Louis Nicolas

Louis Nicolas ( * August 15, 1634 in Aubenas, † 1682) was a French Jesuit missionary in Canada, leaving behind a Algonquian grammar and the Codex canadiensis.

Biography

Nicolas joined Toulouse in 1654 the Jesuit order in, received priestly ordination in 1663 and came on 25 May 1664 a missionary to New France to stay there until 1675. First he went to Sillery, to learn the language of the missionary to the Indians, and to study theology. But he fled twice to the Algonquin area of Trois- Rivières. In August 1667, he went on his first missionary journey. She led accompanied by Father Claude Allouez to Ottawa. The two were initially in Chagouamigon on the southwestern shore of Lake Superior, where they met Sioux, Illinois and Hurons, but Father Allouez sought soon located further south mission area.

On June 21, 1668 Nicolas was back in Québec. This may go to the fact that his superiors him for brutality against Indians -. Whom he called " amériquains septentrionnaux " (northern Americans ) - and sent back neglect of his primary responsibilities Although he received another opportunity to return to its site of action, but already in 1669 he was for the time being sidelined.

The next year he received another chance to prove, but this time accompanied by Father Jean Pierron and the Agniers de Tionontoguen. 1671 however, he was again in Sillery and signed Taufakten. He probably began during this forced stay with the composition of his grammar. In the spring of 1673 he interrupted this work and went to Sept- Îles, but returned back over the summer. During these months, he wrote his Mémoire pour un missionnaire qui ira aux Sept Isles que les Sauvages appellent Manitounagouch ou bien Mantounok. 1673 and 1674 he lived in Batiscan on, probably in an economically -managing activity. From 1674 he appeared no longer on in the registers of the Jesuits. Therefore, to assume that he has returned no later than 1675 to France.

Now he tried to publish his works, but the Order refused him permission. So Nicolas joined in 1677 from the Jesuit order from. His last place of residence is secured Albi 1678th

His main interest was less than the mission of the landscape and its inhabitants, the Indians in the Great Lakes region. During his time in North America, he traveled to the area between Lake Superior and Sept- Îles, between Trois -Rivières and the area south of Lake Ontario. He came here in clashes in which he is said to have even beaten a chieftain of the Odawa, Kinongé Club. In Sillery in Quebec he should have kept a bear cub pair, which he tamed and trained, what his friars seemed particularly displeased.

He the author of the Codex canadiensis, a 79 -page description of plants and animals, but especially of the Indians of the region. It is equipped with 180 illustrations of the utmost importance for the biological, historical and ethnological science. He took over drafts and outlines of the Historiae Canadensis seu Novae Franciae Libri Decem of the Jesuit François du Creux, published in Paris in 1666. Yet he added meticulously Tattoos, pipe shapes, weapons and shields, hairstyles and body painting added. In almost anthropological precision he held tool and canoe types, with some forms he then assigned precisely certain strains. He also narrated the appearance of a mask of a healer society, the False Face Society. The code also one of only two surviving portraits of Indians from the French era, the chief of the Ottawa Iskouakite contains.

There are also many edible plants and animals of the region, such as bears and moose, otters, beavers and seals. Even sea creatures he made from, but not distinguished between marine mammals from fishing. The Code is now kept by the Thomas Gilcrease Institute in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Surely he has also written the Histoire Naturelle des Indes Occidentales and said Grammaire algonquine. Year of his death is uncertain, but one suspects that he died around 1700, as the Codex canadiensis emerged around this time. Should the last datable entry in another hand come, he might have died in the 1680s, however, already.