The web site.....

The web site is at www.joshuaradu.com

Micmac Indians poetically named the archipelago "Menagoesenog", a word that means "islands brushed by the waves". Well before the arrival of the first Europeans, Indians were coming to the Islands to fish, and to hunt for seal and sea cows (walrus).

In June 1534, Jacques Cartier inscribed in his diary the first written report about the Islands, which he called "Les Araynes" (from Latin "arena", meaning "sand"). He named the first islands he came upon Île Margaulx (today Rocher aux Oiseaux) and Île Brion. He wrote in his ship's log: "These islands have sandbanks and good passages around them, 6 or seven fathoms. This island is the best land we have seen, better even than Terre Neuve (Newfoundland). We found a land with great trees, fine meadow, fields of wild wheat and flowering peas, as many species as I ever saw in Brittany, and it seemed as if all had been planted by man's hand."

In 1629, Samuel de Champlain wrote on a map, "La Magdeleine", near the area of Île du Havre Aubert. However, it is said that the archipelago's present name, Îles de la Madeleine, was given in honour of Madeleine Fontaine, wife of François Doublet de Honfleur, and concessionaire of the Islands in 1663. Under the French Regime, the Islands were passed from hand to hand without lasting colonisation or exploitation.