Gispaxlo'ots
The Gispaxlo'ots are one of the 14 tribes of the Tsimshian nation in British Columbia, Canada, and one of the nine of those tribes making up the "Nine Tribes" of the lower Skeena River resident at Lax Kw'alaams, B.C. The name Gispaxlo'ots means literally "people of the place of elderberries." Their traditional territory includes an area on the Skeena River between present-day Terrace and Prince Rupert. Since 1834, when a Hudson's Bay Company trading fort was established at Lax Kw'alaams, they have been based there. Their chief Ligeex permitted the HBC to build on Gispaxlo'ots territory.
Traditionally, the Gispaxlo'ots have been the most powerful of the Tsimshian tribes, due to the exploits and wealth of Ligeex, a great trading chief. As part of the negotiations with the HBC, he arranged in 1832 for his daughter Sudaał to marry Dr. John Frederick Kennedy, the first HBC partner of the fort. The House of Ligeex belongs to the Laxsgiik.
Other house-groups of the Gispaxlo'ots include:
- House of Spooxs -- Laxsgiik
- House of Suhalaayt -- Gispwudwada
- House of T'amks -- Gispwudwada
- House of 'Wiigyet—Gispwudada
Prominent Gispaxlo'ots people
- Paul Legaic, Legaic V, hereditary chief and merchant trader
- Rev. William Henry Pierce, missionary and memoirist
- Henry W. Tate, oral historian
- Arthur Wellington Clah, head man and diarist, taught Father Duncan sm'algyax
- Legaic IV, known as Old Legaic, the pinnacle of chiefly dynasty
- Elizabeth Diiks Lawson, sister to Legaic V, mother of Sgagweet IV
- John C. Tate, oral historian,
- Xoop, in time of Legaic IV, acted as regent for the child chief
- Russell Mather Sr., Chief Neesa Walp
- Alex Campbell Sr., Chief Gitxoon
- Wayne Ryan