The Metamorphoses of Landscape and Community in Early Quebec

by Coates, Colin M.

• ISBN13: 9780773518964
• ISBN10: 0773518967
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2000-01-01
• Publisher: McGill Queens Univ Pr

Summary

French settlers distanced the indigenous people and flora and fauna to create a landscape that by the mid-eighteenth century had become recognizably European. British industrialists and landowners attempted similar appropriations with far less durable results and the area remained a heartland of French-Canadian life, with a sense of cohesive community. This community spirit, rooted in agrarian landscape, was channelled into the developing sense of colonial nationalism of the 1820s and 1830s. Drawing on maps by explorers and surveyors, correspondence documenting the conflict between a backwoods priest and his parishioners, a gentlewoman's sketchbook, and the documents of a bitter court case between a seigneur's wife and a local priest, Coates illuminates the development of the region and the social, cultural, and economic ties and tensions within it, providing insights into the often hidden values of a rural community.

Author Biography

Colin M. Coates is director of the Centre of Canadian Studies at the University of Edinburgh.

Table of Contents

Maps, Tables, and Figures	vii
Preface	xi
Acknowledgments	xiii
Introduction: The Rivers	3	(3)
Aboriginal Landscapes	6	(7)
Seigneurial Landscapes	13	(19)
Habitant Landscapes	32	(23)
Ties of Blood and Marriage	55	(20)
Lines of Authority	75	(25)
Lines of Community	100	(25)
An Industrial Landscape	125	(19)
A Picturesque Landscape	144	(18)
Conclusion: Three Journeys	162	(5)
Abbreviations Used in the Sources	167	(2)
Notes	169	(42)
Bibliography	211	(14)
Index	225