Map of Canada with the Maritime Provinces (New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island) marked in red
3 April 2024
The adjective maritime is a mid sixteenth century borrowing from French, which in turn is from the Latin maritimus, an adjective meaning related to the sea.
But in Canada, the Maritimes, refers to the provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island, not to be confused with the Atlantic Provinces, which adds Newfoundland and Labrador to those three.
The term Maritime Provinces, often clipped to the Maritimes, dates to at least 1847, when it appears in Jennet Roy’s History of Canada:
These provinces are of two classes—first, the Inland Provinces, watered only by great lakes and rivers, and, secondly, the Maritime Provinces. Canada belongs to the first class, and is more extensive, more productive, and more populous, than all the Maritime Provinces united; it is also the principal resort of Emigrants from the Mother Country.
But in early use, which provinces constituted the Maritimes was a bit fungible. So in his book, Roy may have meant the phrase to refer to Newfoundland and Labrador as well.
Residents of the Maritimes are called Maritimers, a usage that dates to at least 1894, when it appears in the 8 October 1894 issue of the Montreal Daily Star:
MARITIMERS TO MEET
Sir William Dawson has accepted the invitation of Dr. A. Lapthorn Smith, president of the Maritime Provinces Association, to be present and address the annual meeting of the Association this evening in the Y.M.C.A. building. Sir William is the honorary president.
The phrase Atlantic Provinces appears in April 1855 issue of Monthly Nautical Magazine and Quarterly Review:
As it is with the coals of the two countries, so it is with the timber. From Nova-Scotia and New-Brunswick, we may obtain the soft bituminous description, while these Provinces require from us, for the use of steamboats and foundries, large quantities of anthracite, which nature has not provided to their hand. […] The demand for pitch pine, oak, locust, hickory, and black walnut, and many kinds of cabinet wood, none of which are found in these Atlantic Provinces, will be greatly increased under the operation of free trade influences, which the late treaty secures.
That last article was from the perspective of the United States, but a use of Atlantic Provinces by a Canadian publication would appear in August 1855 in an article about a proposed confederation of provinces in what was then known as British North America. From the Anglo-American Magazine, published in Toronto:
To some persons, it may seem as absurd thus to connect the Atlantic Provinces with British Oregon, Vancouver or Queen Charlotte’s Islands, as to connect them, in like manner with New Zealand. But it must be borne in mind, that we are considering the question of a union of the British North American Colonies; and the great object of that union would not be attained, unless every part of the British North America—particularly of the continental portions—participated in it.
And there is this in London, England’s Daily News of 14 February 1867, reporting on the formation of the confederation of Canada:
The plan of Confederation which is now found practicable is much less imposing than that which was contemplated two years ago. It does not embrace all the provinces of the Atlantic seaboard, nor British Columbia. Newfoundland and Prince Edward’s Island have sent no delegates to England, and the new Confederation will only include Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and the Canadas. It will be remembered that in 1864, when the leading Canadian politicians formed a Coalition Government, the various maritime provinces were negotiating with one another for a close union among themselves, for the furtherance of their common interests. The introduction of the larger scheme, originating at Quebec, founded on a proposal to annex the maritime provinces to Canada, frustrated the design of the smaller, more practicable union, towards which the Atlantic provinces were naturally tending. The new Confederation has not absorbed all the elements of the defeated scheme, but it must either prove so successful as to draw Newfoundland and Prince Edward’s Island into it at some future time, or prove a barrier to the realization of a union dictated by many considerations of policy and interest.
The two Canadas (Upper and Lower Canada or Canada West and Canada East) referred to in the article are what would become the provinces of Ontario and Quebec under the confederation. Rupert’s Land, controlled by the Hudson’s Bay Company, would come under Canadian control in 1870, becoming the province of Manitoba and the Northwest Territories. British Columbia would join in 1871. Prince Edward Island would join the confederation in 1873. The Yukon Territory was formed from a portion of the Northwest Territories in 1898, as would Saskatchewan and Alberta in 1905. Newfoundland and Labrador would join the confederation in 1949. And in 1999 the territory of Nunavut was formed out of a portion of the Northwest Territories. (There is a legal distinction between the provinces and territories regarding from where their administrative powers derive, but it is a distinction with little practical difference.)
Sources:
Daily News (London), 14 February 1867, 4/3. Gale Primary Sources: British Library Newspapers.
Dictionary of Canadianisms on Historical Principles, first edition, 1967, s.v. Maritime, n., Maritime Provinces, n., Maritimer, n., Atlantic Provinces, n. DHCP-2.
Hamilton, P. S. “Union of the Colonies of British North America.” The Anglo-American Magazine (Toronto), 7.2, August 1855, 79–87 at 87. HathiTrust Digital Archive.
Lewis, Charlton T. and Charles Short. A Latin Dictionary. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1879, s.v. maritimus. Brepols: Database of Latin Dictionaries.
“Maritimers to Meet.” Montreal Daily Star, 8 October 1894, 6/3. Newspapers.com.
Oxford English Dictionary, third edition, December 2000, s.v. Maritimer, n., maritime, adj. and n.; 1999, s.v. Maritime Provinces, n.; September 2013, s.v. Atlantic provinces, n.
“The Reciprocal Timber Trade of the United States and British North America.” Monthly Nautical Magazine and Quarterly Review (New York), 2.1, April 1855, 82–85 at 82–83. Gale Primary Sources.
Roy, Jennet. History of Canada for the Use of Schools and Families. New York: 1847, 165–66. HathiTrust Digital Archive.
Image credit: Allice Hunter, 2021. Wikimedia Commons. Used under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.