History of New Brunswick

New Brunswick (French: Nouveau-Brunswick), is one of the three Maritime provinces in Canada, and the only officially bilingual province (English-French) in the country. The history of New Brunswick can be viewed according to four periods: pre-European contact, French colonization, British colonization and finally, New Brunswick since Confederation.

The aboriginal nations of New Brunswick include the Mi'kmaq, Maliseet/Wolastoqiyuk and Passamaquoddy. The Mi'kmaq territories are mostly in the east of the province. The Maliseets are located in the northwest and the Passamaquoddy tribe is situated in the southwest, around Passamaquoddy Bay. Amerindians have occupied New Brunswick since about 6000-8000 BCE.

The Maliseet (also known as Wolastoqiyik and Malecite and in French as Malécites or Étchemins (the latter collectively referring to the Maliseet and Passamaquoddy)) are a First Nations people who inhabit the Saint John River valley and its tributaries, roughly overlapping the International Boundary between New Brunswick and Quebec in Canada, and Maine in the United States.

Wolastoqiyik is the name for the people and their language; Maliseet is the name by which the Mi'kmaq described the Wolastoqiyik to early Europeans. "Maken talkers"; the Wolastoqiyik and Mi'kmaq languages are fairly closely related, but the name reflected what the Mi'kmaq perceived to be a sufficiently different dialect to be a "broken" version of their own language. The Wolastoqiyik so named themselves because their territory and existence centered on a river they called the Wolastoq, which simply meant "good river" or "beautiful river"; "woli" = good or beautiful, shortened to "wol-" when used as modifier; "astoq" = river; "-iyik" = people of, equivalent e.g. of "-ians" or "-ites". Wolastoqiyik therefore means simply People of the Beautiful River, in their own language. The Wolastoq River is the Saint John River.

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