Tsimshian

The Tsimshian (/ˈsɪmʃiən/; Sm'algyax: Ts’msyan) are an indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest Coast. Their communities are mostly in coastal British Columbia and far southern Alaska, around Terrace and Prince Rupert in British Columbia, and Alaska's Annette Island. The Tsimshian people comprises approximately 10,000 members belonging across seven member First Nation peoples (which include the Kitselas, Kitsumkalum, and the "Allied Tribes" of the Lax Kw'Alaams, Metlakatla, Kitkatla, Gitga'at (at Hartley Bay) and Kitasoo (at Klemtu)). The Tsimshian are one of the largest groups of First Nations' people in northwest British Columbia. The Tsimshian culture is matrilineal, with a societal structure based on a clan system, properly referred to as a moiety. Early anthropologists and linguists had also grouped Gitksan and Nishga as Tsimshian because of apparent linguistic affinities. They were referred to as "Coast Tsimshian," even though some communities were not coastal. The three groups, however, self-identify as separate nations.