The Jesuit Relations document discusses the missionary work of Jesuits in New France (Canada) from the 1600s-1700s. The Jesuits struggled to adapt their European religious teachings to the native populations in New France who had very different customs related to health, medicine, warfare, and views of the natural world. Over nearly two centuries, the Jesuits interacted with many native nations, learning about their cultures while also trying to convert them to Christianity. The document also describes some of the early European explorations of areas like the Mississippi River valley and interactions with tribes like the Illinois.

1. The Jesuit Relations
By: Sara Rawson

2. Introduction (1)
• The Jesuits were members of a religious
order, the Society of Jesus, and like the
monks, nuns, and friars of other orders,
they dedicated their lives to their religion
and vowed to live in poverty and
obedience.
• The Society of Jesus was founded by a
Spanish ex-soldier Ignatius of Loyola in
1534.
• Like many other religions the Jesuits did
missionary work all over the place.
• Over the course of nearly two centuries
of missionary work, the Jesuits had
dealings with almost every Indian nation
of the Northeast.

3. Introduction (2)
• The Jesuits were active in Latin America, France,
Canada, and many other places.
• New France was a place where the Society of
Jesus was always the prominent religion, but
they always had rivals.
• The Jesuits struggled with their missions in New
France because in their other missions they were
use to people listening to their words and they
had to adapt to their new audience.
• The missions there did begin to show signs of
success in the 1640s.
• There were those who were against the Jesuits
just like there are those who do not approve of
every other religion.

4. Disease and Medicine
• The Jesuits of New France knew
nothing of germs, viruses, and
immunity.
• They learned the contrast in how
illness was dealt with when they
discovered that when people
were sick in those places, they
were kept close by everyone
else, while when a person was
sick where they were from they
were kept secluded.
• They disapproved of the majority
of the aspects of native
medicine.

5. Disease and Medicine
• The native played games that they claimed
were good for their health.
• They also played a great deal of hope in the
idea of luck.
• They held ceremonies and dances to attempt
to make the ill better.
• The accounts of the lives of the Natives by the
Jesuits depicted the Natives as somewhat
strange. It is clear that many of the things that
they did were foreign and new to the Jesuits.

6. Diplomacy and War
• The Jesuits did not arrive in New
France as conquerors. Instead
they made a place for themselves
within the already established
lives on the Natives.
• Wars between the Natives
became more intense in the
seventeenth century, partially due
to the adaptation of European
weapons.
• The Jesuits often referred to the
Natives as “barbarians” in the
accounts.

7. Diplomacy and War
• This chapter discusses the wars
that were going on during that time
between all of the Natives.
• It talks about how when the
Mohawks were taking over the
canoe routes of the Ottawa and St.
Lawrence rivers in the later 1640s,
at the same time other Iroquois
armies were attacking Huron
country father west.
• The Jesuits believe that they faith
was spreading more and more
each day.

8. Writings on the Natural Environment
• New France was a strange and
new place for the Jesuits in terms
of the land.
• The forests and harsh climate
were unusual and tough things
for these people.
• The Jesuits were fascinated by
the stars and the sky, and
recorded appearances of comets,
eclipses and other things.
• The Natives were unwilling to
separate the happenings of
nature and faith, as they
worshipped the land.

9. Writings on the Natural Environment
• The spoke a lot about the wild animals
and what they meant to the Natives,
some evil and some kind.
• The Natives taught the Jesuits to fish
and hunt well using the resources that
the land offered them.

10. Exploring the Mississippi
• The Jesuits often
traveled with the
French as chaplains
looking for potential
new mission places.
• Marquette had relations
with different Native
tribes and traded and
learned from them all.

11. Exploring the Mississippi
• Father Marquette travel on the
Mississippi river. He visited the
Wild Rice People and the Fire
Nation.
• Along the river he learned that
there is a vast selections of
animals.
• As he traveled he met many more
Native tribes, one in particular was
the Illinois. They lived divided into
many different villages.
•He learned things about
this tribe such as: When
they go to war, the whole
village is notified with a
loud shout. They only wear
skins. They do not believe
in much in the area of
medicine. They have a
special dance which they
practice and do often.
•He continued on his
travels and met other tribes
as well.