Samuel Rheen

{{Short description|Swedish priest}}

File:Lapponia.jpg]]

Samuel Rheen ({{circa|1615}} – 1680) was a Swedish priest, known for the work En kortt Relation om Lapparnes Lefwarne och Sedher, wijdskiepellsser, sampt i många Stycken Grofwe wildfarellsser [A brief treatise of the life and culture of the Sami, and their superstitions] (1671), being one of the earliest descriptions of Sami mythology and Sami noaidi.{{Cite web|url=https://www.ub.uit.no/northernlights/nor/myths11.htm|title=Nordlysveien - Myter|website=www.ub.uit.no}}{{Cite web|url=http://www.love.is/roald/kildeskrifter.html|title=Samiske kildeskrifter|website=www.love.is}}{{cite book |title=Berättelser om samerna i 1600-talets Sverige. |edition=Faksimileutgåva av prästrelationerna först publicerade av K.B. Wiklund 1897-1909 /med företal av Phebe Fjellström och efterskrift av Israel Ruong |series=Kungl. Skytteanska samfundets handlingar; 27 |issn= 0560-2416 |year =1983 |orig-year = 1897 |publisher=Skytteanska samf. |location=Umeå |language=Swedish|isbn=91-86438-01-8 }}

He grew up in Böle in Piteå and worked as a minister in Jokkmokk 1664/6-1671 and then in Råneå in Luleå until 1680.

His treatise was commissioned by the government as a part of a larger work describing the life and faith of the Sami. Together with other, similar "clergy correspondences", it served as a source for Johannes Schefferus and his book Lapponia in 1673. His treatise contained a drawing of a sami drum, with explanations of the symbols on the membrane.Noaidier, historier om samiske sjamaner. Edited with an introduction by {{ill|Brita Pollan|no}}. XXXIX, 268 s. Oslo: Bokklubben, 2002. (Verdens Hellige Skrifter; 14). {{ISBN|82-525-5185-8}} Rheen was also one of the sources to professor K.B. Wiklund's assumption that Swedish reindeer herding Sami had used Norwegian islands during summer.{{Cite web|url=https://www.regjeringen.no/no/dokumenter/nou-2007-14/id584312/|title=NOU 2007: 14|first=Justis-og|last=politidepartementet|date=December 3, 2007|website=Regjeringen.no}}