montagnes Rocheuses

the Rocky Mountains

Calque of English Rocky Mountains, itself a calque from French Montagnes de Roche originally coined by French fur trader Jacques Legardeur de Saint-Pierre in 1752 as a translation of a word from an Indigenous language in present-day Alberta, most likely Plains Cree asinîwaciy, a compound of asiniy (“rock”) + waciy (“mountain”).