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The glaciers began their retreat from in the Maritimes approximately 13,500 years ago, with final deglaciation, isostatic rebound, and sea level fluctuation ending and leaving the New England-Maritimes region virtually ice free 11,000 years ago. . The earliest evidence of Palaeo-Indian settlement in the region follows rapidly after deglaciation. Evidence of settlement found in the Debert Palaeo-Indian Site dates to 10,600 before present, though settlement seems likely to have occurred earlier,following large game animals such as the caribou as they expanded into the land revealed by the retreating glaciers. The record of continuous habitation through the paleo and archaic period over ten thousand years culminated in the development of the culture, traditions, and language now known as the Mi’kmaq.

Mi'kmaq

Main article: Mi'kmaq

For several thousand years the territory of the province has been a part of the territory of the Mi'kmaq nation of Mi'kma'ki. Mi'kma'ki includes what is now the Maritimes, parts of Maine, Newfoundland and the Gaspé Peninsula. The Mi'kmaq lived in an annual cycle of seasonal movement between living in dispersed interior winter camps and larger coastal communities during the summer. The climate was unfavourable for agriculture, and small semi-nomadic bands of a few patrilineally related families subsisted on fishing and hunting.

The Mi'kmaq were governed the Santé Mawiómi (Grand Council), lead by the Kji-saqmaw (Grand council leader) and composed of the seven Nikanus (District Chiefs), Kji-Leptin (Grand Captain, or war chief) as well a Putús (recorder/secretery). Mi'kma'ki was divided into seven largely sovereign districts, each governed by a Nikanus and council of Sagamaw (local band chiefs), Elders, and other worthy community leaders. The district council enacting lawed, ensured justice, apportioning fishing and hunting grounds, made war and sued for peace. Local bands were lead by a Sagamaw and council of Elders and consisted of several extended family units.

The Mi'kmaq people inhabited region at the time the first European colonists arrived. Mi'kmaq territory was the first portion of North America that Europeans exploited at length for resource extraction. Early European fishermen salted their catch at sea and sailed directly home with it. But they set up camps ashore as early as 1520 for dry-curing cod. During the second half of the century, dry curing became the preferred preservation method. The local Mi'kmaq peoples began trading with European fishermen when the fishermen began landing in their territories as early as the 1520s. In about 1521–22, the Portuguese under João Álvares Fagundes established a fishing colony on the island. Though it's fate is unknownit is mentioned as late as 1570. . By 1578 some 350 European ships were operating around the Saint Lawrence estuary. Most were independent fishermen, but increasing numbers were exploring the fur trade.

On June 24, 1610, Grand Chief Membertou converted to Catholicism and was baptised. A Concordat, or treaty, was signed between the Grand Council and the Pope protecting French settlers and priests and affirmed the right of Mi'kmaq to choose either Catholicism or Mi'kmaq tradition. In signing the Concordat the Catholic church affirmed Mi’kmaq sovereignty as a Catholic nation.

French Colonization & Acadia

Main article: Acadia

In 1605, French colonists established the first permanent European settlement in the future Canada (and the first north of Florida) at Port Royal, founding what would become known as Acadia. The French, led by Pierre Dugua, Sieur de Monts established the first capital for the colony Acadia at Port Royal. Acadia (French: Acadie) was located in the northeastern region of North America comprising what is now the Canadian Maritime Provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island, Gaspé, in Quebec, and to the Kennebec River in southern Maine.

The transition from trading to colonization was slow to shift from being primarily a matter of explorers and traders, of men, to a colony of permanent settlers, with the ships beginning to arrive in 1632 that included women and children. The survival of the Acadian settlements was based on successful cooperation with the Indigenous peoples of the region. In 1654 Acadia was first conquered by English forces out of Boston, occupying the colony the Treaty of Breda, signed 31 July 1667, returned Acadia to France. In 1674, the Dutch briefly conquered Acadia, renaming the colony New Holland. During the last decades of the seventeenth century, Acadians migrated from the capital, Port Royal, and established what would become the other major Acadian settlements:Grand Pré, Chignecto, Cobequid and Pisiguit.