Once a month, The duty challenges history enthusiasts to decipher a current theme based on a comparison with a historical event or character.
Tadoussac, May 27, 1603. François Gravé Du Pont and Samuel de Champlain encounter a group of Native people who are smoking [qui font la fête] at the gates of Saguenay. Through the voice of Innu interpreters, they bring a message of alliance from King Henri IV. For many historians, this is the starting point of the Franco-Native alliance, a key moment in the genesis of New France. Some even consider this event to be the founding moment of the Quebec nation, which resulted in the establishment of Quebec in 1608. What about it?
In Savages, published in 1603, Champlain describes this smoking during which “the Estechemins, Algoumequins & Montagnes” celebrate the victory “obtained by them over the Irocois”. He recounts how he accompanied Gravé Du Pont, then representative of Aymar de Chaste, the holder of the fur trade monopoly, and two Innu interpreters who had stayed in France to address the great sagamo Anadabijou.
The French delegation would have been well received and the interpreters would have informed Anadabijou that the king of France “want them well & wanted to populate their land, & make peace with their enemies or send them forces to defeat them”. A proposal that Anadabijou would have accepted with good grace, according to Champlain.
An alliance would thus have been concluded in a context of harmony and respect and would have allowed the establishment of the French on the indigenous territory. This interpretation, however, ignores the Innu oral tradition according to which their ancestors only allowed the French to settle in the territory of the present city of Quebec.
The alliance would have been economic rather than military, and based on a promise of food aid. Still according to this tradition, the negotiations were carried out in a climate of distrust and the terms of the alliance were not respected.
Founding myth
Without entering into the discussion on the very necessity of defining such a moment, a founding myth which celebrates the alliance of two nations as equals fits poorly in the current context where Aboriginal people are precisely demanding nation-to-nation negotiations. with Quebec.
A few months ago, the chief of the Assembly of First Nations Quebec-Labrador, Ghislain Picard, refused to participate in the commission on the bill establishing the cultural security approach within the health network. and social services. One of the reasons given for its refusal is the non-recognition of Aboriginal people as full partners.
Let us put ourselves back in the historical context in order to better understand the ins and outs of the Tadoussac meeting. The French monarchy is aware that it must take possession of land in America if it does not want to be excluded from the race started by the Spanish and Portuguese. Nine commissions are granted to stimulate exploration.
In 1598, Henry IV named Sieur de La Roche “lieutenant general of the countries of Canada”. The following year, the king shared the monopoly granted to La Roche with Pierre de Chauvin and, upon the death of the latter, the monopoly passed to Aymar de Chaste.
These appropriations on paper serve, first of all, to formalize a restriction of access. This message is addressed not only to the other European powers, but also to the various competing merchant companies. They are part of a game of power between royal power and the different provinces of the kingdom, and serve to justify the French presence in America. Although the commissions granted include a colonization component, the primary incentive remains trade.
One of the goals of the French delegation of 1603 was to consolidate the alliances already in place to ensure the supply of furs. Diplomacy is required, because Gravé Du Pont is not the only one who wants to do business with the Innu. Basque, Breton, Norman, English and Dutch fishermen and merchants have frequented the region since at least the 1580s, if not since the early 16th century.e century.
Skilled negotiators, the Innu knew how to compete between various European merchants. As they blocked access to the Saguenay, they assumed a privileged position as intermediaries between the indigenous people of the hinterland and the Europeans.
In the diplomatic game surrounding this meeting of 1603, it is they who have the power to manage the negotiations, it is they who establish the rules. Anxious to establish good relations with Europeans, regardless of their origin, and to take advantage of their privileged position for the trade, the Innu received Gravé Du Pont and Champlain as one would receive any ambassador.
Translation
We can believe that the meeting of 1603 is part of a process of alliance, but we must exercise caution in the analyzes of an event based on a single text. Champlain in fact no longer refers to it in his later works. This narrative framework is also based on a tangle of translations.
We can question the effectiveness of Innu interpreters in clearly transmitting ideas expressed between two languages which express such different concepts. It is difficult to believe that after a stay of a few months in France, they were able to master not only the French language, but the concepts which are at its core.
The response that Champlain says he received from Anadabijou is the result of a series of exchanges translated more or less adequately. Knowing the ontological gap that separates the Western vision and the indigenous vision of the occupation of a territory, we can imagine that the concept of “populating a land” could have been misinterpreted. The Innu can only benefit from the installation of trading posts on their territory, but this in no way implies a transfer of territory.
In this type of diplomatic exchange, everyone gets what they want in their own way. Champlain translates what he observes through his Eurocentric filters of interpretation and according to the message he wishes to transmit to the king. We can also imagine that these people, whom Champlain, like the late anthropologist Serge Bouchard, described as laughing, may have found the French proposal to “populate their land” ironic. Experience had shown them that Europeans had great difficulty surviving in this territory which was unfamiliar to them. The disastrous result of Chauvin’s recent attempt to establish a dwelling in 1600 in Tadoussac must surely have always been present in mind.
There were of course alliances. Without these, the residence of Chauvin in Tadoussac, those of Dugua de Mons in Sainte-Croix and Port-Royal, just like that of Champlain in Quebec could not have seen the light of day. These alliances were essential to the French, who could not have settled without the agreement of the indigenous peoples.
Dispossession
The establishment in 1600 of a trading post in Tadoussac by Chauvin suggests that an agreement between the French and the Aboriginal people of the region had already been concluded. However, how can we explain that after having concluded such an agreement with the Innu, the French waited until 1608 to establish themselves in the St. Lawrence valley?
In 1604 and 1605, it was towards Acadia that their eyes were turned. The unfortunate choice of Sainte-Croix Island in 1604, followed by the transfer to Port-Royal in 1605, as well as Champlain’s searches along the Atlantic coast to find a place more suitable for the installation of a habitation l The following year demonstrated that the Tadoussac “alliance” had little weight in the choices of the monopoly holders.
Indeed, in 1604, during his expedition to the south of Acadia, it was to the sagamo pentagoet Bessabez that Champlain proposed an alliance. The terms are reminiscent of those presented in Tadoussac. Bessabez is said to have eagerly accepted the proposal.
We must certainly celebrate the Franco-Native alliances which allowed the French to first establish trading posts. But we must also recognize how the latter used these alliances to insidiously dispossess the Indigenous people of their territory.
Does this founding myth which proposes an alliance of equals serve to relieve us of guilt by affirming that everything began with harmony and respect? Does it serve to evacuate the colonialist dimension of the relationship? It is ironic that this beautiful alliance that we celebrate as our point of origin has evolved into a society where one of the nations involved is dispossessed and marginalized.
In a context of truth and reconciliation, historians must revisit received ideas in order to move away from a European solipsism which persists in marking collective memory.
To suggest a text or to make comments and suggestions, write to Dave Noël at [email protected].