Memkumlis

{{Use Canadian English|date=February 2026}} {{Use mdy dates|date=September 2023}} '''Memkumlis''' or, officially '''Meem Quam Leese''',<ref>[http://apps.gov.bc.ca/pub/bcgnws/names/54300.html BC Names/Geo BC entry "Meem Quam Leese"]</ref> '''Memkoomlish''', '''Memqumlis''', '''ʼmimkumlis''' or '''Miʼmkwamlis''',<ref>[http://apps.gov.bc.ca/pub/bcgnws/names/54857.html BC Names/GeoBC entry "Memkoomlish"]</ref> commonly known as Mamalilaculla,<ref>[http://apps.gov.bc.ca/pub/bcgnws/names/25752.html BC Names/GeoBC entry "Mamalilaculla (locality)"]</ref> which is actually the name of the subgroup of the Kwakwakaʼwakw whose home it is, is located on the west side of Village Island in the Johnstone Strait region of the Central Coast of British Columbia.

The village is on '''Mahmalillikullah Indian Reserve No. 1''' on Eliot Passage, which was created in 1886.<ref>[http://apps.gov.bc.ca/pub/bcgnws/names/54857.html BC Names/GeoBC entry "Memkoomlish"]</ref><ref>[http://apps.gov.bc.ca/pub/bcgnws/names/65503.html BC Names "Mahmalillikullah 1 (Indian reserve)"]</ref> The name means "village with rocks and islands out front",<ref>[http://apps.gov.bc.ca/pub/bcgnws/names/54300.html BC Names/Geo BC entry "Meem Quam Leese"]</ref> or as translated by famous chief and carver Mungo Martin, "group of little islands" and by Franz Boas as "round things [islands] in front at beach".<ref>[http://apps.gov.bc.ca/pub/bcgnws/names/54857.html BC Names/GeoBC entry "Memkoomlish"]</ref>

==History== When the Kwikwasutʼinux village of Gwayasdums was destroyed in the 1850s by the Nuxalk, the survivors joined the Mamalilikulla at Memkumlis. The village was partly destroyed by fire in 1892 and rebuilt.<ref>[http://apps.gov.bc.ca/pub/bcgnws/names/54857.html BC Names/GeoBC entry "Memkoomlish"]</ref>

The village's population was estimated at 2000 in 1836-41 (before the Kwikwasutʼinux moved there), but by 1911 it was only 90.<ref>Franz Boaz, American Geographical Society, vol XIX, no.3, 1887, reprinted in ''Handbook of the Indians of Canada'', 1913, quoted in [http://apps.gov.bc.ca/pub/bcgnws/names/25752.html BC Names/GeoBC entry "Mamalilaculla (locality)"]</ref>

==See also== *List of Kwakwakaʼwakw villages

==References== {{reflist}}

==External links== *[http://www.emilycarr.org/totems/exhibit/kwak/miintro.htm '''Miʼmkwamlis'', Emily Carr - To The Totem Forests website]

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Category:Kwakwaka'wakw villages Category:Central Coast of British Columbia