French Canadian surnames are surnames which are held by people from Canada who are ultimately of French ancestry, being descendants of individuals who arrived to what was then called ‘New France’ in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Because New France was limited to the eastern parts of Canada, French Canadians are generally to be found in largest numbers in Quebec. However, many French Canadian families later moved westwards as Canada expanded and some migrated into the United States.
History of French Canadian surnames and naming conventions
French Canadian surnames are the by-product of a very specific period of history running from 1608 to 1763. This was the period in which portions of what is now eastern Canada and in particular the province of Quebec were settled as a French colony. The French had begun exploring the eastern seaboard of North America along with the English and others in the sixteenth century. However, as with the English further to the south in Virginia and New England, it was not until the early seventeenth century that the first permanent French settlements were established in eastern Canada. The first such settlement was founded by Samuel de Champlain, a French navigator and explorer, near the mouth of the St Lawrence River in the summer of 1608. He called this settlement Quebec, an Algonquian Indian word for ‘narrow passage’ or ‘strait’. It was the beginning of the colony of ‘New France’ and the introduction of French surnames into the region.[1]
Over the next century and a half the small outpost at Quebec expanded to other settlements along the course of the St Lawrence River and other nearby regions. Although the region was not settled as extensively as the English colonies further to the south in New England, the Middle Colonies, Virginia and the Carolinas were in the seventeenth century, it was nevertheless colonized to a sufficient degree to introduce tens of thousands of French men and women here by the eighteenth century. These would form the basis for the French heritage of eastern Canada in times to come and in particular the Gallic influences acting on Quebec where most of French colonial activity was concentrated.
We might well be talking about nearly all Canadians having French-inspired surnames today had it not been for the events of the mid-eighteenth century. In 1756, France and Britain, the two great rivals to establish themselves as Europe’s pre-eminent power at the time, went to war with each other in a conflict known as the Seven Years War. This was the first truly global conflict, with the war extending to engagements in North America, India and other regions where France and Britain were rivals. When it ended in 1763, the British had gained the upper-hand and were able to acquire French Canada from the French as part of the Treaty of Paris. Thus, after a century and a half the region became a British colony.[2]
Canada, as it soon became known under British rule, would begin acquiring increasing amounts of independence from Britain from the 1860s onwards. It was also experiencing increased migration from Britain into Canada. This transformed the ethnic and lingual landscape of the country, which shifted from being primarily French to primarily British. However, the Quebec region, which had been most intensively colonized by the French between 1608 and 1763, retained its French character. The people here would come to identify as French Canadians, many of them being bilingual in English and French, and many of them retaining their French surnames. This situation has persevered down to the present day and approximately 85% of all those bearing French Canadian surnames are from Quebec.[3]
Most popular French Canadian surnames and their origins
The most popular French Canadian surnames tend to be as follows:[4]
Tremblay – The third most common surname in Canada and the most common French Canadian surname with over 100,000 people holding it. It is a derived from the French term for someone who lived near aspen trees and is a toponymic surname.
Roy – This is a French Canadian surname derived from the French word for ‘king’, roi. It is the second most common French Canadian surname with approximately 90,000 people called Roy in Canada.
Gagnon – This French Canadian surname is derived from the Old French word gaaigner, which transliterates to ‘to cultivate’ or ‘to work’. This was applied to ‘cultivating’ or ‘working’ the land and as such the surname was first applied to farmers or agricultural workers in medieval France.
Leblanc – This is a physical descriptor surname literally meaning ‘the white’. It developed as a surname for describing people with white or blonde hair as ‘the white’. About 65,000 French Canadians have this surname today.
Geographical spread of French Canadian surname
Map showing the distribution of French Canadians in Canada.
As we have seen, the geographical spread of French Canadian surnames follows a clear pattern. These are overwhelmingly found in Quebec province which was the core part of the French colony in Canada prior to it being ceded to Britain in 1763. It remains the heartland of Francophone Canada today and approximately 85% of all people with French Canadian surnames come from Quebec.[5]
The other region where there are many people with French Canadian surnames is directly to the east of Quebec on the island of Nova Scotia and the New Brunswick region on the mainland adjacent to Nova Scotia. Somewhat anomalously there are few French Canadians in central and western Canada, the exception being the Yukon territory in the north-western corner of Canada, which experienced migration of French Canadians there during the Klondike gold rush of the late 1890s.[6]
Famous people with French Canadian surnames
Alanis Morissette, a French Canadian singer and songwriterAlanis Morissette – A famous French Canadian singer who had many hits in the 1990s and 2000s. Her surname is a physical descriptor surname which means ‘swarthy’ or ‘dark’, used originally to describe someone with swarthy skin or dark hair.[7]Justin Trudeau – The leader of the Canadian Liberal Party and Prime Minister of Canada from 2015 to the current time of writing in 2023. The meaning of the Trudeau surname is not 100% clear. It may be derived from the French for ‘I trust’.[8]
Celine Dion – A French Canadian singer whose surname had two possible meanings. It may ultimately be derived from Dionysius, the Greek god of wine and ecstasy, or be a toponymic surname to describe someone who came from Dionne in the Burgundy region of eastern France.[9]
Jean-Marc Vallée – A French Canadian filmmaker known for directing the Oscar-winning film Dallas Buyer’s Club. The Vallée surname is most likely a toponymic surname used to originally describe someone who came from a valley region.[10]
