Hochelaga (village)

Hochelaga (French pronunciation: [ɔʃlaɡa]) was a St. Lawrence Iroquois 16th century fortified village on or near Mount Royal in present-day Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Jacques Cartier arrived by boat on October 2, 1535; he visited the village on the following day. He was greeted well by the Iroquois, and named the mountain he saw nearby Mount Royal. Several names in and around Montreal and the Hochelaga Archipelago can be traced back to him. A stone marker commemorating the former village was placed in 1925 on land adjacent to McGill University. It is believed to be in the vicinity of the village visited by Cartier in 1535. The site of the marker is designated a National Historic Site of Canada. The name of the village survives in Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, the name of a neighbourhood of Montreal; a variant spelling survives in Montreal's contemporary Osheaga Festival.