The Metis are one of the three Indigenous Peoples in Canada, and the term Metis or Metissage was first recorded in New France, which was made up of Quebec, Hudson’s Bay, Acadia, Newfoundland, and Louisiana.

The Metis were primarily the offspring of the First Peoples and French settlers, but also the Scots, and were distinct from both groups with their own language, culture and traditions. They fished and were involved in the early fur trade, and continued to intermarry with other Metis forming a new people.

As the fur trade flourished in the east, the Hudson Bay and Northwest companies were created to capitalize off this new economy, and as a result of this, immigration and demand for furs increased, and the fur traders migrated into the Great Lakes, then westward.