"Moyie River (not Mooyie)" adopted in the 2nd Report of the Geographic Board of Canada, 30 June 1900.

Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office

A corruption of the French, mouiller, "to (make) wet", the name given by trappers, owing to the moist conditions described by David Thompson, 1808. Thompson elsewhere calls it "McDonald's river" after his NWC clerk Finan McDonald (Thompson journal, 1808); called "Grand Quête River" by Governor Simpson, in honour of an Indian chief by that name, whose pigtail was very long (Simpson's journal, 1847, & Thorington's The Purcell Range, 1946); called "Choe-coos River" by Captain Palliser (Palliser's journal 1858, significance not provided). Originally pronounced moo-YAY, now commonly pronounced moy-EE.

Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office

The name Moyie or Mooyie is a very old one... and is a corruption of the French mouillé, meaning "wet". Lees and Clutterbuck, who were this way in 1887, had some bitter things to say about "this water-logged Mooyie valley."

Source: Akrigg, Helen B. and Akrigg, G.P.V; British Columbia Place Names; Sono Nis Press, Victoria 1986 /or University of British Columbia Press 1997

The French origin of the name explains the pronunciation "Mo-yeah" which one still hears given to "Moyie" by old-timers.

Source: Akrigg, Helen B. and Akrigg, G.P.V; 1001 British Columbia Place Names; Discovery Press, Vancouver 1969, 1970, 1973.

Headwaters at 49 17 - 116 09 on 82F/8; crosses into Idaho at 49 00 - 116 11 on 82 F/1.

Source: Canadian Geographical Names Database, Ottawa