Chinlac
Chinlac is an anglicization of Carrier word Chunlak, itself a contraction of duchun nidulak - "logs customarily float to a point", which describes the way in which driftwood accumulates in the shallows where the weir was built.
According to oral tradition, the village was destroyed around 1745 by Chilcotin raiders from Nazko, on the Nazko River. (Although Nazko is now a Carrier village, it was Chilcotin at the time.) The meadow contains the traces of 13 lodges. In the surrounding bush are the remains of hundreds of cache pits.
One lodge site was excavated in 1951–1952 by a team led by Charles Edward Borden. Among other things, he found a Chinese coin, indicating the existence of trade routes with the Pacific Coast, perhaps in the late 18th century, prior to the Carriers' direct contact with Europeans.
References
- ^ Morice, Adrien-Gabriel. 1905. History of the Northern Interior of British Columbia. Toronto: William Briggs. pp. 14-19.
- ^ Poser, William. 2008. Saik'uz Whut'en Hubughunek - Stoney Creek Carrier Lexicon. Vanderhoof: Saik'uz First Nation. p.53.
- ^ Morice, Adrien-Gabriel. 1905. History of the Northern Interior of British Columbia. Toronto: William Briggs. pp. 14-19.
- ^ Cranny, Michael William. 1986. Carrier settlement and subsistence in the Chinlac/Cluculz Lake area of Central British Columbia. MA thesis, University of British Columbia.
External links
- "Tragic Chinlac still shunned", Vancouver Sun, 9 November 2007