Editing Lake Superior (section)

==Name==
[[File:LS-MetOp-B.png|thumb|left|False color view of Lake Superior|alt=False color view of Lake Superior as seen by the AVHRR instrument onboard MetOp-B. Made in a 221 composition, so colors are approximate. Received by an amateur station via the HRPT downlink with a 1m parabolic antenna.]]
[[File:Lake-Superior.svg|thumb|left|Map of [[Great Lakes]] (Lake Superior in darker blue)]]

The [[Ojibwe]] name for the lake is ''gichi-gami'' (in [[Ojibwe writing systems#Ojibwe syllabics|syllabics]]: {{lang|oj|ᑭᒋᑲᒥ}}, pronounced ''gitchi-gami'' or ''kitchi-gami'' in different dialects),<ref name = SuperiorMagOnName>{{cite web |url = http://www.lakesuperior.com/the-lake/lake-superior/281almanac/ |title = Kitchi-Gami Almanac: The Name |work = LakeSuperior.com |date = January 1, 2006 }}</ref> meaning "great sea". [[Henry Wadsworth Longfellow]] wrote this name as "'''Gitche Gumee'''" in the poem ''[[The Song of Hiawatha]]'', as did [[Gordon Lightfoot]] in his song "[[The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald|The Wreck of the ''Edmund Fitzgerald'']]{{-"}}.

According to other sources, the full Ojibwe name is {{lang|oj|ᐅᒋᑉᐧᐁ ᑭᒋᑲᒥ}} ''Ojibwe Gichigami'' ("Ojibwe's Great Sea") or {{lang|oj|ᐊᓂᐦᔑᓈᐯ ᑭᒋᑲᒥ}} ''Anishinaabe Gichigami'' ("[[Anishinaabe]]'s Great Sea").<ref name = ChisholmGutsch>{{cite book |title = Under the Shadow of the Gods: A Guide to the History of the Canadian Shore of Lake Superior |first1 = Barbara |last1 = Chisholm |first2 = Andrea |last2 = Gutsche |name-list-style = amp |edition = 1st |year = 1998 |publisher = Transcontinental Printing }}</ref> The 1878 dictionary by [[Frederic Baraga|Father Frederic Baraga]], the first one written for the Ojibway language, gives the Ojibwe name as ''Otchipwe-kitchi-gami'' (a transliteration of ''Ojibwe Gichigami'').<ref name = SuperiorMagOnName/>

In the 17th century, the first French explorers approached the great inland sea by way of the [[Ottawa River]] and Lake Huron; they referred to their discovery as ''le lac supérieur'' (the upper lake, i.e., above Lake Huron). Some 17th-century [[Society of Jesus|Jesuit]] missionaries referred to it as ''Lac Tracy'' (for [[Alexandre de Prouville de Tracy]]).<ref>{{cite web |url = http://www.epa.gov/greatlakes/atlas/ |title = Great Lakes Atlas |publisher = Environment Canada and United States Environmental Protection Agency |year = 1995 }}</ref> After taking control of the region from the French in the 1760s, following their defeat in the [[French and Indian War]], the British [[Anglicisation|anglicized]] the lake's name to ''Superior'', "on account of its being superior in magnitude to any of the lakes on that vast continent".<ref>{{cite journal |author-link = George R. Stewart |first = George R. |last = Stewart |title = Names on the Land, A Historical Account of Place-Naming in the United States |journal = Geographical Review |year = 1945 |volume = 35 |issue = 4 |page = 83 |doi = 10.2307/210804 |jstor = 210804 |bibcode = 1945GeoRv..35..659P }}</ref>