Jeg vurderte først å lage en helt egen side om samiske båter, men jeg har konkludert med at samiske båtbyggere har vært så involvert i byggingen av den vanlige nordlandsbåten, at jeg ikke fant det rett å skille alt stoff ut under en separat side. Det er likevel noen båttyper som ser ut til å være helt særegne for samer, da i Finnmark, og disse er vist på denne siden. Dessverre har jeg heller lite stoff om dette, så presentasjonen lider under dette. Det meste jeg har skrevet om sjøsamene, ligger under siden om nordlandsbåten.

Elvebasker - Finnmark

Elvebaskene er avlange og lette båter spesielt tilpasset strøm og grunne elver. Fra gammelt av hadde de gjerne et eller to årepar og spiss gatt akter. Kjølen var nærmest en bred bunnplanke. En båt med to årepar kunne gjerne være 9 - 10 meter lang, med et langt åpent rom akter til last og passasjerer. Senere ble elvebaskene motorisert med påhengsmotorer.

Skoltebask - Øst-Finnmark / Kola / Nord-Finland

Skoltesamene er en undergruppe av samene som tradisjonelt hører hjemme langt øst i Finnmark og på Kola. Skoltebasken er en enkel robåt med aner som ser ut til å direkte tilbake til Folkevandringstiden. Bordganger og kjøl er hugget med øks, og saumen er gjort med sener. Eksemplaret på Sjøfartsmuseet i Oslo er ikke nødvendigvis representativt for den håndverksmessige kvaliteten på disse båtene.

Dessverre har jeg ikke lyktes i å finne hjemmesider til båtbyggere i Finnmark som lager elvebasker. Finner du en, så send meg gjerne linken.

Magnar Varsi i Finnmark lager en trekano som er en hybrid av indianerkanoer og samisk elvebåt. Resultatet er blitt en svært vakker og spennende farkost. Her er også mer info om elvebåter.

12.10.2008, Jørn Olav Løset

At first I concidered to make a separate page about the Sami boat types, but I soon realized that Sami boatbuilders were so involved in building the common Nordland boat that it is rather pointless to distinguish the Sami boat builders from other boat builders in northern Norway. They were just as good boat builders as anyone else up north, usinge the same tools and procedures, including blacksmithing and iron clinkering the hulls. However, some certain boat types seem to have been built solely by the Sami's, and are closely connected to the Sami's way of life in the arctic regions in Scandinavia. They are mainly simple, light and unrigged crafts that were suited to the broad rivers in Finnmark and the Kola peninsula, where the rivers are reknowned for their rich populations of atlantic salmon and sea trout.

Elvebask - sami river boats in Finnmark

The "elvebask", meaning "riverboat", are oblong and light boats that are specially adapted to use in shallow rivers with moderate to strong currents. They have a broad keel plank, rather than a real keel, which makes the boats easy to land on river banks and prevents that the hull is caught by sudden cross currents.

A Sami river boat with two pairs of oars could be 9 to 10 meters long and a beam of about 1 m. A long and open room aft in the boat was a compartment for cargo and fishing gear. Modern Sami river-basks are usually converted to or built for fitting an outboard engine.

Skoltebask - Eastern Finnmark / Kola peninsula, Russia / Northern Finland

The Skolte sami's are a subgroup of the Sami people who traditionally inhabits the eastern part of Finnmark, Kola in northwestern Russia and northern Finland. The Skoltebask is a simple rowing craft which probably has undergone only minor changes since the Migration age, some 1500 years ago. The strakes and shallow keel is fashioned with axes, and all plank joints are stitched with sinews or withies.
Only very few of the these boats have survived, so we are left with too few examples to evaluate properly how these rare boats really were. The example in the picture above is probably too roughly built to do the boat builders of the Skolte Sami just. Rock carvings along the shores in Finnmark and in the White Sea in Russia reveals that boats have been used in this area at least since the younger stone age. Rock art from Kanozero in Russia reveals that Man hunted for whales already in Neolithicum, using multiple seagoing crafts to hunt down the whales with barbed harpoons of bone. The harpoons were connected to on or more inflated bladders from animals with a line, which acted as a buoy that tired the wounded whale and eventually forced it to the surface. The Kanozero carvings may be the oldest depictions of whale hunting in the World.