Athabasca
a river lake, and former district of Canada. The ATHABASCA or ELK RIVER rises on the E. slopes of the Rocky Mountains in the province of Alberta, flows in a N. E. direction through the province of the same name, and falls into Lake Athabasca after a course of about 750 miles. LAKE ATHABASCA, or Lake of the Hills, is about 190 miles S. S. E. of the Great Slave Lake, with which it is connected by means of the Slave river, a continuation of the Peace.
It is about 200 miles in length from E. to W., and about 35 miles wide at the broadest part, but gradually narrows to a point at either extremity. The district of ATHABASKA, formed in 1882, lay immediately E. of British Columbia and N. of Alberta; area about 251,900 square miles. Its territory was in 1905 absorbed by the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba.