindahl–Öhrling's laire litte, a clay vessel). Ihkep̣, "for", is read as ihke, "for, because" (Halász IV s.v. ihke, "weil, denn; dass"), with an ending that no dictionary explains. Kolᵒmo saďďai, "into three places", is said both of the breaking of the pipe and of the throwing; the English gives the first as "broke … in three". Cōpcan, said of the herd at the fence, is kept in Sámi: no dictionary decides it. Halász's bracketed variants (taʼuṭa, ālṭuw) are kept in the Source Text; the English gives each word once. Pite Sámi is close to Lule and South Sámi; where no dictionary of those languages decides a word, the reading is named here.

No English translation of this text 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: Supcas olᵒbma pirra, kuhte Āčēhkau rohkoṭalai

The Pite Sámi text as printed by Halász (1893), no. 21, transcribed from the page images in his phonetic spelling. Line-end hyphens are joined; Halász's first two paragraphs are divided here at the same places as the English.

te li akta olmaj, kute rohkoṭalai Āčēhkau. tāt lī Āčēk jupmēl tāi hētnik āikī. tē tahta sammā olmaj mannā muppēn koʼiku, kute lī alvūs ponnṭa. tē tohko pōhta. kēssē-aʼiḳē lē ville tahta, ku son lē mannamen.

ku son tē kᵘœssēn pōhta, mannā āi son ēlūp̣ kähhčat kaska-päʼivē pālēn. tē lē tān muppēn olᵒbman stûrra tawṭa (taʼuṭa) ēlūn, kaʼihka ńiččē lē späklūṭam. vala ē tā aktaḳīt hōlō tān apmasī, aināt viddi suńi nahpēp̣, ačai pohhčēt sijāin vähhkēn.

vala ku lī aktau ālṭū (ālṭuw) kullṭalam, vaʒʒā son muppē allṭui ja tahte muppēst kolmaṭi. ko lī taiṭe kullṭalam, jahhtā tāt amās ēlūn eikāṭī: «lē-kus kaʼihka tū ēllū nauhte?» ponnṭe jahhta: «nauhte lē kaʼihka mū ēllū.»

tē ċoǯǯīl amās ja vaʒʒā lannṭai jalā pōcuj-raʼbĕdai. cōpcan lī käč ēllū. ko tahta amās čuhkėṭī pōcuj-raʼbĕdai, tē tōjēst son laʼirē-pipō kolᵒmo saďďai ja palhkēst āi kolᵒmo saďďai.

unna poddo ta’te mañgēl kulluḳōtī aďďā ja rīṭeḳōtī sagga ja sparrali kaʼihka ēlūb āi kolᵒmo saďďai, jäbᵉda kukte son lēi pihpū-kēčit palhkēstam. raššūḳōti ai sagga ja ēllū poððānī. tē jahhtā amās ēlūn ēikāṭī, ačasa pāďďat ēlūws nauhte mannat. ja tē kāďďusi tat sū ēllū tate šụ̄hkast.

tat amās olmaj sa lī ihkep̣ ēhča Āċēk, kuhte mahtī täiṭe tahkat.

Source Colophon

Ignácz Halász, Svéd-lapp nyelv V: Népköltési gyűjtemény a Pite-lappmark arjepluogi egyházkerületéből (Budapest: Magyar Tudományos Akadémia, 1893), no. 21, pp. 26–27. Public domain. Transcribed from the page images of the scan of the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (REAL-EOD 4154). Halász's spelling is kept letter for letter, with his length marks, dots above and below, breves, raised vowels, ð, ʒ, ǯ, œ, the raised stroke of the checked syllable (written here ʼ), and his two bracketed variants. His Hungarian translation and his notes are not reproduced.

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