September 10 and 12, 2025, will be historic days for Sámi museums and Sámi culture field: A decorative antler spoon from the Southern Sámi region will be returned from the Sámi Museum Siida in Inari, Finland, to Saemien Sijte – the Southern Sámi museum and cultural center in Snåsa, Norway. This is the first return between two Sámi museums.

The antler spoon, which was a personal item attached to a belt, is engraved with the year 1893. The spoon was originally given to Finnish linguist Eliel Lagercrantz by Malena Torkelsen – also known as Aahka Meele – during his documentation trip in 1925. Malena was a well-known figure in the mountain regions of Snåsa and Lierne and lived in Snåsa during her adult life. Lagercrantz later sold the spoon to the National Museum of Finland in 1931. In 2021, the National Museum of Finland returned its entire collection of Sámi artifacts to the Sámi Museum Siida, and thus Malena’s spoon also ended up in Inari.

On Wednesday, September 10, Birgitta Fossum, director of Saemien Sijte, will travel to Inari to receive the spoon from Taina Máret Pieski, director of the Sámi Museum Siida, in an official handover ceremony at Siida.

– The return of our cultural heritage to its home is of great significance. We are delighted to be able to return the antler spoon to its home region, and we hope that it will convey its significance to current and future generations in the community, says Taina Máret Pieski, director of the Sámi Museum Siida.

On Friday, September 12, Saemien Sijte invites you to an open event in Snåsa, where the antler spoon and photographs from Lagercrantz’s documentation trip will be on display.

– This is an important milestone for the Southern Sámi community and Sámi museums in general. The object has great cultural and historical value, and we are proud to receive it, says Birgitta Fossum, director of Saemien Sijte.

The spoon is not only a personal possession, but also part of the history and identity of the Southern Sámi. Lagercrantz left behind detailed notes from his travels, in which he describes, among other things, 34 huts on a mountain farm in Snåsa and encounters with several Sámi people. This material is also very interesting to study.

The event will be held at Saemien Sijte on September 12 at 2:00 p.m. The press is welcome at 1:00 p.m.

 

Further information

Saemien Sijte

Museum Director Birgitta Fossum
Tel. +47 948 56 586
birgitta.fossum@saemiensijte.no

Curator Lisa Dunfjeld-Aagård
Tel. +47 940 17 021
lisa.dunfjeld-aagard@saemiensijte.no

Sámi Museum Siida

Museum Director Taina Máret Pieski
Tel. 050 5351574
taina.pieski@samimuseum.fi

Chief Curator Anni Guttorm
Tel. 0400 891 860
anni.guttorm@samimuseum.fi

 

 

Sámi Museum Siida is carrying out a community-based project to explore how best to make returned Sámi objects part of living Sámi culture. The grant continues the Finnish Cultural Foundation’s long-standing support for the Sámi culture and languages.

Items belonging to the Sámi culture have been collected for European museums and research institutes since the 17th century, and the looting of Sámi graves for research purposes continued into the 20th century. Around 50,000 Sámi objects are still held in museum collections around Europe.

Today, the way museums have historically acquired their collections is being criticised. By what right were items collected and to whom do they belong?

The Sámi Museum Siida has worked towards the repatriation of Sámi cultural material for decades. In 2021, the National Museum of Finland returned more than 2,200 objects from its Sámi collection to Siida, and repatriation processes are currently underway with a number of European museums. Siida has received several international awards for its work, including the Europa Nostra Award 2022 and the titles of European Museum of the Year and Finnish Museum of the Year 2024.

The Finnish Cultural Foundation granted €850,000 to Siida’s three-year project Ellos min árbi! (Long Live Our Cultural Heritage!), which involves studying and developing a Sámi way of processing the repatriation of objects together with the community. The aim is to publish the knowledge and research results gained to benefit other indigenous museums. The project will also result in the travelling exhibition Máhccan – Homecoming, research articles, a guide on best practices, a podcast series and an international conference on repatriation.

Information about the previous owners and historical use of the returned objects will be collected in workshops. These workshops will provide Sámi communities with the opportunity to connect with the objects their ancestors used by reminiscing about and studying them and by giving them new meanings. Through this community-based provenance research, the knowledge and skills associated with the objects will be once more restored as part of living Sámi culture.

In other words, the repatriation of objects involves more than just moving them from one place to another. It is a symbolic process that reinforces the continuity of Sámi identity and culture.

“The Finnish Cultural Foundation has previously supported Siida in the redesign of its main exhibition. Now, Siida is launching a new and significant opening in museum practice, linking the repatriation of objects to community knowledge as an active process. This means that museum pieces are physically, culturally and spiritually restored as part of living culture,” says Susanna Pettersson, CEO of the Finnish Cultural Foundation.

“We want to explore and develop a Sámi way of researching and repatriating objects and carrying out community work. If successful, our project will provide new knowledge and experience of repatriation that will benefit other indigenous peoples and the museum scene as a whole,” says Taina Máret Pieski, Museum Director of the Sámi Museum Siida.

Sámi Museum Siida is located in the town of Inari. It is a national museum responsible for its special field, Sámi culture, and a regional museum responsible for tasks concerning cultural environments in the Sámi Area.

 

Further information

Taina Máret Pieski

Museum Director of the Sámi Museum Siida

+358 50 535 1574

tainamaret.pieski@samimuseum.fi

 

Susanna Petterson

CEO of the Finnish Cultural Foundation

susanna.pettersson@skr.fi