Ziinzibaakwutakaming is "the place for making maple sugar" on the south shore of Nett Lake. Ginewigwasensikag is the "long promontory of birch trees" on Lake Vermilion, also known as Birch Point.
These Ojibwe names and meanings and more than 100 others are translated on a new handmade map of the Bois Forte Band of Chippewa's traditional realm, extending 100 miles between the eastern shores of Lake Vermilion to Nett Lake, encompassing about 7,000 square miles.
The map, more than two years in the making, is intended to restore Indigenous names to rivers, lakes, islands and other points of interest found in the boreal forests inhabited by the Bois Forte tribe for hundreds of years.
"Those people really had a sense of place and a sense of belonging to the land," which is reflected in naming practices, said Rick Anderson, a Bois Forte citizen who worked on the project.
The new map is a reminder "that people were here before, and we share the love and respect of the land as they did," he...