LALEMANT Jérôme (appelé Achiendassé par les Hurons) Relation de ce qui s’est passé de plus remarquable aux missions des Pères de la Compagnie de Jésus en la Nouvelle France sur le grand flevve de Saint Laurens en l’année 1647.

Alden/Landis, 648/89 ; John Carter Brown, II, 372 ; Sabin, 38685 ; Church, II, 487; de Backer-Sommervogel, IV, 1401:8. Not in Chadenat and Leclerc.

First edition of this important account by Jesuit missionaries in Canada of their activities in 1647 among the Native Americans of the Quebec and Great Lakes regions, and their daily life among the Hurons and Algonquins.

Born in Paris in 1593 and died in Quebec City in 1673, Jérôme Lalemant was a Jesuit priest, superior of the Huron mission from 1638 to 1645, then superior of the Jesuits of Canada from 1645 to 1650 and from 1659 to 1665. He entered the Jesuit novitiate in Paris in 1610 and studied philosophy and then theology at the Collège de Clermont. In the meantime, he was prefect of the boarding school in Verdun and a teacher at the Collège d’Amiens before teaching philosophy and science at the Collège de Clermont and becoming spiritual father of that college. Few Jesuits had as much experience as Father Jérôme Lalemant before coming to Canada, which attests to the high esteem in which he was held by his superiors.

After all these years of teaching, Lallemant was appointed superior of the Huron mission in 1638, the same year he arrived in Canada, succeeding Brébeuf. His first act was to conduct a census of the population within the boundaries of Huronia: 12,000 people spread across 32 towns or villages.

His name remains attached to the missionaries’ central residence: Sainte-Marie-des-Hurons. Begun in 1639, this first major settlement in the ‘Pays d’En Haut’ developed at the same pace as the mission itself. By 1649, it contained a chapel, residences for the priests and lay staff, carpentry and blacksmith workshops, a hospital, a retirement home for neophytes, a guesthouse for non-Christians passing through, a cemetery, and a farm with a farmyard and domestic animals. As a base for apostolic operations, Sainte-Marie-des-Hurons was the stronghold of the mission from 1639 to 1649.

The physical construction of Sainte-Marie-des-Hurons would have been impossible without an institution introduced to Canada by Father Jérôme Lalemant: the ‘donnés’. The brothers in charge of domestic work were too few in number to keep up with the constant progress of the mission. Moreover, their religious status prohibited them from carrying weapons, and it was not prudent for the missionaries to remain defenceless in Huronia. The ‘donés,’ who devoted their lives to the mission but did not take religious vows, supplemented the coadjutor brothers and could, if necessary, take up arms.

In 1644, Father Jérôme Lalemant was appointed superior of the Jesuits in Canada, with residence in Quebec City. The letter bringing him this news was intercepted by the Iroquois, and he did not take up his post until September 1645. After returning to France for a few years, he returned to Quebec City as superior of the Jesuits in 1659, never to leave again.

The Hurons had nicknamed Father Lalemant ‘Achiendassé’. He himself explains the origins of this custom: ‘The reason for these nicknames is that the Savages, not being able to pronounce our names or nicknames, as their language does not use many of the consonants found in them, do their best to approximate them, and if they cannot manage it, they look for words in their own language that are easy to pronounce and have some connection with our names or their meaning. But as it sometimes happens that they come across words that are rather inappropriate, they look for words in their own language that are easy to pronounce and have some connection with our names or their meaning. in the country that they can easily pronounce and that have some connection with our names or their meaning. But since it sometimes happens that they encounter rather inappropriate names, the confirmation or change of the names they gave during the voyage is done in the country.” See : Dictionnaire biographique du Canada, Léon Pouliot, vol. 1.

A very fine copy in contemporary vellum, small marginal waterstain to the last 50 leaves.