The Indigenous Colonization of New France

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Disentanglement: Reimagining Early Colonial Trajectories in the Americas" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

While the French were settling their colony of Canada in the 17th century, Iroquois, Wendat, Abenaki and other indigenous people also established villages in their midst along the St Lawrence River. Historians have considered these native enclaves very much from a European perspective, as markers of the success or failure of efforts to Christianize and "frenchify" natives, all in the service of an integrative colonial project. This paper considers the same relocations in terms of indigenous purposes. Natives, it appears, sought access to northern hunting territories and they valued the diplomatic and commercial advantages that close association with the French could provide. Within strict limits, they were willing to adapt to the ways of their neighbors, but they insisted on maintaining their political autonomy and cultural identities. Both alliance and "disentanglement" are in evidence when we examine indigenous relations with the French colony. This paper focuses on marital practices, land tenure and criminal jurisdiction, areas where the indigenous villagers of the St Lawrence demonstrated their determination to stay aloof from the French.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)   •
• Disentanglement: Reimagining Early Colonial Trajectories in the Americas

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 22894