Would ancient Finnish tribes have spoken the same language?

[Dickyboi19]

Idk the history and am too lazy to do my research but it would be interesting if there was a language factor that limited your interactions with tribes other than your own unless you could learn the language from a safe or something. Like imagine all the normal tribes people couldn't understand you or had limited dialogue options but their sage may be able to communicate with you and by doing a quest or 3 for him could teach you the local language so that you could get more interaction from the rest of the tribe. It'd be cool because it would make you more tangibly connected to your own tribe and more of an outsider to others. All of this is irrelevant if the real tribes of Finland had a common language but it's an interesting concept none the less.

[PALU]

The Finnish tribes, including the Saami (who are found in Norway, Sweden, and Russia as well), share a common ancestry, and thus have common linguistic roots. If I remember the cursory reading I've done correctly, the current day Saami are divided into 3-4 languages (the border between language and dialect is very much fluid and depends on politics as much as actual differences), but I would expect all the languages to have been a fair bit closer to each other than they are today.
People speaking closely related language are often able to understand each other with minor difficulties, as long as the parties put at least some effort into it.

[Tom H]

People speaking closely related language are often able to understand each other with minor difficulties, as long as the parties put at least some effort into it.

Of course, and all the proper Finnishing schools teach them...( )

[JP_Finn]

Saami and Finnish aren’t that close to each. I.e. personally can understand all Finnish dialects, but don’t know a word of Saami.

Various regional dialects use different words for same thing. “Vasta or vihta”. “Löylykauha or kuuppa”. Coastal regions mingle in Swedish origin words; which vary by regions too.
As per ancient Finnish, there’s literally* no record. First written Finnish was by Mikael Agricola in 1543 “ABC kiria” (ABC kirja / book)

*ah so punderful

[PALU]

Yes, but 800-1000 years ago the language differences ought to have been smaller, as I believe both the Saami and the Finns originate from the same group migrating from the East (although I don't know when that happened. Apparently the group moved in to a population vacuum resulting from the previous Finnish population largely dying off before the migration [so the migrants do not appear to have been the cause]). Also, the "contamination" from Swedish ought to have been smaller at that time (I don't know whether the usage of Swedish along the coast resulted from contact, migration, or both, nor when Swedish got a foothold there), apart from it being independent of the political powers.

At the time of the UrW time line the Vikings appear to have had no major problems speaking to each other, while nowadays Icelandic is too far removed from the other languages to be understood without some training (or, rather, the case is the reverse, as Icelandic has changed little, which the other languages have changed a fair bit).

[JP_Finn]

Folklore in Tampere-Nokia-Tottijärvi region tells of a story of ancient Finns moving into the area and Saami shaman’s toddler son choked on a fish bone of massive bream gifted by the newcomers.
The shaman cursed the bream population of Pyhäjärvi around Vapalo island. Sinking in a wooden idol carved from pine fat wood; “until the idol’s fully rotten, there’ll be no large bream in these waters”
And then the saami tribe moved north.

Never caught large bream in the waters, but on neighboring waters. Strong curse 🤔

[JP_Finn]

Point was to note that folklore would indicate saami were already in the area when Western cultures (hämäläiset) arrived.
There’s also archeological evidence to point to several migrations. There’s some pre-steel/iron age find of dwellings in the nearby area that were dated to ~4000 BCE (stone, bronze)

That is often deemed as indication of varied cultures (often varied language as well)