B. Map - Native-European Encounters Preserved in Native Oral Tradition and
European Written Narrative

Prairies: Blackfoot and Assiniboine

The Prairie region remained autonomous to European trade practices until the eighteenth century when interest grew in large-scale procurement of buffalo hides for a burgeoning hide market in North America and Europe. This commercial demand for buffalo, coupled with the introduction of the horse and firearms into Blackfoot and Assiniboine cultures, greatly influenced all areas of their lifeways. Consequently, the initial influence of Europeans came indirectly through technology and foreign animals. Direct contact was not sustained until the late eighteenth century when fur traders moved farther west into Blackfoot and Assiniboine territories.

Map showing the regional distribution of southern Alberta's Native population.
Kainai (Blood), Peigan, Siksika (Blackfoot proper), Assiniboine (Stoney),
Tsuu T'ina (Sarcee), and Plains Cree.
The Applied History Research Group

Blackfoot Encounter with Europeans

The horse was native to the American continent until approximately 10,000 years ago. At that time, the horse, along with other large fauna, became extinct on the American continent. The horse was returned to America with European explorers starting in the fifteenth century. It is believed that the Native Americans of what is now the United States were the first to reacquire the horse from the Spaniards in Mexico. Knowledge of this useful animal was passed from First Nation to First Nation through existing communication networks. The Cree called the horse mistatim, or big dog, while the Blackfoot called the horse ponokamita, or elk dog. When the horse arrived on the Prairies, it had a profound political, social, and economic effect on the Blackfoot peoples. David Thompson, an explorer and surveyor for the North West Company, recorded an incident when a group of Pikiani hunters first encountered a horse. A lone Shonshoni hunter on horseback was in Pikiani territory where he was discovered by a group of Pikiani hunters who surrounded and killed his horse. They then studied it up close and were impressed to see the animal that was a slave to man and carried man's things.

European Encounters with Blackfoot

The Blackfoot initially called the Europeans Napikawan, which translates as "old man person". This is a possible reference to Napi the creator. The first documented meeting was English explorer Alexander Henday's encounter in 1754-55. An expedition led by Henday unsuccessfully attempted to engage Blackfoot peoples into trade with the Hudson's Bay Company. David Thompson, in 1787, similarly encouraged trade relations with the North West Company during his expedition into Blackfoot territory. Initially, the Blackfoot bands resisted these invitations because the Blackfoot did not want to travel the great distances necessary to trade directly with the Europeans. Instead, the Blackfoot traded with the Cree and Assinboine, who in turn traded with the Hudson's Bay Company or the North West Company. However, relations between the Blackfoot and their trading partners were uneasy and often ended in conflict. At about the same time, the Hudson's Bay Company and the North West Company were moving closer to Blackfoot territory. Competition between the two rival companies forced them to move further inland where they would have direct contact with a greater number of potential Native traders. Cumberland House, built by the Hudson Bay Company in 1774, and Hudson House, built in 1779, brought the trade to Saskatchewan. The North West Company built Fort Augustus on the North Saskatchewan River in 1795, and in response, the Hudson's Bay Company built Fort Edmonton. These posts were located on the perimeter of Blackfoot territory. When Rocky Mountain House was built in 1799 a trading post was now located very close to Blackfoot Confederacy territory. The distance was broached and the Blackfoot entered into direct trade alliances with Europeans.

Blackfoot Confederacy

The Blackfoot Confederacy was an alliance between the Pikanni, Blood, and Siksika. The Tsuu T'ina (Sarcee) joined in the beginning of the nineteenth century. Occupying regions south and west of the Saskatchewan River, the First Nations of the Prairies were a nomadic hunting culture that relied heavily on buffalo, and to a lesser extent, elk, deer, antelope, beaver, mountain sheep, and mountain goat for their survival. The introduction of the horse into the Prairie region, by the early eighteenth century, made a significant impact on Native life. The horse was incorporated into the buffalo hunt and this dramatically increased buffalo kills. Buffalo meat and hides were sought after by Europeans, creating a strong market for these goods.

The fur trade created a strong economy in the Prairies, and the market for pemmican grew at the same pace as did the number of individuals participating in trade activities. Pemmican, made with buffalo meat that is dried and pounded with local berries, was an ideal food. It was preserved, easily transportable and nutritious, and it was eaten by both European and Native hunters and traders, who would have faced hunger without it. The result was a lucrative trade good for the Blackfoot and for other First Nations that hunted buffalo.

The decline of buffalo on the Prairies is attributed primarily to the repeating rifle in the mid-nineteenth century, which allowed a hunter to shoot several rounds without reloading, thus increasing its efficiency and the speed with which the animals were taken down. By 1880 buffalo herds on the Canadian prairies had thinned to near extinction. The peoples of the Blackfoot Confederacy, who were dependent upon the buffalo for food and for trade items, were starving. In the face of starvation and weakened by several waves of epidemics, the Natives signed land usage agreements in the form of treaties. The Canadian government created reservations for the First Nations peoples, where the former buffalo hunters were to be transformed into Christian farmers. They were encouraged to abandon their buffalo hunting culture and to adopt, instead, agrarian skills.

Assiniboine

During the 1640s the Assiniboine occupied territories that extended west of Lake Superior to Lake of the Woods. The Assiniboine and Cree allied themselves in an economic and political union. Together they participated in trade networks and regularly travelled north to Hudson Bay to trade with the English. They acted as middlemen, acquiring horses and buffalo robes from the Blackfoot in exchange for European goods. The Assiniboine were first mentioned in an English explorer's journal in 1690. By the end of the eighteenth century the Assiniboine were divided into two groups, one group remaining primarily in the Woodlands, the other spending most of its time on the plains. The Plains Assiniboine peoples did manufacture pemmican for trade.