Diabetes

Montreal, French Montréal, city, Quebec province, southeastern Canada. Montreal is the second most-populous city in Canada and the principal metropolis of the province of Quebec. The city of Montreal occupies about three-fourths of Montreal Island (Île de Montréal), the largest of the 234 islands of the Hochelaga Archipelago, one of three archipelagoes near the confluence of the Ottawa and St. Lawrence rivers. Area 141 square miles (365 square km); metro. area, 1,644 square miles (4,259 square km). Pop. (2011) 1,649,519; metro. area, 3,934,078; (2021) 1,762,949; metro. area, 4,342,213.

Montreal is a city with considerable French colonial history dating back to the 16th century. It began as a missionary settlement but soon became a fur-trading centre, a role that was enhanced after the conquest of New France by the British in 1763. Montreal’s location on the St. Lawrence proved to be a major advantage in its development as a transportation, manufacturing, and financial centre. From the time of the confederation of Canada (1867), Montreal was the largest metropolitan centre in the country until it was overtaken by Toronto in the 1970s