PIERRE

See also:

• FRANCOIS (1558-1614)

FRANCOIS

See also:

• CHARLEVOIX
• PIERRE FRANCOIS CHARLEVOIX

CHARLEVOIX  X&VIER DE (1682—1761), French Jesuit traveller and historian, was born at St Quentin on the 29th of October 1682 . At the age of sixteen he entered the Society of Jesus; and at the age of twenty-three was sent to Canada, where he remained for four years as professor at Quebec . He then returned and became professor of belles lettres at home, and travelled on the errands of his society in various countries . In 1720-1722, under orders from the regent, he visited America for the second time, and went along the Great Lakes and down the Mississippi . In later years (1733—1755) he was one of the directors of the Journal de Trevoux . He died at La Fleche on the 1st of February 1761 . His works, enumerated in the Bibliographic des Fret's de la Compagnie de Jesus (by Carlos Sommervogel), fall into two groups . The first contains his Histoire de l'etablissement, du progres et de la decadence du Christianisme dans t'empire du Japon (Rouen, 1715; English trans . History of the Church of Japan, 1715), and his Histoire et description generale du Japon (1736), a compilation chiefly from Kampfer . The second group includes his historical work on America: Histoire de lisle Espagnole ou de Saint Domingue (1730), based on manuscript memoirs of P . Jean-Baptiste Le Pers and original sources; Histoire de Paraguay (1756); Vie de la Mere Marie de l'Incarnation, institutrice et premiere superieure des Urselines de la Nouvelle-France (1724); Histoire et description generale de la Nouvelle-France (1744; in English 1769; tr . J .

G . Shea, 1866—1872), a work of

capital importance for Canadian history .