Acadia

Ile Sainte Croix, the first French settlement of Acadia. Britain and France contested ownership of the peninsula until British possession in 1713.

Historic territory, encompassing modern Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island in Canada, and parts of the US state of Maine. The French first settled the territory in the 17th century. The term Cajun derives from Acadia.

The Passamaquoddy, Micmac, and Malecite peoples inhabited the region when French explorer Jacques Cartier first visited it in the 1530s. The first French settlement was on St Croix (Dochet) Island in 1604. Harsh conditions there caused a move the following year to Port-Royal, on the Annapolis River in Nova Scotia. From there settlement gradually spread to the Minas Basin and beyond; colonists were brought from Poitou and neighbouring areas in western France, many of whom imported marshland farming techniques, including diking. The British, meanwhile, laid claim to the area, in 1621 naming much of it Nova Scotia; struggles between the two colonial powers continued for 150 years.

In 1755 the British expelled the Acadians, although they had declared neutrality, from Nova Scotia. Acadian deportees were scattered throughout New England and the West Indies, and some returned to Europe. One group later migrated into west Louisiana, to the area now known as Cajun Country, where they developed a distinctive culture and today constitute a large proportion of the population.

The largest modern-day Acadian community in Canada is in New Brunswick, where francophones make up close to 40% of the population.

The source of the name Acadia is disputed, but may lie in Giovanni da Verrazzano's 1520s use of Arcadie, referring to the idyllic plain of classical Greece, for a larger coastal expanse.