1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Algonquin

ALGONQUIN, or Algonkin (a word formerly regarded as a French contraction of Algomequin, “those on the other side” of the river, viz. the St Lawrence, but now believed to be from the Micmac algoomaking—“at the place of spearing fish”), a collective term for a number of tribes of North American Indians dwelling in the valley of the Ottawa river and around the northern tributaries of the St Lawrence. The Algonquins allied themselves with the French against the Iroquois. Many were driven west by the latter and later became known as Ottawa. The French missionaries at work among the Algonquins early in the 17th century found their language to be the key to the many Indian dialects now included by philologists under the general term “Algonquian stock.” The chief tribes included in this stock were the Algonquin, Malecite, Micmac, Nascapi, Pennacook, Fox, Kickapoo, Delaware, Cheyenne, Conoy, Cree, Mohican, Massachuset, Menominee, Miami, Misisaga, Mohegan, Nanticoke, Narraganset, Nipmuc, Ojibway, Ottawa, Pequot, Potawatami, Sac, Shawnee and Wampanoag. The Indians of Algonquian stock number between 80,000 and 90,000, of whom rather more than half are in the United States, the rest being in Canada. Of the Algonquins proper there remain about 1500 settled in the provinces of Quebec and Ontario.

For details see Handbook of American Indians, ed. F. W. Hodge, Washington, 1907.