The Tsuutʼina Nation (also Tsu Tʼina, Tsuu Tʼina, Tsúùtínà – "a great number of people"; formerly Sarcee, Sarsi) ( srs, Tsúùtʼínà) is a

First Nation Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...

band government In Canada, an Indian band or band (french: bande indienne, link=no), sometimes referred to as a First Nation band (french: bande de la Première Nation, link=no) or simply a First Nation, is the basic unit of government for those peoples subjec ...

in Alberta, Canada. Their territory today is confined to the Tsuu T'ina Nation 145

reserve Reserve or reserves may refer to: Places * Reserve, Kansas, a US city * Reserve, Louisiana, a census-designated place in St. John the Baptist Parish * Reserve, Montana, a census-designated place in Sheridan County * Reserve, New Mexico, a US vi ...

, whose east side is adjacent to the southwest city limits of

Calgary Calgary ( ) is the largest city in the western Canadian province of Alberta and the largest metro area of the three Prairie Provinces. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806, makin ...

. Their traditional territory spans a much larger area in southern Alberta. The land area of the current reserve is 283.14 km² (109.32 sq mi), and it had a population of 1,982 in the 2001 Canadian census. The northeast portion of the reserve was used as part of

CFB Calgary CFB may refer to: *College football *Canadian Forces base, military installation of the Canadian forces * Caminho de Ferro de Benguela, railway in Angola *Carrollton-Farmers Branch Independent School District * Cipher feedback, a block cipher mode i ...

, a

Canadian Army The Canadian Army (french: Armée canadienne) is the command responsible for the operational readiness of the conventional ground forces of the Canadian Armed Forces. It maintains regular forces units at bases across Canada, and is also respo ...

base, from 1910 to 1998. In 2006, the land was returned to the Nation by the

Government of Canada The government of Canada (french: gouvernement du Canada) is the body responsible for the federal administration of Canada. A constitutional monarchy, the Crown is the corporation sole, assuming distinct roles: the executive, as the ''Crown ...

. The Tsuutʼina people were formerly called the Sarsi or Sarcee, words which are believed to have been derived from a

Blackfoot The Blackfoot Confederacy, ''Niitsitapi'' or ''Siksikaitsitapi'' (ᖹᐟᒧᐧᒣᑯ, meaning "the people" or " Blackfoot-speaking real people"), is a historic collective name for linguistically related groups that make up the Blackfoot or Bla ...

word meaning "stubborn ones". The two peoples long had conflict over the territory because the Sarcee are on traditional Blackfoot land. Because of its origins from an enemy, the term is now viewed as offensive by most of the Tsuutʼina.

History

The Tsuutʼina are an Athapaskan group, once part of the more northerly

Dane-zaa The Dane-zaa (ᑕᓀᖚ, also spelled Dunne-za, or Tsattine) are an Athabaskan-speaking group of First Nations people. Their traditional territory is around the Peace River in Alberta and British Columbia, Canada. Today, about 1,600 Dane-zaa resi ...

Beaver Beavers are large, semiaquatic rodents in the genus ''Castor'' native to the temperate Northern Hemisphere. There are two extant species: the North American beaver (''Castor canadensis'') and the Eurasian beaver (''C. fiber''). Beavers ar ...

Indians') nation, who migrated south onto the Great Plains during the 1700s, prior to any written records of the area. Tsuutʼina oral history has preserved the memory of their separation from the Dane-zaa. Explorer David Thompson said that the Tsuutʼina lived in the Beaver Hills near present-day Edmonton during the 1810s, where they cohabited with the

Cree The Cree ( cr, néhinaw, script=Latn, , etc.; french: link=no, Cri) are a Indigenous peoples of the Americas, North American Indigenous people. They live primarily in Canada, where they form one of the country's largest First Nations in Canada ...

. At some point, however, they came into conflict with the Cree and moved further to the south, eventually forming an alliance with the Blackfoot. The Tsuutʼina likely acquired most of their Plains Indian culture from the Blackfoot. Although in most respects the Tsuutʼina are typical Northern Plains Indians, their Tsuutʼina language is an

Athabaskan Athabaskan (also spelled ''Athabascan'', ''Athapaskan'' or ''Athapascan'', and also known as Dene) is a large family of indigenous languages of North America, located in western North America in three areal language groups: Northern, Pacific C ...

language, closely related to the languages of the

Dene The Dene people () are an Aboriginal peoples in Canada, indigenous group of First Nations in Canada, First Nations who inhabit the northern Boreal forest of Canada, boreal and Arctic regions of Canada. The Dene speak Northern Athabaskan languag ...

groups of northern Canada and Alaska, and also to those of the

Navajo The Navajo (; British English: Navaho; nv, Diné or ') are a Native American people of the Southwestern United States. With more than 399,494 enrolled tribal members , the Navajo Nation is the largest federally recognized tribe in the United ...

and

Apache The Apache () are a group of culturally related Native American tribes in the Southwestern United States, which include the Chiricahua, Jicarilla, Lipan, Mescalero, Mimbreño, Ndendahe (Bedonkohe or Mogollon and Nednhi or Carrizaleño an ...

peoples of the American Southwest, rather than the geographically nearer

Blackfoot language The Blackfoot language, also called Siksiká (its denomination in ISO 639-3, ; Siksiká ik͡siká syllabics ), often anglicised as ', is an Algonquian language spoken by the Blackfoot or ''Niitsitapi'' people, who currently live in the nort ...

and the

Cree language Cree (also known as Cree– Montagnais–Naskapi) is a dialect continuum of Algonquian languages spoken by approximately 117,000 people across Canada, from the Northwest Territories to Alberta to Labrador. If considered one language, it is th ...

, which are

Algonquian languages The Algonquian languages ( or ; also Algonkian) are a subfamily of Indigenous languages of the Americas, indigenous American languages that include most languages in the Algic languages, Algic language family. The name of the Algonquian language f ...

21st century

In 2007, the Tsuutʼina opened the Grey Eagle Casino just outside Calgary city limits. The Grey Eagle complex began a major expansion, including construction of a hotel, in 2012. Both the initial construction of the casino and the expansion have been accompanied by concerns among city residents about traffic tie-ups in the area of the casino. Beginning in the late 2000s, the proximity of the Nation's territory to the city of

led to disagreement over Alberta's plans to construct the southwest portion of Highway 201, a ring road. The planned freeway, expected to be completed by 2024, will nearly encircle the City of Calgary. The southwest portion was planned to pass through Tsuutʼina land to avoid environmentally sensitive areas. A 2009 referendum by the Nation rejected a plan to transfer reserve land to the Province of Alberta to permit construction of the southwest portion of the ring road. Some members of the Nation were upset by the rejection of the land transfer, while others viewed it as a triumph both environmentally and for the Nation. A subsequent referendum held by the Nation in 2013 approved the land transfer for the ring road, the Tsuu Tʼina portion of which was named Tsuutʼina Trail, even though it caused the forced removal of some residents from their traditional land by the Chief and Council. The construction disturbed 22 hectares of wetlands. On 28 August 2020,

Costco Costco Wholesale Corporation (doing business as Costco Wholesale and also known simply as Costco) is an American multinational corporation which operates a chain of membership-only big-box retail stores (warehouse club). As of 2022, Costco i ...

opened a store at 12905 Buffalo Run Blvd, in the Shops at Buffalo Run development created by the Nation's development project, Taza. This store is the first Costco branch located on a First Nations reserve in Canada, and as of 6 October, Costco had indicated that the store had broken records.

Notable members

* Harold Crowchild, last surviving Tsuutʼina and

Treaty 7 Treaty 7 is an agreement between the Crown and several, mainly Blackfoot, First Nation band governments in what is today the southern portion of Alberta. The idea of developing treaties for Blackfoot lands was brought to Blackfoot chief Crowfo ...

veteran of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

. * O. E. L. "Bud" Graves, artist and painter/sculptor, became a full member of the tribe after many years of association with its people.

Honorary chiefs

W. G. Hardy William George Hardy (February 3, 1895 – August 28, 1979) was a Canadian professor, writer, and ice hockey administrator. He lectured on the Classics at the University of Alberta from 1922 to 1964, and served as president of the Canadian Aut ...

, professor at the

University of Alberta The University of Alberta, also known as U of A or UAlberta, is a public research university located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. It was founded in 1908 by Alexander Cameron Rutherford,"A Gentleman of Strathcona – Alexander Cameron Rutherfor ...

given the honorary title of "Chief Running Eagle" by the Tsuutʼina.

References

External links