ABSTRACT
In the late-nineteenth century, the people living in the lower Nass River valley in British Columbia, the Nisga’a, began to deal with the governments of Canada and British Columbia. The British Columbia government did not recognize the territoriality system of the Nisga’a. As is more fully explained in Chapters 5 and 6, head titleholders of each of the houses (wilps) of the Nisga’a were responsible for managing the lands of their wilp. When the Province attempted to identify reserves in 1881, the Nisga’a rejected its efforts, stating that they owned all of the land in the lower Nass Valley. When surveyors attempted to demarcate the reserves in 1886, the chiefs pulled up the stakes and threw them in the river. The Nisga’a efforts to reject the Province’s actions were not successful, although they laid the groundwork for later efforts and for the eventual settlement of the land claims issue. Daniel Raunet (1996) provides a detailed history of the Nisga’a land claims efforts.
