Ingrian language - Definition

The Ingrian Finns (inkeriläinen or inkerin suomalainen) is a Lutheran Finnic people traditionally inhabiting the Saint Petersburg area and Northern Estonia (Ingria). They are primarily distinguished by their Protestant religion from other Finnic peoples of Balticum, that are of Orthodox faith. Today some 25,000 Ingrian Finns are recorded in the Saint Petersburg region.

The Ingrian Finns originate partly from resettlers and work-migrants during the period of Swedish rule 1617–1703 arriving from present-day Finland, then an integral part of the Swedish realm; and to lesser extent from more or less voluntary conversion among the Votes and the Izhorians that was gratified by the Swedes.

After the Russian reconquest and the foundation of Saint Petersburg, the flow of migration was reversed. Russians were granted land in Ingria and Lutheran Ingrian Finns left Ingria, where they were in minority, for Old Finland, i.e. Russia's 18th century gains north of the Gulf of Finland, where Lutherans were in great majority. There they assimilated with the Karelian Finns.

The 20th century Soviet rule, and the German occupation (1941–1944) during the Great Patriotic War, was as disastrous for the Ingrian Finns as for other lesser nationalities: prosecuted as unreliables, if not executed, then deported to Siberia or dispersed all over the Soviet Union.