The Jesuit Relations
Natives and Missionaries in Seventeenth-Century North AmericaSecond Edition ©2019
As a 73-volume library, the original Jesuit Relations has long been inaccessible to undergraduate students. Vitally important, the writings of seventeenth-century French Jesuits in Native North America tell the story of early American encounters. This new edition deftly binds them into a t...
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As a 73-volume library, the original Jesuit Relations has long been inaccessible to undergraduate students. Vitally important, the writings of seventeenth-century French Jesuits in Native North America tell the story of early American encounters. This new edition deftly binds them into a thematically arranged, 35-document sampler with a detailed introduction that provides background on these missionaries, the Native Americans, and their cohabitation in early North America. Colorful journal entries by such fathers as Paul Le Jeune, Jean de Brébeuf, Claude Dablon, and Claude Allouez describe the Wendat, Algonquin, Iroquois, and Innu peoples. Changes to this edition include recent scholarship in the Introduction, chapter notes, and bibliography, as well as a new chapter which recounts the early stages of the Jesuits’ westward expansion into the region of Lakes Superior and Michigan and the upper Mississippi valley, and sheds light on the anti-Iroquois alliance that was taking shape in the late 1660s. Two maps, a chronology, a bibliography, and questions for consideration supplement the firsthand accounts.
"The Jesuit Relations are among the most important scholarly sources for the study of early American history, and they’re simply magic in the classroom. Greer’s thoughtful translations and his concise, well-informed introduction do justice to these remarkable documents. The gripping, vivid selections from the Relations will fully engage undergraduates, dissolve their stereotypes of both Indians and colonists, and allow them to gain a more nuanced view of life in early America." – James D. Rice SUNY Plattsburgh
Table of Contents
Foreword
Preface
PART ONE
Introduction: Native North America and the French Jesuits
The Society of Jesus in Europe and Abroad
Iroquoians and Algonquians
The Colonization of New France
The Canadian Missions
The Jesuit Relations and Their Readers
How to Read the Jesuit Relations
PART TWO: The Documents
1. Paul Le Jeune Winters with Innu Hunters of the Northern Woodlands
1. Paul Le Jeune, Journal [of a Winter Hunt], 1634
2. Paul Le Jeune, On Their Hunting and Fishing, 1634
3. Paul Le Jeune, On the Beliefs, Superstitions, and Errors of the Montagnais Indians, 1634
4. Paul Le Jeune, On the Good Things Which Are Found among the Indians, 1634
2. Jean de Brébeuf on the Wendat
Language
5. Jean de Brébeuf, Of the Language of the Hurons, 1636
Religion, Myth, and Ritual
6. Jean de Brébeuf, What the Hurons Think about Their Origins, 1636
7. Jean de Brébeuf, That the Hurons Recognize Some Divinity; Of Their Superstitions and of Their Faith in Dreams, 1636
8. Jean de Brébeuf, Concerning Feasts, Dances . . . and What They Call Ononharoia, 1636
Law and Government
9. Jean de Brébeuf, Of the Polity of the Hurons and of Their Government, 1636
10. Jean de Brébeuf, Of the Order the Hurons Observe in Their Councils, 1636
The Wendat Feast of the Dead
11. Jean de Brébeuf, Of the Solemn Feast of the Dead, 1636
3. Disease and Medicine
Wendat Medical Practices
12. Jean de Brébeuf, [Cure by Lacrosse], 1636
13. Jérôme Lalemant, [Cure by Gambling], 1639
14. Jérôme Lameant, {Satisfying the Soul’s Desires], 1639
The Influenza Epidemic of 1637
15. François Le Mercier, The Malady with Which Our Little Household Has Been Afflicted, 1637
16. François Le Mercier, The Help We Have Given to the Sick of Our Village, 1637
17. François Le Mercier, Ossossané Afflicted with the Contagion, 1637
18. François Le Mercier, Of the Hurons Baptized This Year, 1638
Smallpox among the Wendat, 1639
19. Jérôme Lalemant, Of the Persecutions Excited against Us, 1640
4. Diplomacy and War
Peace Negotiations at Three Rivers, 1645
20. Barthélemy Vimont, Treaty of Peace between the French, Iroquois, and Other Nations, 1644-1645
Iroquois Attacks on the Algonquins, 1647
21. Jérôme Lalemant, Some Iroquois Surprised after Defeating the Algonquins; A Woman Kills an Iroquois and Escapes, 1647
The Wendat Annihilated, 1649
22. Paul Ragueneau, Of the Capture of the Villages of the Mission of St. Ignace, 1648-1649
A Jesuit Map of New France
23. Francesco-Giuseppe Bressani, New France Accurately Depicted, 1657
5. Writings on the Natural Environment
Innu Explanations of a Solar Eclipse
24. Paul Le Jeune, Of Their Customs and Their Belief, 1637
The Moral Qualities of Animals
25. Jérôme Lalemant, Various Matters, 1647-1648
Earthquakes, Comets, and Other Prophetic Signs
26. Jérôme Lalemant, Three Suns and Other Aerial Phenomena Which Appeared in New France, 1662-1663
27. Jérôme Lalemant, Universal Earthquake in Canada and Its Marvelous Effects, 1662-1663
28. François Le Mercier, Of the Comets and Extraordinary Signs That Have Appeared at Quebec and in Its Vicinity, 1664-1665
Nature as a Storehouse of Resources
29. François Le Mercier, Of the Condition of Canada over the Last Two Years, 1666-1667
6. Missions to the Iroquois
Mission to the Mohawk Country, 1667
30. François Le Mercier, Of the Mission of Ste. Marie among the Mohawk Iroquois, 1667-1668
Mohawks Converted
31. Jean Pierron, Of the Mission of the Martyrs in the Country of the Mohawks, or the Lower Iroquois, 1669-1670
The Iroquois Mission of Sault St. Louis/Kahnawake
32. Claude Chauchetière, [Letter on Intense Religious Practice among Indigenous Converts], 1682
7. Martyrs and Mystics
The Ordeal of Isaac Jogues
33. Jérôme Lalemant, How Father Isaac Jogues Was Taken by the Iroquois, and What He Suffered on His First Entrance into Their Country, 1647
An Indigenous Saint
34. P. F. X. de Charlevoix, Catherine Tegahkouita: An Iroquois Virgin, 1744
8. Jesuits on the Middle Ground
35. Claude Dablon and Claude Allouez, Relation of the Mission to the Ottawa, 1669-70
APPENDIXES
A Chronology of Events Related to the Jesuit Relations (1534-1773)
Questions for Consideration
Selected Bibliography
Index
Authors
Allan Greer
Allan Greer is professor of history and Canada Research Chair in Colonial North America at McGill University in Montreal. He is the author of Mohawk Saint: Catherine Tekakwitha and the Jesuits (2005); The People of New France (1997); The Patriots and the People: The Rebellion of 1837 in Rural Lower Canada (1993); Peasant, Lord and Merchant: Rural Society in Three Quebec Parishes 1740–1840 (1985), books which have garnered a number of national and international awards.
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