Finland-Swedes: Encyclopedia II - Finland-Swedes - History

Finland-Swedes - History

The Swedish-speaking minority of Finland descends chiefly from:

• peasant and fisherman settlements on coastal areas and islands in today's Finland some time between 1000 and 1250AD. [1]
• settlers who arrived to some coastlines and archipelagos with the Viking raids and trade connections (the "East Way" in the 10th to 13th century, perhaps even earlier when towns in present-day Russia also had Norse colonies). One theory suggests that Finland's coastal areas may have had continuous or sporadic Indo-European speaking settlers during the Corded Ware culture, ca 20th century BC.

• settlers who arrived with Christian missionaries, crusaders and administrators in the early middle ages of Finland (13th to 15th century).
• socially ambitious Finnish families; the Swedish mother tongue was a great social advantage from the 17th to the 19th century. Socially ambitious families often raised their children in Swedish, ultimately leading to a situation where the administrative elite had a limited knowledge of the majority language, Finnish.
• foreign immigrants. Plenty of non-Finnic immigrants, particularly burgesses and the elite, chose to adopt the Swedish language instead of Finnish. For example, Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim a Finland-Swedish military leader and President of Finland in the early 20th century, had his roots in the Netherlands.
• Swedish settlers throughout the period of close connections, ca 15th to 19th century.

About 60,000 Swedish-speaking Finns are estimated to have emigrated to Sweden during the second half of the 20th century.

The number of Finland-Swedes reached its maximum in 1940, with 354.286 persons.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "History", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki