Kangirsuk (in

Inuktitut Inuktitut ( ; , Inuktitut syllabics, syllabics ), also known as Eastern Canadian Inuktitut, is one of the principal Inuit languages of Canada. It is spoken in all areas north of the North American tree line, including parts of the provinces of ...

: ᑲᖏᕐᓱᖅ/''Kangirsuq'', meaning "the bay") is an

Inuit Inuit (singular: Inuk) are a group of culturally and historically similar Indigenous peoples traditionally inhabiting the Arctic and Subarctic regions of North America and Russia, including Greenland, Labrador, Quebec, Nunavut, the Northwe ...

village in northern

Nunavik Nunavik (; ; ) is an area in Canada which comprises the northern third of the province of Quebec, part of the Nord-du-Québec region and nearly coterminous with Kativik. Covering a land area of north of the 55th parallel, it is the homelan ...

Quebec Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...

, Canada. It is north of

Kuujjuaq Kuujjuaq (; or ), formerly known as (ᓲᐃᕙᐅᖃᔾ) and by #Names, other names, is a former Hudson's Bay Company outpost at the mouth of the Koksoak River on Ungava Bay that has become the largest northern village (Quebec), northern vil ...

, between

Aupaluk Aupaluk () ( 2021 Population: 233) is a northern village in Nunavik, in the Nord-du-Québec region of Quebec. It is the least-populous Inuit community in Nunavik. The name means "where the earth is red", referring to its iron-bearing (ferrugin ...

and

Quaqtaq Quaqtaq () is a northern village (Inuit community) in Nunavik, northern Quebec, Canada. Its population was 453 in the Canada 2021 Census. The village is one of the northernmost inhabited places in Quebec, located on the eastern shore of Diana ...

. The community is only accessible by air ( Kangirsuk Airport) and, in late summer, by boat. The village used to be known also as ''Payne Bay'' and ''Bellin''.

Geography

Kangirsuk is located above the

tree line The tree line is the edge of a habitat at which trees are capable of growing and beyond which they are not. It is found at high elevations and high latitudes. Beyond the tree line, trees cannot tolerate the environmental conditions (usually low ...

near the mouth of the

Arnaud River The Arnaud River (formerly known as the Payne River) is a river in Nunavik, Quebec, Canada, flowing from the low plateaux of the Ungava Peninsula through a series of glacial lakes to Ungava Bay. Its mean discharge is approximately per year, but ...

on the north shore of Payne Bay, inland from the western coast of

Ungava Bay Ungava Bay (; , ; /) is a bay in Nunavut, Canada separating Nunavik (far northern Quebec) from Baffin Island. Although not geographically apparent, it is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean. The bay is roughly oval-shaped, about at its widest p ...

. A rocky cliff to the north and a large, rocky hill to the west partially surround the village.

Climate

Kangirsuk has a

tundra climate The tundra climate is a polar climate sub-type located in high latitudes and high mountains. It is classified as ET according to the Köppen climate classification. It is a climate which at least one month has an average temperature high enough ...

( ET), characterized by long, cold winters and short, but cool and rainy summers with chilly nights.

History

In the 11th century the area was possibly visited by

Vikings Vikings were seafaring people originally from Scandinavia (present-day Denmark, Norway, and Sweden), who from the late 8th to the late 11th centuries raided, pirated, traded, and settled throughout parts of Europe.Roesdahl, pp. 9� ...

. Not far from the village on Pamiok Island,

Thomas E. Lee Thomas Edward Lee (1914–1982) was an archaeologist for the National Museum of Canada in the 1950s. He was the discoverer of Sheguiandah on Manitoulin Island. Public interest in the find contributed to passage in Ontario of a bill to protect ar ...

, an archaeologist from

Université Laval (; English: ''Laval University)'' is a public research university in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. The university traces its roots to the Séminaire de Québec, founded by François de Montmorency-Laval in 1663, making it the oldest institutio ...

, discovered a stone foundation of what he identified at the time to be a Viking

long house A longhouse or long house is a type of long, proportionately narrow, single-room building for communal dwelling. It has been built in various parts of the world including Asia, Europe, and North America. Many were built from lumber, timber and ...

. More recent archaeological investigations have identified the site as being part of the Dorset culture. Another archeological site,

Hammer of Thor A hammer is a tool, most often a hand tool, consisting of a weighted "head" fixed to a long handle that is swung to deliver an impact to a small area of an object. This can be, for example, to drive nail (fastener), nails into wood, to sh ...

, is located on north shores of Payne River about west of the village. Inuit have hunted and fished along the

coast for centuries. Permanent European settlement did not occur until 1921 when the

Revillon Frères Revillon Frères (Revillon Brothers) was a French fur and luxury goods company, founded in Paris in 1723. Then called ''la Maison Givelet'', it was purchased by Louis-Victor Revillon in 1839 and soon, as Revillon Frères, became the largest fu ...

company set up a

trading post A trading post, trading station, or trading house, also known as a factory in European and colonial contexts, is an establishment or settlement where goods and services could be traded. Typically a trading post allows people from one geogr ...

here, named Payne River (now the

) in memory of Frank F. Payne, who explored the region during the winter of 1885–1886. Four years later, the competing

Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), originally the Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading Into Hudson’s Bay, is a Canadian holding company of department stores, and the oldest corporation in North America. It was the owner of the ...

also set up a post. The Inuit remained nomadic however and only visited the site as a summer encampment because of the abundance of game. In 1945, the location was known as Payne Bay. In 1959, the federal day school was founded. From then on permanent settlement by Inuit finally began. In 1961, the federal government provided healthcare facilities, housing, and social services. That same year, the Quebec Government decided to give French names to places of the northern Quebec coast and changed the name of the post to Francis-Babel, in honour of Louis-François Babel (1826-1912). But this name did not take root, and was replaced a year later with Bellin, named after

Jacques-Nicolas Bellin Jacques Nicolas Bellin (; 1703 – 21 March 1772) was a French hydrographer, geographer, and member of the French intellectual group called the philosophes. Bellin was born in Paris. He was hydrographer of France's hydrographic office, membe ...

(1703-1772). It was subsequently known as Bellin (Payne) until 1980. That year, the name was changed to Kangiqsuk when the village was incorporated as a Northern Village Municipality (). Local authorities disagreed with this

transliteration Transliteration is a type of conversion of a text from one script to another that involves swapping letters (thus '' trans-'' + '' liter-'') in predictable ways, such as Greek → and → the digraph , Cyrillic → , Armenian → or L ...

, and in 1982 it was corrected to Kangirsuk. Since 1996, the police services in Kangirsuk are provided by the

Kativik Regional Police Force The Nunavik Police Service (NPS; , ) delivers regular policing services in the 14 remote northern villages of the Kativik Region. The headquarters of the NPS are in Kuujjuaq, and detachments operate in each community. The service was formerly cal ...

The community is depicted in the 2019 short film ''

Throat Singing in Kangirsuk ''Throat Singing in Kangirsuk'' () is a Canadian short documentary film, directed by Eva Kaukai and Manon Chamberland and released in 2019.Jackie McKay"'It's a huge thing': Film starring 2 Nunavik teens screening at Sundance Film Festival" CBC No ...

(Katatjatuuk Kangirsumi)''.

Demographics

In the

2021 Census of Population The 2021 Canadian census was a detailed enumeration of the Canadian population with a reference date of May 11, 2021. It follows the 2016 Canadian census, which recorded a population of 35,151,728. The overall response rate was 98%, which is sli ...

conducted by

Statistics Canada Statistics Canada (StatCan; ), formed in 1971, is the agency of the Government of Canada commissioned with producing statistics to help better understand Canada, its population, resources, economy, society, and culture. It is headquartered in ...

, Kangirsuk had a population of living in of its total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of . With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021. Population trend: * Population in 2021: 561 (2016 to 2021 population change: -1.1%) * Population in 2016: 567 * Population in 2011: 549 * Population in 2006: 466 * Population in 2001: 436 * Population in 1996: 394 * Population in 1991: 351

Education

The

Kativik School Board The Kativik School Board (KSB; , Kativik Ilisarniliriniq) is a school district with territory in Nunavik in northern Quebec; it has an office in the Saint-Laurent area of Montreal and one in Kuujjuaq. While most Quebec school boards are categor ...

operates the Sautjuit School.Our Schools
."

. Retrieved on September 23, 2017.

Flora and fauna

Payne Bay and the Arnaud River are renowned for its excellent

mussel Mussel () is the common name used for members of several families of bivalve molluscs, from saltwater and Freshwater bivalve, freshwater habitats. These groups have in common a shell whose outline is elongated and asymmetrical compared with other ...

harvesting. Numerous nearby lakes and rivers provide an abundance of

Arctic char The Arctic char or Arctic charr (''Salvelinus alpinus'') is a cold-water fish in the family Salmonidae, native to alpine lakes, as well as Arctic and subarctic coastal waters in the Holarctic realm, Holarctic. Distribution and habitat It Spaw ...

and

lake trout The lake trout (''Salvelinus namaycush'') is a freshwater Salvelinus, char living mainly in lakes in Northern North America. Other names for it include mackinaw, namaycush, lake char (or charr), touladi, togue, laker, and grey trout. In Lake Sup ...

. On the islands of Kyak Bay and Virgin Lake located to the east and north-east of Kangirsuk, respectively, important colonies of

eider duck The eiders () are large Mergini, seaducks in the genus ''Somateria''. The three extant species all breed in the cooler latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere. The down feathers of eider ducks and some other ducks and geese are used to fill pillow ...

s nest every year.

References

External links

Northern Village of Kangirsuk
{{Webarchive, url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161105143924/http://nvkangirsuk.ca/en/index_eng.htm , date=2016-11-05 Inuit communities in Quebec Hudson's Bay Company trading posts Road-inaccessible communities of Quebec