This study aims to unfold and explain the historical Swedish view upon the Samic people. The fundamental question asked is: ”In which manner, or manners, are the Samic people in the so called Lappmarkerna portrayed by Swedish missionaries during the 17th century? The study makes use of five Swedish missionaries’ written accounts of their travels in Lappmarkerna during the 17th century. The primary sources are examined through a hermeneutic method and the results are analyzed from a postcolonial theoretical framework based mostly on Edward Said’s Orientalism and Ania Loomba’s Colonialism/postcolonialism. The results unfold a view of the Samic people as indeed something other than the rest of the Swedes. The Samic people were described as cowardly, lazy, small in stature, not particularly strong, vigorous, fairly intelligent, disgraceful in the context of trade and very skilled with a bow and at hunting in general, but lacking any inclination towards war. The view of the Samic people as the other is however mostly not based on a suggestion that there were any ontological differences between the Samic people and the Swedes. On the contrary, the described differences were mostly ascribed to historical and cultural causes. It’s plausible that the explanation for the limited claims about any fundamental differences is found in the Swedish missionaries’ purpose of producing accounts of their travels. The Swedish missionaries were probably inclined to emphasize the basic similiarities in order to establish that the Samic people were possible to convert to Christianity as well as foster into becoming proper Swedish subjects.

Sturgeon species (order Acipenseriformes) are prone for interspecific hybridization. Anthropogenic activities in river basins influence sturgeon reproduction by destruction of their natural spawning grounds. Consequently, spawning areas, as well as the time of spawning of sturgeon species overlap and different sturgeon species reproduce concurrently. This increases the probability of meeting of heterospecific gametes and pre-zygotic postcopulatory reproductive barriers, comprising of sperm competition and cryptic female choice, may play an important role in preventing undesirable interspecific hybridization. The goal of this study was to evaluate the role of interspecific sperm competition and cryptic female choice during interspecific hybridization of sterlet (Acipenser ruthenus) and Siberian sturgeon (Acipenser baerii). Reproductive characteristics (fertilization rate and hatching rate) were described in each of experimental and control groups showing similar values for competitive and non-competitive trials. Parentage assignment was performed in hatched larvae using combination of mitochondrial DNA and microsatellite DNA markers. Obtained results revealed higher fertilization success of sterlet spermatozoa, when these competed for fertilization with spermatozoa of Siberian sturgeon. Total reproductive success of starlet spermatozoa was 78.9 % and Siberian sturgeon 21.1 %. Contrary, when spermatozoa did not compete for fertilization, males of analysed species showed equal fertilization success. In the trials, where eggs of both studied species were mixed and fertilized by sperm from each species separately, eggs of any species did not show a tendency to bias fertilization by spermatozoa of conspecific males. Probably, there are no pre-zygotic postcopulatory reproductive barriers that prevent interspecific hybridization of sterlet and Siberian sturgeon at the gametic level.