They used to inhabit large parts of British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Montana, but their reserves are now located in Alberta and in Saskatchewan where they are scarcely differentiated from the Assiniboine. Through their language they are related to the Dakota and Lakota nations of the Great Plains and the Rocky Mountains, part of the large Sioux Nation.
They refer to themselves in their own language as "Nakoda", meaning friend, ally. The name "Stoney" was given them by white explorers, because of their technique of using fire-heated rocks to boil broth in rawhide bowls. They are very closely related to the Assiniboine who are also known as Stone Sioux (from Ojibwe asinii-bwaan).
The Stoney are descendants of individual bands of Dakota, Lakota and Nakota, in particular of western groups of Assiniboine, from which they spun out as an independent group at about 1744. The Stoney were divided geographically and culturally into two tribal groups or divisions with different dialects, which in turn were further divided into several bands: 
Wood Stoney (Chan Tonga Nakoda- ‘Big Woods People’, often called Swampy Ground Assiniboine, northern tribal group)
Mountain Stoney (Ye Xa Yabine Nakoda or Hebina - ‘Rock Mountain People’, often called Strong Wood Assiniboine, Thickwood Assiniboine, southern tribal group)
In 1877, representatives of the Nakoda Nations of Bearspaw, Chiniki and Wesley met with representatives of the British Crown to discuss the terms of Treaty 7. In exchange for use of traditional native lands, the Crown agreed to honor their right to self-government and an ancestral way of life. They were also promised reserve lands, 279 km² situated along the Bow River between the Kananaskis River and the Ghost River, which became the Big Horn, Stoney and Eden Valley reserves, shared between the Bearspaw, Chiniki and Wesley tribes.