La Maison des Jésuites

Today I took advantage of the constant rain to visit another museum I had never been to:  La Maison des Jésuites, which tells the story of the Jesuit missionaries to Québec in the 17th century. Shortly after Champlain founded the city in 1608, missionaries arrived to convert the "savages" (Huron, Algonquin and Iroquois tribes in this region) to Christianity.  The museum is housed in a rebuilt 18th century manor which stands on the land that the missionaries had built their compound, including a chapel and housing over a century before.  Inside, the story is told and many artifacts have been excavated from the site, including a  preserved femur bone from one of the prominent Jesuit priests!  Upstairs is a more modern history of the English owners who remodelled the house before it was eventually acquired by the city and turned into a museum.  As well, there is current excavation going on in the neighbouring yards as artifacts continue to be recovered.

I found the museum very interesting and learned much about this part of Canada's history that I was quite ignorant of before.   I am more familiar with the more modern histories of Canada's First Nations, and this museum allowed me to piece together the stories of the early settlers with the European colonizers just after the conquest of Québec.

My museum tour continues tomorrow...