Chief Maquinna, drawn by Tomás de Suria, 1791.
The Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation welcomes you to the ancient Mowachaht village of Yuquot, the centre of our world. Here we understand the past and receive strength to face the future.
Archaeologists speculate about the “when” of our arrival in Nootka Sound, but we prefer to speak of “time immemorial” and to understand our traditions about “how” we became human at Yuquot. It is here that we first learned to live with each other, our environment, the animal world and our neighbours. Our story goes back beyond recorded history to a time when our First Ancestors were placed here in our hahoothlee (territories).
Williams Family With Welcome/Watchman Figure, 2012.
Mowachaht laws and customs and the precious heritage of our hahoothlee have been treasured and protected through thousands of years by our ha’wiih (chiefs) and elders, long before the mamatni (white people) came to our shores. We continue to sustain our traditions through honouring our ha’wiih today, and will forever live here in the inheritance of our hahoothlee.
A representative of our Beachowner welcomes you, as he and his family have welcomed visitors for thousands of years. Tradition demands that he greet all visitors before conducting them to Nis’maas, the great house of our ta’yi ha’wilth (head chief) Maquinna. The name Nis’maas, means “solid, well-rooted, always there,” like the Mowachaht/Muchalaht First Nation today.
Illustration of Mowachaht canoe welcoming Capt. Cook near Yuquot, 1778.