Connections on the name...
In the Eskimo languages, the word for person or human is inu. Various Eskimo groups use inu in part of their names for themselves - such as inuit, inuplak, inukit, inuttut, inuvialukton and inuinaqtun. Inuvik means the people's place - or town. Inuvik can refer to any settlement, but it is also the name of a particular arctic town in the Northwest Territories.
Vik is a word that can be found around the world from India to Alaska and is always associated with family, home or dwelling place. The ancient Indo European word wika meant clan or extended family; and from that origin, many of the European languages from Sanskrit to Old Norse have some form of the word. The Sanskrit word vis derives from the same root meaning home or dwelling. The word is also related to the Latin vicus, meaning a neighborhood or town quarter, and from this Latin origin derives English words such as the word vicinity. In Old Norse vik refers to dwellings along a creek, bay or inlet, and the people who lived in these became known as Vikingar or Vikings. The word was also used in Old English or Anglo-Saxon as wic or wik originally meaning camp, but later becoming the word for town.
It appears in Dutch in a similar way as wijk meaning neighborhood in a town. The widespread use of vik (also spelled wick, wijk and wich) can be seen in many town names that have one of these forms of vik as a suffix: Anvik, Noorvik(Alaska); Inuvik, Aklavik (Canada); Gactwick, Norwich (England); Rikswijk, Waalwijk (Netherlands); Vivevik, Narvik (Norway); Prestwick (Scotland); Studsvik, Valvik (Sweden).
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