Nicolas Perrot (c. 1644–1717), a French explorer, fur trader, and diplomat, was one of the first European men to travel in the Upper Mississippi Valley, in what is now Wisconsin and Minnesota.

He journeyed with several to the Western Great Lakes, where they intended to preach to the Native Americans, reaching present-day Wisconsin in 1665.

He earned the friendship of the natives by swapping furs for guns, allowing the group to defend themselves on an equal footing against their enemies.

In 1670, he was enlisted as a translator for Simon-François Daumont de Saint-Lusson, a military officer and deputy of Jean Talon, who had been sent "to lay claim to the land of the Ottawa, Amikwa, Illinois, and of other nations discovered or to be discovered in North America contiguous and adjacent to Lake Superior (French: Lac Supérieur), the great inland sea, including all its length and breadth, and including the resources therein, for Louis XIV" at what was called "The Pageant of the Sault".

In 1684, he participated in the peacekeeping mission of the Governor Antoine Lefebvre de La Barre and succeeded in bringing the warriors of several nations together to sign a peace treaty.

After this, Perrot traveled to the northern waters of the Mississippi River, in the territory of the Sioux, where he built Fort Saint Antoine, now in Minnesota.

Their success in breaking the Iroquois blockade of the Ottawa River and in resupplying the western Indians loyal to the French may have saved New France from the Five Nations.

In 1695 Perrot brought the Miami, Sauk, Menominee, Potawatomi and Fox chiefs to Montreal at the governor's request, regarding war with the Iroquois.