Tornedalians (Meänkieli: tornionlaaksolaiset; Finnish: tornionjokilaaksolaiset; Swedish: tornedalingar) are an ethnic minority native to the Torne Valley (Meänmaa) region in northern Sweden and Finland.

[5] Tornedalians are generally thought to be descended from the ancient Kvens, first mentioned by Ohthere of Hålogaland in 890, though recountings of Tornedalian history often begin with the birkarls who are first mentioned in 1328 in a legal hearing by the Swedish Drots Knut Jonsson over disputes with the Hälsings who the birkarls claimed were encroaching on their lands.

[6][7] The birkarls were through the 14th to the 17th century slowly incorporated into and replaced by the Swedish state, with the establishing of Christianity beginning in the 1400s though some pagan burials continued until the early 1600s.

[8][7] Finnic settlement in the Bothnian Bay likely extended as far as the Pite and Lule Rivers by the 11- and 1200s, though Swedish colonisation beginning in the 1300s largely displaced and assimilated these populations.

[23] No equivalent ban was ever instituted in Finland, however what is now called Meänkieli was heavily looked down upon and de facto forbidden in school.

Tornionlaaksolaiset) originally refers specifically to someone living along the lower course of the Torne river, beginning roughly in Pajala municipality, though the term has also come to be widely used to denote all 'Tornedalians'.

[37] Christianity first gained a proper foothold in the region in the 1400s and by the 1600s had come to be the dominant religion, largely displacing earlier pagan beliefs.

[38] According to traditional beliefs, a saivo is a special kind of holy "double-bottomed" lake which can act as a portal to the land of the dead.

[38] A significant religious shift would come to Meänmaa in the mid-1800s when the Swedish priest Lars Levi Læstadius began preaching his beliefs in the area.

Læstadius, while largely Swedish, had during his childhood learned Sámi (primarily Lulesámi as is spoken in Kvikkjokk) however had no knowledge of Meänkieli when he first came to the area in the 1820s.

Lars Levi Læstadius gained great popularity in Meänmaa, though especially in his earlier years his devout belief in temperance caused trouble.

[41] When Lars Levi Læstadius died in 1861, preacher Johan Raattamaa [sv] took up the mantle as spiritual leader of the movement.

[42][43] During the 1930s, the Korpela Movement gripped Meänmaa, promising that God would soon make a crystal bridge to Palestine where a utopia would be established.

The Korpela movement, while originally branching from Læstadianism was much more lenient with the consumption of alcohol, and extramarital sexual relations could be described as accepted, if not outright encouraged.

[46][45] Sweden does not distinguish minority groups in population censuses, but the number of people who identify themselves as "Tornedalians" is usually estimated to be between 30,000 and 150,000.

[citation needed] The oldest works of native Tornedalian literature known today are two runic songs by Antti Keksi (1622-1705, known in Swedish as Anders Kexi).

Titled Liikheitä in Meänkieli (Swedish: Rörelser; Finnish: Valitut), it follows the rise and fall of the Korpela movement.