ЮЖНАЯ КАРЕЛИЯ В КОНЦЕ ЭПОХИ СРЕДНЕВЕКОВЬЯ
SOUTH KARELIA AT THE END OF THE MIDDLE AGES

Summary/Abstract: The article discusses a number of issues related to the history of the settlement of south Karelia in the period before the colonization of its territory by modem Karelians. Archaeological evidence suggests that the region of study became inhabited about 9 thousand years ago, and the archaeological cultures emerged here gradually replaced each other throughout this time, up to the era of the Middle Ages. At the same time, researchers cannot determine exactly which languages were spoken by the local populations of the paleo-European archaeological cultures of Fennoscandia, which had been replaced by the ancestors of modem Sami. Thus, the earliest of reliably identifiable strata in the languages and toponymy of the peoples of modem Karelia is of (pre-)Sami origin. Traces of this layer are best preserved in toponymy, as well as in borrowed vocabulary in the Karelian, Vepsian and Russian languages. The Baltic-Finnish population of southern Karelia is also quite ancient, and it originated from the medieval Vepsians, who from the 10th century A. D. began the gradual settlement of the southern parts of Karelia. From the 13th century, the territory of Karelia began to be actively colonized by ancient Karelians, whose historic homeland was in the northwestern Ladoga area. Over time, the Ladoga Karelians assimilated both the autochthonous Sami population of Karelia, and most of the Veps who moved here from the Svir river area.

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