The Finland Portal
Finland (Finnish: Suomi [ˈsuo̯mi] (
listen); Swedish: Finland [ˈfɪ̌nland] (listen)), officially the Republic of Finland (Finnish: Suomen tasavalta; Swedish: Republiken Finland (listen to all)), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, across from Estonia. Finland covers an area of 338,455 square kilometres (130,678 sq mi) with a population of 5.6 million. Helsinki is the capital and largest city. The vast majority of the population are ethnic Finns. Finnish and Swedish are the official languages, Swedish is the native language of 5.2% of the population. Finland's climate varies from humid continental in the south to the boreal in the north. The land cover is primarily a boreal forest biome, with more than 180,000 recorded lakes.
Finland was first inhabited around 9000 BC after the Last Glacial Period. The Stone Age introduced several different ceramic styles and cultures. The Bronze Age and Iron Age were characterized by contacts with other cultures in Fennoscandia and the Baltic region. From the late 13th century, Finland became a part of Sweden as a consequence of the Northern Crusades. In 1809, as a result of the Finnish War, Finland became part of the Russian Empire as the autonomous Grand Duchy of Finland, during which Finnish art flourished and the idea of independence began to take hold. In 1906, Finland became the first European state to grant universal suffrage, and the first in the world to give all adult citizens the right to run for public office. After the 1917 Russian Revolution, Finland declared independence from Russia. In 1918, the fledgling state was divided by the Finnish Civil War. During World War II, Finland fought the Soviet Union in the Winter War and the Continuation War, and Nazi Germany in the Lapland War. It subsequently lost parts of its territory, but maintained its independence. (Full article...)
Selected article -
Ahtisaari in 2012 |
Martti Oiva Kalevi Ahtisaari (Finnish: [ˈmɑrtːi ˈʔoi̯ʋɑ ˈkɑleʋi ˈʔɑhtisɑːri] (listen); born 23 June 1937) is a Finnish politician, the tenth president of Finland (1994–2000), a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, and a United Nations diplomat and mediator noted for his international peace work.
Selected image -
Photo credit: commons:User:AngMoKio
Mika Häkkinen driving a Mercedes-Benz DTM racing car at Stars and Cars in Stuttgart, Germany.
Did you know (auto-generated)
- ... that Domus Litonii is the only remaining 19th-century residential building in the entire centre of Helsinki?
- ... that Finnish politician Maija Perho encouraged future president Sauli Niinistö to join the National Coalition Party in the 1960s?
- ... that the United States severed diplomatic ties with Finland in 1944 because of a personal letter sent to Hitler?
- ... that Vieno Simonen was first elected to the Finnish parliament in 1948, ten years after she was widowed with seven children?
- ... that Alli Lahtinen, the first woman to lead a central government agency in Finland, helped establish the country's national child care system?
- ... that in 1975, Finland's Minister of Education Marjatta Väänänen sent a petition to the Archbishop of Turku with almost 1 million signatures, advocating for the introduction of female priests?
Wikiprojects
You are invited to participate in Finland WikiProject, a WikiProject dedicated to developing and improving articles about Finland.
More did you know -
- ...that according to Lapsiporno.info, a blacklist of websites compiled by the Finnish National Bureau of Investigation included those containing legal pornography?
- ...that Ismo Alanko Säätiö's accordionist Kimmo Pohjonen has been dubbed the "Jimi Hendrix of the accordion" by the Finnish music press?
- ...that the Christmas carol Personent hodie, first published in the 1582 Finnish song book Piae Cantiones, is thought to be a parody of a 12th-century carol?
- ...that Anssi Koivuranta is leading the 2008–09 Nordic Combined World Cup right now?
- ...that the Finnish tango is an established variation of the Argentine tango and one of the most enduring and popular music forms in Finland?
Good article -
A scene of the Kauhajoki vocational college campus a few hours after the shooting |
The Kauhajoki school shooting occurred on 23 September 2008 at the Seinäjoki University of Applied Sciences (SeAMK) in Kauhajoki, Finland. The gunman, 22-year-old student Matti Juhani Saari, shot and killed ten people with a Walther P22 Target semi-automatic pistol, before shooting himself in the head. He died a few hours later at Tampere University Hospital. One woman was injured but was in a stable condition.
The shooting took place at the Kauhajoki School of Hospitality, owned by the Seinäjoki Municipal Federation of Education. The facilities and campus were shared between SeAMK and the Seinäjoki Vocational Education Centre – Sedu. Saari was a second-year student in a Hospitality Management undergraduate degree programme. The incident was the second school shooting in less than a year in Finland, the other being the Jokela school shooting in November 2007, in which nine people including the gunman died. Before that, only one other school shooting had taken place in the country's history, in Rauma in 1989, leaving two people dead. (Full article...)General images
- Northern Europe in 814 (from History of Finland)
- Erkki Karu, one of the pioneers of the Finnish cinema, with cinematographer Eino Kari in 1927 (from Culture of Finland)
- Karjalanpiirakka, a traditional Finnish pastry. (from Culture of Finland)
- A smoke sauna (savusauna) in Enonkoski (from Culture of Finland)
- Students on Helsinki's Esplanadi wearing their caps on Vappu (from Culture of Finland)
- Midsummer bonfire (kokko) in Mäntsälä (from Culture of Finland)
- A peasant girl and a woman in traditional dress from Ruokolahti, eastern Finland, as depicted by Severin Falkman in 1882 (from Culture of Finland)
- Eero Järnefelt, Burning the Brushwood, 1893 (from History of Finland)
- A triptych by Akseli Gallen-Kallela, depicting the Aino Story of Kalevala on three panes. (from Culture of Finland)
- Prehistoric red ochre painted rock art of moose, human figures, and boats in Astuvansalmi, Finland from ca. 3800–2200 BC. (from Culture of Finland)
- President K. J. Ståhlberg in his office in 1919. (from History of Finland)
- The first government of independent Finland. P. E. Svinhufvud, the first Prime Minister of Finland, sitting at the head of the table. (from History of Finland)
- Grand Duchy of Finland, 75 kopek assignat (1824) (from History of Finland)
- Women in sauna with Vihtas.
- Janne Ahonen is considered one of the best and most successful currently active ski jumpers. (from Culture of Finland)
- People gathered in the Senate Square for a demonstration against the February Manifesto in March 1899 (from History of Finland)
- The Finnish composer Jean Sibelius (1865–1957), a significant figure in the history of classical music. (from Culture of Finland)
- Finnish folk dancers in a 1907 postcard sent from Mustamäki, Finland (from Culture of Finland)
- The Swedish empire at its largest. Most of present-day Finland was part of Sweden proper, rike, shown in dark green. (from History of Finland)
- Ancylus Lake covered major part of Finland (7,500–6,000 BC) (from History of Finland)
- Homann's map of the Scandinavian Peninsula and Fennoscandia with their surrounding territories: northern Germany, northern Poland, the Baltic region, Livonia, Belarus, and parts of Northwest Russia. Johann Baptist Homann (1664–1724) was a German geographer and cartographer; map dated around 1730. (from History of Finland)
- Signing the Helsinki Accords are the West German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, East Germany's leader Erich Honecker, US president Gerald Ford and the Austrian chancellor Bruno Kreisky (from History of Finland)
- 2007 Formula One World Champion Kimi Räikkönen celebrating victory at the 2007 Brazilian Grand Prix. (from Culture of Finland)
- An old drawing of the city of Turku in the 18th century (from History of Finland)
- Kreeta Haapasalo Playing the Kantele in a Peasant Cottage (1868), by Robert Wilhelm Ekman (from History of Finland)
- A summer cottage (mökki) on a lake island (from Culture of Finland)
- Linus Torvalds, a famous Fennoswede software engineer, best known for initiating the development of the Linux kernel (from Culture of Finland)
- The area controlled by Finland at its largest, in 1942 (from History of Finland)
- In 2011 figure skater Kiira Korpi was ranked 4th in the world. (from Culture of Finland)
- Pieces of the Antrea Net (8,300 BC), the oldest-known fishing net in the world. (from History of Finland)
- A reconstruction of a 12th-century Perniö costume (from History of Finland)
![Image 2Kastelli Giant's Church in Pattijoki by Pöljä culture [fi] (from History of Finland)](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/60/Kastelli_giant%27s_church_1.JPG/240px-Kastelli_giant%27s_church_1.JPG){kind=small}
Related portals
Selected panorama -
Topics
| History |  | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Geography | |||||
| Politics | |||||
| Economy | |||||
| Society |
| ||||
Categories
Recognized content
Things you can do
- Add the ((Portal|Finland)) template to existing See also sections of Finland-related articles.
- Tag the talk pages of Finland-related articles with the ((WikiProject Finland)) template. (Tip: Use PetScan to find articles that are not tagged yet. Just replace the category "Finnish films" with another category and adjust "Depth" if needed. This tool is helpful for tagging.)
- Rate unassessed articles according to the guidelines.
- Translate a Finnish-language article into English.
- Expand a stub into a full article.
- Help with the articles needing attention (watch).
- Create a requested article (watch).
- Support fresh articles (watch).
- Patrol the recent changes.
- Add the following pages to your watchlist:
Associated Wikimedia
The following Wikimedia Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:
-
Commons
Free media repository -
Wikibooks
Free textbooks and manuals -
Wikidata
Free knowledge base -
Wikinews
Free-content news -
Wikiquote
Collection of quotations -
Wikisource
Free-content library -
Wikiversity
Free learning tools -
Wikivoyage
Free travel guide -
Wiktionary
Dictionary and thesaurus
