The Kuusamo area has been inhabited for about nine thousand years. As the continental ice receded, people who practiced fishing, hunting, and gathering settled on the gradually expanding isthmus between the Baltic Sea and the White Sea. To the west of Kuusamo, the seashore ran along the line Rovaniemi-Kitkajärvi-Ranua-Pudasjärvi. In the east, Paanajärvi was a bay jutting west of the White Sea.
The stone weapons and tools of the earliest inhabitants were roughly shaped, only the blade parts were ground. The population, which lived in families and tribal communities, led a wandering life, moving to the most favourable places of residence according to the seasons. Residences from the period have been found in Kuusamo, for example in Kirkonkylä’s Samostenperä and Pohjaslahti and Lake Naamankajärvi.
