Yellowknife (
2011 population: 19,234) is the capital city and largest community of the
Northwest Territories (NT or NWT),
Canada. It is located on the northern shore of
Great Slave Lake, approximately south of the
Arctic Circle, on the west side of Yellowknife Bay near the outlet of the
Yellowknife River. Yellowknife and its surrounding water bodies were named after a local Dene tribe once known as the 'Copper Indians' or 'Yellowknife Indians' (now referred to locally as the
Yellowknives Dene (First Nation)) who traded tools made from
copper deposits near the Arctic Coast. The current population is ethnically mixed. Of the eleven official languages of the Northwest Territories, five are spoken in significant numbers in Yellowknife:
Dene Suline,
Dogrib,
South and North Slavey,
English, and
French. In the Dogrib language, the city is known as
So`mbak'è (Som-ba Kay) ("where the money is").