There are some hypotheses concerning the origin of the name of

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...

. The best-known is that it is a variant of "

Mount Royal Mount Royal (french: link=no, Mont Royal, ) is a large intrusive rock hill or small mountain in the city of Montreal, immediately west of Downtown Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The best-known hypothesis for the origin of the name Montreal is the hi ...

Hypotheses concerning the origin of the name

Among the hypotheses concerning the origin of Montreal's name, the most acceptable to

toponymy Toponymy, toponymics, or toponomastics is the study of ''toponyms'' (proper names of places, also known as place names and geographic names), including their origins, meanings, usage and types. Toponym is the general term for a proper name of ...

is the one that finds it to be a variant of Mount Royal. In the 16th century ''réal'' was a variant of ''royal'', hence the contraction of Mont Royal that gave ''Mont Réal'' or Montreal. Historian

Marcel Trudel Marcel Trudel (May 29, 1917 – January 11, 2011) was a Canadian historian, university professor (1947–1982) and author who published more than 40 books on the history of New France. He brought academic rigour to an area that had been ma ...

asked: "Where does the name "Mount Royal" come from? In honour of Cardinal de Medici,

Archbishop of Monreale The Italian Catholic Archdiocese of Monreale ( la, Archidioecesis Montis Regalis) is in Sicily. As of 2000 it is no longer a metropolitan see, and is now a suffragan of the Archdiocese of Palermo.Château de Montréal The Château de Montréal is a château in the Dordogne department located near the commune of Issac, in southwestern France. It overlooks the valley of the Crempse River. It was built as a castle in the 12th century and rebuilt in the 16th centu ...

'' in France) accompanied

Jacques Cartier Jacques Cartier ( , also , , ; br, Jakez Karter; 31 December 14911 September 1557) was a French-Breton maritime explorer for France. Jacques Cartier was the first European to describe and map the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and the shores of th ...

on his expedition up the

Saint Lawrence River The St. Lawrence River (french: Fleuve Saint-Laurent, ) is a large river in the middle latitudes of North America. Its headwaters begin flowing from Lake Ontario in a (roughly) northeasterly direction, into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, connectin ...

and was with him on October 3, 1535, when he reached Hochelaga, on the site of the present-day city of Montreal. The name Montreal referred first to the

mountain A mountain is an elevated portion of the Earth's crust, generally with steep sides that show significant exposed bedrock. Although definitions vary, a mountain may differ from a plateau in having a limited Summit (topography), summit area, and ...

, then to the

island An island (or isle) is an isolated piece of habitat that is surrounded by a dramatically different habitat, such as water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, skerries, cays or keys. An island ...

and finally to the

city A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be def ...

itself.

Ville-Marie

The original name for the settlement that would later become Montreal was Ville-Marie. When the missionary society ''

Société Notre-Dame de Montréal The Société Notre-Dame de Montréal, otherwise known as the ''Société de Notre-Dame de Montréal pour la conversion des Sauvages de la Nouvelle-France'', was a religious organisation responsible for founding Ville-Marie, the original name for ...

'' sent

Paul Chomedey de Maisonneuve Paul de Chomedey, sieur de Maisonneuve (15 February 1612 9 September 1676) was a French military officer and the founder of Fort Ville-Marie (modern day Montreal) in New France (Province of Quebec, Canada). Early life Maisonneuve was born in ...

to found a city on the

island of Montreal The Island of Montreal (french: Île de Montréal) is a large island in southwestern Quebec, Canada, that is the site of a number of municipalities including most of the city of Montreal and is the most populous island in Canada. It is the main ...

in 1642, they named the settlement ''Ville-Marie'' in honour of the

Virgin Virginity is the state of a person who has never engaged in sexual intercourse. The term ''virgin'' originally only referred to sexually inexperienced women, but has evolved to encompass a range of definitions, as found in traditional, modern ...

, protectress of the venture. Nonetheless, from the very beginning both the settlement of Ville-Marie and the mountain were known as Montreal to many people, including some mapmakers of the period. In the 18th century, for no official reason, the name Montreal supplanted that of Ville-Marie. Up until then, the city was called either Montreal and/or Ville-Marie. The name Ville-Marie now refers to the

borough A borough is an administrative division in various English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely. History In the Middle Ag ...

encompassing

Old Montreal Old Montreal (French: ''Vieux-Montréal'') is a historic neighbourhood within the municipality of Montreal in the province of Quebec, Canada. Home to the Old Port of Montreal, the neighbourhood is bordered on the west by McGill Street, on th ...

(the site of Fort Ville-Marie), as well as the downtown core and adjacent areas.

Timeline

*In modern

Iroquois The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian-speaking confederacy of First Nations peoples in northeast North America/ Turtle Island. They were known during the colonial years to ...

, Montreal is called ''Tiohtià:ke''. Other

First Nations First Nations or first peoples may refer to: * Indigenous peoples, for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area. Indigenous groups *First Nations is commonly used to describe some Indigenous groups including: **First Natio ...

languages, such as

Algonquin Algonquin or Algonquian—and the variation Algonki(a)n—may refer to: Languages and peoples *Algonquian languages, a large subfamily of Native American languages in a wide swath of eastern North America from Canada to Virginia **Algonquin la ...

, refer to it as ''Moniang''. *1535 – On October 3,

climbed up the mountain and named it

. He wrote: "Nous nommasmes icelle montaigne le mont Royal." (We named the said mountain Mount Royal.) The name Montreal is generally thought to be derived from "Mount Royal", the name given to the mountain by Cartier in 1535. *1556 – On his map of Hochelaga, Italian geographer

Giovanni Battista Ramusio Giovanni Battista Ramusio (; July 20, 1485 – July 10, 1557) was an Italian geographer and travel writer. Born in Treviso, Italy, at that time in the Republic of Venice, Ramusio was the son of Paolo Ramusio, a magistrate of the Venetian ci ...

wrote ''Monte Real'' to designate Mount Royal. *1575 – In his ''Cosmographie universelle de tout le monde'', historiographer

François de Belleforest François de Belleforest (1530 – 1 January 1583) was a prolific French author, poet and translator of the Renaissance. He was born in Samatan (actual department of Gers), into a poor family, and his father (a soldier) was killed when he was ...

was the first to use the form ''Montréal'' with reference to this area. In translation, it reads: "Let us now look at Hochelaga... in the midst of the countryside is the village, or ''Cité royale'', adjacent to a mountain on which farming is practiced. The Christians call this city Montreal...". *1601 – On his map, Guillaume Le Vasseur wrote ''Hochelaga'' for the inhabited area and called the hill Mont Royal. *1609 –

Marc Lescarbot Marc Lescarbot (c. 1570–1641) was a French author, poet and lawyer. He is best known for his '' Histoire de la Nouvelle-France'' (1609), based on his expedition to Acadia (1606–1607) and research into French exploration in North America. ...

called the settlement "Hochelaga, ville des Sauvages". *1612 – On Champlain's map, the mountain is called Montreal. *1642 – The mission named Ville-Marie was built at Place Royale. *1705 – Montreal is now the official name for the city formerly named Ville-Marie.

Nicknames

* MTL *

YUL Yul or YUL may refer to: * Yul (name), including a list of people with the name *YUL, the IATA airport code of Montréal–Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport *YUL Condos, a residential high-rise in downtown Montreal *Yul, a fictional ki ...

(IATA airport code) *

514 __NOTOC__ Year 514 (DXIV) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Cassiodorus without colleague (or, less frequently, year ...

(telephone area code)* unofficial * VDM (Ville de Montréal - City of Montreal) * "The City of Saints" * unofficial * "The City of a Hundred Steeples" (

Mark Twain Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, entrepreneur, publisher, and lecturer. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has p ...

- 1881) * "La Metropole" * "Quebec's Metropolis" * "Sin City" (During the period of

Prohibition in the United States In the United States from 1920 to 1933, a Constitution of the United States, nationwide constitutional law prohibition, prohibited the production, importation, transportation, and sale of alcoholic beverages. The alcohol industry was curtai ...

, it became well known as one of North America's "sin cities" due to its unparalleled

nightlife Nightlife is a collective term for entertainment that is available and generally more popular from the late evening into the early hours of the morning. It includes pubs, bars, nightclubs, parties, live music, concerts, cabarets, theatre, c ...

.) *"The City of Festivals" or "Festival City" * "Paris of North America"

References

External links

Where does the name Montréal come from?
* https://web.archive.org/web/20080531042123/http://geonames.nrcan.gc.ca/education/montreal_e.php {{DEFAULTSORT:Name Of Montreal History of Montreal