Nenets, ethnolinguistic group inhabiting northwestern Russia, from the White Sea on the west to the base of the Taymyr Peninsula on the east and from the Sayan Mountains on the south to the Arctic Ocean on the north. At present the Nenets are the largest group speaking Samoyedic, a branch of the Uralic language family. Their name comes from the word nenets meaning “man.”
Descended from people formerly inhabiting southwest Siberia, the Nenets are reindeer pastoralists, fishermen, and hunters (especially of wild reindeer) of the tundra, but they also include small groups of forest dwellers. Ethnographers generally refer to them as the Forest Nenets and the Tundra Nenets. The former group is much smaller (roughly five percent of the total Nenets population) and its language, considered seriously endangered because few if any children learn it, is spoken by only about 1,500 people. The language of the Tundra Nenets, the larger of the two groups, is spoken by more than 25,000 people, but children in some regions are not learning it. The Forest Nenets live near the Pur River and on tributaries of the Middle Ob. The Tundra Nenets inhabit three principal regions: an area west of the Ural Mountains, the Ob and Yamal peninsulas, and regions on the Taymyr Peninsula and the Yenisey River. Smaller groups of peoples related to the Nenets include the Enets (Entsy, or Yenisey), the Nganasans (Tavgi), and the Selkup. In some areas Turkic languages and Russian have replaced Samoyedic dialects. Under Soviet administration, communal, collective production was introduced among the Nenets, with reindeer keeping remaining the main activity.
Reindeer breeding provides the Nenets with meat, lard, and blood for food; skins for making clothes, footwear, and winter tents; leather for making lassos, harnesses, and summer footwear; tendons for making thread; and horn for making various implements. A herd of 70 to 100 reindeer furnishes everything needed by a household.
Descent is traced through the paternal line; clans of people claiming common ancestry have their own territories, as well as common burial and sacrificial grounds and clan symbols and signs. Individuals marry outside their own clan. Women are in a subordinate position. There are several classes of shamans, with different abilities.