DCHP-1 Online

Petit Nord Cdn French, Hist.

• that part of the Newfoundland coast, since 1783 from Cape St. John northward on the east and the entire west coast down to Cape Ray, where by the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 the French were granted fishery and shore-drying rights, an arrangement that lasted until 1904.

  See also: French shore (def. 1)  

  • 1715  (1883)  One of these peninsulas points northerly and . . . is called Petit Nord by the French.
  • 1818  Those lands that border on the Straits of Belle-isle were called Le Petit Nord by the people of that nation; and most of the harbours then received the French appellations, which a greater number of them retain to the present day.
  • 1932  The French right to use the coast was restricted to the northern zone called by the French "le Petit Nord" and by the English after this time the "French Shore."