Charles W. Colby The Jesuit Relations The American Historical Review October 1901

La huictiesme nous arriuasmes aux trois Riuieres, le seiour y est fort agréable, la terre sablonneuse, la pesche en son temps tres-abõdante. Vn Sauuage rapportera quelquefois dans son Canot douze ou quinze Esturgeons, dont le moindre sera par fois de la hauteur d’vn homme. Il y a quantité d’autres poissons tres-excellens. Les Français ont nõmé ce lieu les trois Riuieres, pource qu’il sort des terres vn assez beau fleuue, qui se vient dégorger dans la grande Riuiere de sainct Laurens par trois principales emboucheures, causées par plusieurs petites Isles, qui se rencontrent à l’entrée de ce fleuue, nommé des Sauuages Metaberoutin. Ie décrirois volontiers la beauté de ce lieu, mais ie crains d’estre long; Tout le pays entre Kebec & ceste nouuelle Habitation, que nous appellerõs la Residence de la Conception, m’a semblé fort agreable, il est entrecoupé de ruisseaux & de fleuues, qui se déchargent d’espaces en espaces dans le Roy des fleuues, c’est à dire, dans la grande riuiere de S. Laurens, qui a bien encore en ce lieu là quelque deux à trois mille pas de large quoy qu’il soit à trente lieuës au dessus de Kebec.

On the eighth, we arrived at the three Rivers. We found living there very agreeable; the ground is sandy, the fish very abundant in its season. A Savage will sometimes bring in his Canoe twelve or fifteen Sturgeon, the smallest of which is occasionally as long as the height of a man; besides these, there are also a number of other very good fish. The French have named this place the three Rivers, because there emerges here a very beautiful river which flows into the great River saint Lawrence through three principal mouths, caused by several little Islands which are found at the entrance of this river, which the Savages call Metaberoutin. I would like to describe the beauty of this place, but I am afraid of being tedious. The whole country between Kebec and this new Settlement, which we will call the Residence of the Conception, seems to me very pleasant; it is intersected by brooks and streams, which empty at short distances from each other into the King of rivers, that is, into the great river St. Lawrence, which is, even at this place, fully two or three thousand paces wide, although it is thirty leagues above Quebec.

— Le Jeune’s relation, The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents, Volume 8: Quebec, Hurons, Cape Breton, 1634-1636 (1897)

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Few passages of history are more striking than those which record the efforts of the earlier French Jesuits to convert the Indians. Full as they are of dramatic and philosophic interest, bearing strongly on the political destinies of America, and closely involved with the history of its native population, it is wonderful that they have been left so long in obscurity. While the infant colonies of England still clung feebly to the shores of the Atlantic, events deeply ominous to their future were in progress, unknown to them, in the very heart of the continent. It will be seen, in the sequel of this volume, that civil and religious liberty found strange allies in this Western World.

The sources of information concerning the early Jesuits of New France are very copious. During a period of forty years, the Superior of the Mission vi sent, every summer, long and detailed reports, embodying or accompanied by the reports of his subordinates, to the Provincial of the Order at Paris, where they were annually published, in duodecimo volumes, forming the remarkable series known as the Jesuit Relations. Though the productions of men of scholastic training, they are simple and often crude in style, as might be expected of narratives hastily written in Indian lodges or rude mission-houses in the forest, amid annoyances and interruptions of all kinds. In respect to the value of their contents, they are exceedingly unequal. Modest records of marvellous adventures and sacrifices, and vivid pictures of forest-life, alternate with prolix and monotonous details of the conversion of individual savages, and the praiseworthy deportment of some exemplary neophyte. With regard to the condition and character of the primitive inhabitants of North America, it is impossible to exaggerate their value as an authority. I should add, that the closest examination has left me no doubt that these missionaries wrote in perfect good faith, and that the Relations hold a high place as authentic and trustworthy historical documents. They are very scarce, and no complete collection of them exists in America. …

— Francis Parkman, Preface; The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century (Boston: Little, Brown, And Company. 1867)

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commentary by Roger W. Smith

The Jesuit Relations, Relations des Jésuites de la Nouvelle-France, were chronicles of the Jesuit missions in New France written by Jesuit missionaries in the seventeenth century. The reports were written annually beginning in 1632 and ending in 1673. They were originally written in French, Latin, and Italian.

Comprising reports to their superiors in France, the Relations concerned the missionaries’ interactions with various North American tribes and their activities for the purpose of converting the indigenous peoples.

The missionaries made major efforts to study and understand indigenous cultures and to learn native languages.

The Relations included descriptions of the natural landscape and climactic and geographical conditions not encountered in France; also of warfare and martyrdom. An example of the former is Paul Le Jeune’s description of a journey through the woods with a band of Montagnais people, in which he describes physical hardships of carrying a great deal of belongings in the cold, with little food. The latter includes narratives of Jesuit missionaries being killed or maimed. For example: the missionaries Isaac Jogues, who died after being captured by the Mohawks, and Jean de Brébeuf. Much attention is devoted to Indians who became converts to Catholicism.

Beginning in 1896, Reuben Gold Thwaites, secretary of the Wisconsin Historical Society, led a project to translate into English, unify, and cross-reference the original Relations. Thwaites and his associates compiled 73 volumes. The Thwaites edition is posted here.

By the Jesuit missionaries, the natives were called sauvages (savages). The designation in many respect seems apt.

The indigenous (Indian) peoples had a rich vocabulary for concrete things, but no words for or conception of (concepts designating) abstract ideas or terms. Most notable (they always took captives, when possible, alive) was their ferocity and cruelty in torturing their captives.

There are passages of beauty in these relations, in which the natural landscape – woods, lakes, and streams; mountain and sky, snow and ice — are described. There is much of interest about native customs and practices. There are moving stories of religiosity, hardship, and courage.

But the descriptions of torture and martyrdom are such that one cannot bear to read them.

I became acquainted with the Jesuit Relations from reading, in its entirety, Francis Parkman’s monumental work France and England in North America. Parkman’s The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century (1867) comprises the second and third of eight volumes.

— posted by Roger W. Smith

July 2023

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individual volumes (PDF)

Vol. I
ACADIA: 1610-1613

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Vol. II
ACADIA: 1612-1614

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Vol. III
ACADIA: 1611-1616

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Vol. IV
ACADIA AND QUEBEC: 1616-1629

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Vol. V
QUEBEC: 1632-1633

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Vol. V, pp. 168-169 (defective in above PDF)

vol. 5, pp 168-169

Vol. VI
QUEBEC: 1633-1634

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Vol. VII
QUEBEC, HURONS, CAPE BRETON: 1634-1635

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Vol. VIII
QUEBEC, HURONS, CAPE BRETON 1634-1636

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Vol. IX
QUEBEC: 1636

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Vol. X
HURONS: 1636

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Vol. XI
HURONS AND QUEBEC: 1636-1637

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Vol. XII
QUEBEC: 1637

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Vol. XIII
HURONS : 1637

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Vol. XIV
HURONS AND QUEBEC: 1637-1638

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Vol. XV
HURONS AND QUEBEC: 1638-1639

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Vol. XVI
QUEBEC AND HURONS: 1639

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Vol. XVII
HURONS AND THREE RIVERS: 1639- 1640

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Vol. XVIII
HURONS AND QUEBEC: 1640

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Vol. XIX
QUEBEC AND HURONS: 1640

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Vol. XX
HURONS AND QUEBEC: 1640- 1641

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Vol. XXI
QUEBEC AND HURONS: 1641-1642

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Vol. XXII
QUEBEC AND HURONS: 1642

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Vol. XXIII
HURONS, QUEBEC, IROQUOIS: 1642- 1643

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Vol. XXIV
LOWER CANADA AND IROQUOIS: 1642- 1643

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Vol. XXV
IROQUOIS, HURONS, QUEBEC: 1642-1644

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Vol. XXVI
LOWER CANADA, HURONS: 1642- 1644

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Vol XXVII
HURONS LOWER CANADA: 1642 1645

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Vol XXVII (facing pages)

27 facing pages Binder1

Vol. XXVIII (page 113 missing)
HURONS, IROQUOIS, LOWER CANADA: 1645- 1646

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Vol. XXVIII, pp. 113-115

vol 28, pp 113-115

Vol. XXIX
IROQUOIS, LOWER CANADA, HURONS: 1646

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Vol. XXX
HURONS, LOWER CANADA: 1646-1647

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Vol. XXXI
IROQUOIS, LOWER CANADA, ABENAKIS: 1647

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Vol. XXXII
HURONS, LOWER CANADA: 1647-1648

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Vol. XXXIII
LOWER CANADA, ALGONKINS, HURONS: 1648-1649

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Vol. XXXIV
LOWER CANADA, HURONS: 1649

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Vol. XXXV
HURONS, LOWER CANADA, ALGONKINS: 1650

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Vol. XXXVI
LOWER CANADA, ABENAKIS, 1650-1651

Vol. XXXVII
LOWER CANADA, ABENAKIS: 165 I – 1652

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Vol. XXXVIII
ABENAKIS, LOWER CANADA, HURONS: 1652-1653

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Vol. XXXIX
HURONS: 1653

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Vol. XL
HURONS, LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS: 1653

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Vol. XLI
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS: 1654- 1656

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Vol. XLII
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS: 1632- 1657

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Vol. XLIII
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS: 1656- 1657

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Vol. XLIV
IROQUOIS, LOWER CANADA: 1656- 1658

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Vol. XLV
LOWER CANADA, ACADIA, IROQUOIS, OTTAWAS: 1659- 1660

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Vol XLVI
LOWER CANADA, ACADIA, IROQUOIS, OTTAWAS: 1659- 1661

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Vol. XLVII
IROQUOIS, LOWER CANADA: 1661 – 1663

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Vol. XLVIII
LOWER CANADA, OTTAWAS: 1662 – 1664

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Vol. XLIX
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS: 1663- 1665

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Vol. L
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS, OTTAWAS: 1664-1667

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Vol. LI
OTTAWAS, LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS: 1666-1668

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Vol. LII
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS , OTTAWAS 1667-1669

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Vol. LIII
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS: 1669- 1670

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Vol. LIV
IROQUOIS, OTTAWAS, LOWER CANADA: 1669- 1671

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Vol. LV
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS, OTTAWAS: 1670-1672

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Vol. LVI
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS, OTTAWAS,
HUDSON BAY: 1671 – 1672

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Vol. LVII
HURONS, IROQUOIS, OTTAWAS: 1672-73

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Vol. LVIII
OTTAWAS, LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS: 1672-1674

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Vol. LIX
LOWER CANADA, ILLINOIS, OTTAWAS: 1673- 1677

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Vol. LX
LOWER CANADA, ILLINOIS, IROQUOIS, OTTAWAS: 1675-1677

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Vol. LXI
ALL MISSIONS: 1677-1680

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Vol. LXII
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS, OTTAWAS: 1681 – 1683

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Vol. LXIII
LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS : 1667- 1687

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Vol. LXIV
OTTAWAS, LOWER CANADA, IROQUOIS, ILLINOIS: 1689-1695

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Vol. LXV
LOWER CANADA, MISSISSIPPI VALLEY: 1696-1702

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Vol. LXVI
ILLINOIS, LOUISIANA, IROQUOIS, LOWER CANADA: 1702- 1712

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Vol. LXVI I
LOWER CANADA, ABENAKIS, LOUISIANA: 1716- 1727

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Vol. LXVIII
LOWER CANADA, CREES, LOUISIANA: 1720-1736

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Vol. LXIX
ALL MISSIONS: 1710-1756

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Vol. LXX
ALL MISSIONS: 1747- 1764

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Vol. LXXI
LOWER CANADA, ILLINOIS: 1759- 1791

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Vol. LXXII
FINAL PREFACE, ADDITIONAL ERRATA
INDEX: A-I

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Vol. LXXIII
INDEX: J-Z

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publication announcement, The Burrows Brothers Co. (1895)

publication announcement

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Francis Parkman, “The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century”; France and England in North America, Volume Two (Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, 1867)

Parkman, The Jesuits in North America, vol. 1

Parkman, The Jesuits in North America, vol. 2

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secondary sources

R, Vashon Rogers, “The Jesuit Relations,” Queen’s Quarterly, April 1898

Rogers, ‘The Jesuit Relations’

Charles W. Colby, “The Jesuit Relations,” The American Historical Review, October 1901

Charles W. Colby, ‘The Jesuit Relations’

William Bennett Munro, The Jesuit relations : their value as historical material (n.p., 1905).

Munro, ‘The Jesuit Relations; Their Value as Historical Material’

Joseph P. Donnelly, S.J., Thwaites’ Jesuit Relations: Errata and Addenda (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1967)

‘Thwaites’ Jesuit Relations; Errata and Addenda’