Iyiniyu

The Iyiniyu are the southern branch of the East Cree, or James Bay Cree, whose homeland Eeyou Istchee lies east and southeast of James Bay in northern Quebec. Their self-name Iyiniw means human being in their Algonquian tongue; they speak southern East Cree dialects, an inland form around Lake Mistassini and Waswanipi and a coastal form at Waskaganish on Rupert Bay.

Like other Cree they were subarctic hunter-gatherers, in lodges and bands taking caribou and moose, fishing and meeting seasonally under no central chief.

Their entry into written history came through the fur trade: in 1668 English traders built Charles Fort at the Rupert River mouth on the site of Waskaganish, the first Hudson's Bay Company post. Renamed Fort Rupert, it drew southern East Cree bands into supplying furs and provisioning ships, making them middlemen between bay and inland peoples through the eighteenth century.