Lillooet

The Lillooet, who call themselves the St'at'imc, are an Interior Salish people of the Fraser Canyon and mountains of southern British Columbia. Their language is St'at'imcets. Salmon fishing formed the backbone of their economy, supplemented by hunting and berry gathering, and the eleven Lillooet bands generally preferred trade over warfare.

They built plank longhouses, insulated winter earthlodges and summer lodges covered in bark or reed mats. Sharing much with Northwest Coast peoples, they held potlatches, kept clan names and raised totem poles in some communities, notably the Lil'wat of the Whistler valley.

A rare rupture was the brutal war with the Tsilhqot'in, whose raiders carried off women and children from every Lillooet band until a St'at'imc victory in Graveyard Valley broke their power. The fur trader Simon Fraser passed through the Fraser Canyon on his river journey of 1808.