Mistissini () is a Cree village municipality in the territory of Eeyou Istchee in northern

Quebec Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...

, Canada; it has a distinct legal status and classification from other kinds of village municipalities in Quebec: Naskapi village municipalities, northern villages (

Inuit Inuit (singular: Inuk) are a group of culturally and historically similar Indigenous peoples traditionally inhabiting the Arctic and Subarctic regions of North America and Russia, including Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwe ...

communities), and ordinary villages. As with all other

Cree The Cree, or nehinaw (, ), are a Indigenous peoples of the Americas, North American Indigenous people, numbering more than 350,000 in Canada, where they form one of the country's largest First Nations in Canada, First Nations. They live prim ...

village municipalities in Quebec, there is a counterpart

Cree reserved land The following is a list of the types of Local government in Quebec, local and Wiktionary:supralocal, supralocal territorial units in Quebec, Canada, including those used solely for statistical purposes, as defined by the Ministry of Municipal Affa ...

of the same name located nearby:

Mistissini Mistissini ( meaning Big Rock) is a Cree town located in the south-east corner of the largest natural lake in Quebec, Lake Mistassini. The town is inside the boundaries of the Baie-James Municipality and is the second largest Cree community ...

. Despite the title of "village municipality" and the formalities that go along with it (for instance, having a mayor), Statistics Canada lists it (and all other Cree village municipalities in Quebec) as having few resident population or residential infrastructure (dwellings); it is the Cree reserved lands that are listed as having most of the population and residential dwellings in the 2021 census, the 2016 census, and earlier censuses.

Geography

The village is located on the Watso peninsula in the form of a large C (open to the northeast) attached to the east bank, forming the north-eastern shore of the Du Poste Bay, barring the exit of this bay and including the village of Mistissini in the North-West. A road connected to Route 167 serves this peninsula. The village is located at the mouth of the Du Poste Bay and in the southern part of Abatagouche Bay.

History

The Cree have lived in the area of the watershed of the

Rupert River The Rupert River is a river in Quebec, Canada. From its headwaters in Lake Mistassini, the largest natural lake in Quebec, it flows west into Rupert Bay on James Bay. The Rupert drains an area of . There is some extremely large whitewater on ...

and around Lake Mistassini for centuries. French explorers and traders entered it in the early 17th century. During the late 1600s, the French established a trading post on Lake Mistassini. The post was moved from time to time until the

Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), originally the Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading Into Hudson’s Bay, is a Canadian holding company of department stores, and the oldest corporation in North America. It was the owner of the ...

established it in the 19th century at what has developed as the current location of the village. The trading post was supplied by a canoe brigade based at Fort Rupert (today

Waskaganish Waskaganish (/, Little House; ) is a Cree community of over 2,500 people at the mouth of the Rupert River on the south-east shore of James Bay in Nord-du-Québec, Canada. Waskaganish is part of the territory referred to as " Eeyou Istchee" ( ...

) up the Rupert River or through Neoskweskau (a former Cree site) on the

Eastmain River The Eastmain River, formerly written East Main, is a river in west central Quebec. It rises in central Quebec and flows west to James Bay, draining an area of . The First Nations Cree village of Eastmain is located beside the mouth. Name Eastm ...

. The itinerary of the trip moved south - first by Oskelaneo when the railway was built in 1910, and later by the region of

Lac Saint-Jean Lac Saint-Jean (, ) is a large, relatively shallow lake in south-central Quebec, Canada, in the Laurentian Highlands. It is situated north of the Saint Lawrence River, into which it drains via the Saguenay River. It covers an area of , and is ...

. The road reached Mistissini in 1970. Over time, Mistissini and the various posts in the area have been designated: "Maison Dorval", "Patagoosh", "Abatagoushe", "Mistassini" and "Baie-du-Poste".

Demographics

In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by

Statistics Canada Statistics Canada (StatCan; ), formed in 1971, is the agency of the Government of Canada commissioned with producing statistics to help better understand Canada, its population, resources, economy, society, and culture. It is headquartered in ...

, Mistissini had a population of living in of its total private dwellings, an increase from its 2016 population of . With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021.

Languages

In Mistissini, according to the Institut de la statistique du Québec, the language most often spoken at home in 2011, by the population of 3,405 inhabitants, was

- 85.76%, French - 2.35% of inhabitants, and English - 10.87%.Institute of Statistics of Quebec
Population by language spoken most often at home, municipalities and TEs in Nord-du-Québec and all of Québec, 2011

Gallery

Mistassini roadsign.jpg, Multilingual road sign: Cree, English and French Mistissini41.jpg, Welcome sign Mistissini29.JPG, Interior of the arena

References