Plants and Peoples: French and Indigenous Botanical Knowledges in Colonial North America, 1600 – 1760 by Christopher Michael Parsons A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of History University of Toronto © Copyright by Christopher Michael Parsons 2011 Plants and Peoples: French and Indigenous Botanical Knowledge in Colonial North America, 1600 - 1760 Christopher Michael Parsons Doctor of Philosophy Department of History University of Toronto 2011 Abstract As North American plants took root in Parisian botanical gardens and regularly appeared in scientific texts in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, they retained their connections to networks of ecological and cultural exchange in colonial North America. In this dissertation I study the history of French botany and natural history as it became an Atlantic enterprise during this time, analyzing the production of knowledge about North American flora and the place of this knowledge in larger processes of colonialism and imperial expansion in the French Atlantic World. I focus particular attention on recovering the role of aboriginal peoples in the production of knowledge about colonial environments on both sides of the Atlantic. Rather than integrating aboriginal collectors, chefs and healers into traditional histories of western science, I integrate familiar histories of science into larger histories of cultural contact in an Atlantic World with multiple centres of knowledge production and exchange. This dissertation develops two closely related arguments. First, I argue that French encounters with American environments and Native cultures were inseparable. Jesuit missionaries, for example, called both a plant and a native culture ―wild rice,‖ ii iii conflating descriptions of local ecological and morphological features of the Great Lakes plant with accounts of indigenous cultural and moral attributes. Second, ―Plants and Peoples‖ also analyzes the process by which the Paris-based Académie Royale des Sciences expanded its reach into North America and argues that French colonial naturalists drew on a vibrant conversation between diverse colonial and indigenous communities. Yet indigenous participation and the knowledges they provided were progressively effaced over the course of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This research therefore presents both a new understanding of the history of early modern and enlightenment botany and a lens through which to revisit and enrich familiar histories of cultural exchange in colonial North America. iv Acknowledgments Between Toronto where this started and Hanover where it is coming to a close, I have been blessed with an extraordinary community of friends, colleagues and cheerleaders. A full list of debts accrued during these past six years could stretch almost as long as this dissertation, but I want to acknowledge the support of people and institutions who have done the most to make this dissertation what it is today. First and foremost I owe a great debt of gratitude to Allan Greer whose patience in the face of my repeated stubbornness, perceptive comments on my written and presented work and continuous support allowed me to transform ill-formed ideas first discussed in his office in the fall of 2004 into an entire dissertation. I would additionally like to thank Ken Mills and Heidi Bohaker for their generous support and feedback as members of my committee these past years, as well as for their continued patience. I must also thank Michelle Murphy and Adrienne Hood for introducing me to the history of science and early American history during preparation for my comprehensive exams. I also owe a great deal to several governmental agencies, institutions and libraries who saw the merits of this work – in many cases even before I did – and made travel to libraries, archives and conferences possible through their financial support. The generous support of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Ontario Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities, Associated Medical Services, Inc., and the University of Toronto allowed me time to focus on research and writing throughout my dissertation. Travel to archives and conferences would not have been possible without the support of Associated Medical Services, Inc., the National Sciences Foundation, the André Michaux Foundation and the University of Toronto (and particularly the Armour v family‘s support for the Department of History). I am also tremendously grateful to the John Carter Brown Library, the Newberry Library and the American Philosophical Society both for their financial support and, more importantly, for introducing me to many colleagues who have shaped my work profoundly and who, since my trips to these libraries, have in many cases become close friends. The people who I met and talked with during my research trips were fantastic, and I must thank librarians and staff at the Bibliothèque nationale de France, Renald Lessard at the Bibliothèque et Archives nationales de Québec, Cécile Aupic at the Muséum national d‘Histoire naturelle, Timothy Dickinson at the Royal Ontario Museum, Ruth Newell at the Harriet Irving Botanical Gardens at Acadia University, and Roy Goodman and Earle Spamer at the American Philosophical Society. I have also profited immensely from the opportunity to get to know colleagues at several conferences and workshops that I have attended over the past several years. Audiences at two History of Science Society meetings, and meetings of the American Society for Ethnohistory, the French Colonial Historical Society and the Canadian Historical Association gave valuable feedback on early drafts of many of these chapters. I found the opportunity to present to audiences at the McNeil Center for Early American Studies, ―The Age of Sail‖ conference at UBC, the Native American Studies Program at Dartmouth College, an online NiCHE reading group, and the 2009 iteration of the Harvard Atlantic History Seminar particularly profitable, as was a workshop on Jesuit Science organized by Kristin Huffine and Michelle Molina who both have no idea how much drinking martinis in Chicago helped make this dissertation possible. vi While I have therefore had the privilege to present this work to many different people in many different venues, I would also like to acknowledge insightful comments and feedback from Victoria Dickenson, Gilles Havard, Robert Morrissey, François Regourd, Thomas Wien, Kristin Huffine, Kelly Wisecup, Eva Botella-Ordinas, Bruce Moran, Neil Safier, Michael Reidy, Luke Clossey, Florence Hsia, Karin Velez, Susan Sleeper Smith, and Paul Cohen, Michael Reidy as well as Matthew Crawford, Joseph Cullon, Bertie Mandelblatt, Kathleen Murphy and all of the other participants of the 2009 Harvard Atlantic History Seminar. Closer to home I also found a wonderful community of colleagues at the University of Toronto. In particular, the friendship and support of Helen Dewar and Jean-François Lozier made this project immeasurably easier and a great deal more fun. The participants in my fourth year seminar ―The Columbian Exchange,‖ have likewise had a major impact on this dissertation and I thank them for teaching me more than I could have hoped to teach them. There are more than a few botanists – Heather Coiner, Katy Heath, Patrick Vogan and Danielle Way among them – who were more than generous with their time and expertise. I would also like to thank Victoria Freeman and Grafton Antone for introducing me to Native American Studies. I would also like to thank Peter Ward for giving me the tools to become a historian and some sound advice at the beginning of my graduate program that has become a mantra as I near the end. I would also like to gratefully acknowledge the support of my colleagues and friends in the Native American Studies Program at Dartmouth College. You took an errant Canadian in out of the woods, gave him an office and made the last year of his PhD a true joy. Melanie Benson Taylor, Colin Calloway, Bruce Duthu, Sergei Kan, Ben vii Madley, Vera Palmer, Dale Turner and Sheila Laplante, I really cannot describe to you what your support has meant to me, and how much our conversations have shaped this final product. I cannot thank you enough for your trust, confidence and generosity. It is hard to avoid well-worn cliché as I thank my family, but I think that they will forgive me. Daniel Rikely and Geraldine Murphy continue to make Toronto home, and were always ready with support, fantastic meals and a bed. My parents (step and regular alike) have been the best cheerleaders that I could have hoped for, and were welcome sources of encouragement when I needed it most. As for Jess, what do I say? I would not be in graduate school if it were not for her, let alone walking away with a PhD. To her I owe absolutely everything – each accomplishment, each success and all of the joy that I have taken during this long process. This dissertation is hers as much as it is mine. viii Table of Contents INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER 1 - BOTANICAL DISCOVERY IN A NOT-SO-NEW WORLD 23 SHOCK AND LISTS 27 FRENCH FOLK CLASSIFICATIONS IN COLONIAL NORTH AMERICA 34 CULTURAL AND NATURAL DIFFERENCE IN SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY FRENCH NORTH AMERICA 50 THE EMERGENCE OF DIFFERENCE 65 CONCLUSION 83 CHAPTER 2 - THE NATURAL HISTORY OF SECRETS: JESUIT AND INDIGENOUS BOTANICAL KNOWLEDGE IN THE SEVENTEENTH- AND EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY GREAT LAKES 87 JESUIT OBSERVERS AND THE FLORA OF THE GREAT LAKES REGION 90 INDIGENOUS