 Study of pollen in fossils based on cognate words for certain trees – including larch and elm – in the daughter languages suggests the speakers of the Proto @-@ Uralic language lived in the wider region of the Ural Mountains , which were inhabited by scattered groups of Neolithic hunter @-@ gatherers in the 4th millennium BC . They spread over vast territories , which caused the development of a separate Proto @-@ Finno @-@ Ugric language by the end of the millennium . Linguistic studies and archaeological research evidence that those who spoke this language lived in pit @-@ houses and used decorated clay vessels . The expansion of marshlands after around 2600 BC caused new migrations . No scholarly consensus on the <unk> , or original homeland , of the Ugric peoples exists : they lived either in the region of the <unk> River or along the Kama River and the upper courses of the Volga River around 2000 BC . They lived in settled communities , cultivated millet , wheat , and other crops , and bred animals – especially horses , cattle , and pigs . Loan words connected to animal husbandry from Proto @-@ Iranian show that they had close contacts with their neighbors . The southernmost Ugric groups adopted a nomadic way of life by around 1000 BC , because of the northward expansion of the steppes . 
