Vaasa (Swedish: Vasa) is a city on the west coast of Finland. It received its charter in 1606, during the reign of Charles IX of Sweden and is named after the Royal House of Vasa. Today, Vaasa has a population of 60,435 (31 January 2012) (approximately 90,000 in the Vaasa sub-region), and is the regional capital of Ostrobothnia (Swedish: Österbotten, Finnish: Pohjanmaa).
The city is bilingual with 69.8% of the population speaking Finnish as their...
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Vaasa (Swedish: Vasa) is a city on the west coast of Finland. It received its charter in 1606, during the reign of Charles IX of Sweden and is named after the Royal House of Vasa. Today, Vaasa has a population of 60,435 (31 January 2012) (approximately 90,000 in the Vaasa sub-region), and is the regional capital of Ostrobothnia (Swedish: Österbotten, Finnish: Pohjanmaa).
The city is bilingual with 69.8% of the population speaking Finnish as their first language and 24.8% speaking Swedish. The city is an important centre for Finland-Swedish culture.
Over the years, Vaasa has changed its name several times, due to alternative spellings, political decisions and language condition changes. At first it was called Mustasaari or Mussor after the village where it was founded in 1606, but just a few years later the name was changed to Wasa to honor the royal Swedish lineage. Mustasaari (Finnish) or Korsholm (Swedish) remains as the name of the surrounding mostly rural municipality, which...
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