Saskatoon, Saskatchewan in winter. The city’s skyline viewed from across the mostly frozen South Saskatchewan River.
2 September 2021
Like many North American provinces and states, the Canadian province of Saskatchewan is named for a river that runs through it. Saskatchewan is an Anglicization of the Cree name for the river, kisiskâciwanisîpiy (fast-flowing river).
The English spelling appears by 1816, when it appears in a description of the North American fur trade penned by Thomas Douglas, the fifth Earl of Selkirk:
The case is different with respect to the Indian inhabitants of those countries in which the Fur Trade is carried on. Among them a material distinction is to be observed between different tribes. Those who inhabit the plains of the Saskatchewan, Red River, and other fertile districts, can obtain such abundance of buffaloe and game, that they are seldom in want of provisions.
Saskatchewan became the name of a district in the Northwest Territories in 1882, and the province was created in 1905.
Sources:
Douglas, Thomas, Earl of Selkirk. A Sketch of the British Fur Trade in North America, second edition. London: James Ridgway, 1816, 42. HathiTrust Digital Archive.
Everett-Heath, John. Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Place Names, sixth ed. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2020. Oxfordreference.com.
Pearce, Margaret Wickens. Coming Home to Indigenous Place Names in Canada (map). Canadian-American Center, University of Maine, 2017.
Rayburn, Alan. Oxford Dictionary of Canadian Place Names. Don Mills, Ontario: Oxford UP Canada, 1999.