Witsuwit'en
 |
|
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| (2,447 [2]) | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Canada (British Columbia) | |
| Languages | |
| English, Babine-Witsuwit'en | |
| Religion | |
| Christianity, traditional beliefs |
Wet'suwet'en (also known as Hwotsotenne, Witsuwit'en, Wetsuwet'en, Wets'uwet'en) are a First Nations people who live on the Bulkley River and around Broman Lake and Francois Lake in the northwestern Central Interior of British Columbia. The name they call themselves, Wet'suwet'en, means ″People of the Wa Dzun Kwuh River or Bulkley River″.
The Wet'suwet'en are a branch of the Dakelh or Carrier people, and in combination with the Babine people have been referred to as the Western Carrier. They speak Witsuwit'en, a dialect of the Babine-Witsuwit'en language which, like its sister language Carrier, is a member of the Athabaskan family.
Their oral history, called kungax, recounts that their ancestral village, Dizkle or Dzilke, once stood upstream from the Bulkley Canyon. This cluster of cedar houses on both sides of the river was said to be abandoned because of an omen of impending disaster. The exact location of the village has not yet been discovered. The neighbouring Gitxsan people of the Hazelton area have a similar tale, though the village in their version is named Dimlahamid (Temlahan).
The traditional government of the Wet'suwet'en comprises 13 hereditary chiefs, organized today as the Office of the Hereditary Chiefs of the Wet'suwet'en, or the Office of the Wet'suwet'en in BC government terminology (the government does not recognize their hereditary rights). The Office of the Hereditary Chiefs is the main political body of the Wet'suwet'en and is involved in the negotiating process for an eventual treaty with the British Columbia government. In the past, they were co-complainants in the Delgamuukw v. British Columbia case, which sought to establish recognition of the hereditary territorial rights of the Gitxsan and Wet'suwet'en Confederacy.
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Wikipedia