Canada used to be inhabited by various aboriginal peoples for thousands of years before the European colonies were established.
 First Nations and Mtis peoples played a critical part in the development of European colonies in Canada, particularly for their role in assisting European coureur des bois and voyageurs in their explorations of the continent during the North American fur trade
 As a consequence of European colonization, the Indigenous population declined by forty to eighty percent, and several First Nations, such as the Beothuk, disappeared

