EXPLORATION OF THE AMERICAN CONTINENT

The North American continent was explored from various directions. The English moved inland from their footholds on the eastern seaboard, the Spanish ventured north from their empire in Mexico, while the French explored west along the St. Lawrence Seaway and south through the Mississippi. Priests and traders, soldiers and adventurers undertook these explorations over many years. European knowledge of the continent was gained fitfully and erratically, with knowledge not often shared among rival imperial powers. In this section we will consider maps produced in both manuscript and printed form, and both French and English maps, that span almost a hundred years. They show the encroachment of European power and influence further and further inland. The mapping of the interior was both a claim to sovereignty over the indigenous peoples as well as an act of imperial enlargement. To map the continent was to claim the continent.

The French manuscript map from 1683 shown here (fig. 13) records part of the Mississippi. Successive French explorers had used the great river to explore the interior. In May 1673 the fur trader Louis Jolliet and the Jesuit priest Father Jacques Marquette, along with five guides, canoed down the Mississippi River. They traveled over 600 miles and got as far as the Arkansas River, the present-day northern Louisiana border. Nine years later the French explorer Sieur de La Salle managed to reach the Gulf of Mexico.

The manuscript map is an itinerary map; it records the journey down the river as the explorers encountered the people and places. It is not drawn to accurate scale and there are no latitude and longitude. It simply represents the journey down the river.

The map draws attention to three main elements. First, it highlights the Native American presence, recording the names of the tribes and villages. Knowledge of

the local people was essential in order to conduct trade and commerce. The French were very keen to establish both commercial trade and political alliances with the local people. French intentions were less about colonizing the land than about extending their trade and broadening political alliances against the English and Spanish. The Native Americans were also souls to be converted. Missionaries played an important part in many of the French explorations. The search for land was also a search for converts to Catholicism. Second, at various stages the word portage is mentioned. These are references to places where canoes could be carried across land to save time and reduce distance. The map is like a present-day road map that highlights shortcuts. Finally, the map also records the French presence. At a number of stages the map identifies forts such as Fort Prudhomme, established by La Salle in 1682.

John Senex's 1721 map of Louisiana and the Mississippi River (fig. 14) is in fact a direct copy of a French map, produced by the cartographer Guillaume de L'Isle, that codified much of the reports and maps of previous French explorers of the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River. The great river basin is shown in its entirety. The text is both a history and geography as it records previous explorations as well as recent events. Thus, below Lake Erie under the label The Nation du Chat (note the French name giving a clue to its origin) de L'Isle notes that "it was destroyed by the Iroquois." The river basin is a scene of conflict and struggle; the key at the bottom of the map identifies nations that have been destroyed. The map records in great detail Native American villages and tribes. Further west the information is scantier, and although New Mexico is recognized, the outline of the Rockies is only hinted at.

The map's strongest details refer to either side of the river system, the main point of French exploration and trade. The further from the river, the less reliable the information.

The map is also a political document. Louisiana is written in broad letters across the entire basin. The English colonies are compressed along the eastern seaboard.

De L'Isle's map drew on the observations of French explorers, priests, and traders. They had traveled along the rivers of the Mississippi basin, and the compilation of their knowledge led to de Isle's map being the most accurate one of the river system to date. It was immensely influential and was used as a template for almost fifty years. Thomas Jefferson had a copy of the map, and it was an important source of information for the later Lewis and Clark expedition.

The map presents a picture of a huge river basin in French possession inhabited by a variety of Native American nations with the British claims sidelined to the eastern coast.

The map entitled Carte de la Louisiane (fig. 15) is a later version of the de L'Isle map. In contrast to the English version, this map, published in 1730 like the de L'Isle original, notes underneath Carolina that the area was named in honor of Charles of France. This is a subtle way of undermining English claims and reinforcing French ones. The Senex map dropped this French claim. The French map also contains an insert of the mouth of the Mississippi River showing the recently established city of New Orleans. A French merchant company founded the city in 1718. Blocked in the east by the English colonies, the great river was the trading outlet of the French inland trading empire. The new city of New Orleans was founded the same year that the original de L'Isle map was published. Both represented French attempts to legitimize and secure their hold over the interior of North America.

This map draws on the observations, maps, and writings of French explorers, priests, and traders, including Bourgmont, Marquette, Louis Joliet, La Salle, Sieur Vermale, Father Jacob Le Maire, and Louis Hennepin.

They had all traveled extensively along the rivers of the Mississippi basin. The explorers were dependent on Native Americans to find their way and help them survive. Indian tribal names and the location of their villages were thus of supreme importance.

French economic interests lay primarily in the fur trade. They traded with the Indians and thus needed specific knowledge of their trading partners. The Indian presence is richly detailed on the map.

French interests as opposed to British holdings also guided the making of this map. Note how the British possessions are limited to the coast and surrounded by a solid wall of French possessions. The map is a record of French claims and explorations beyond the Appalachians.

The map completed in 1761 (fig. 16) is a more detailed and accurate representation of the mouth of the Mississippi River. This was a low-lying swampy area where it was often difficult to differentiate between land and water, making it hard to navigate. It was a watery wilderness. As the map records at one point, "shallow water with many small islands, very little known." Although the map is written in English it draws heavily on Spanish and French influences. The phrase "according to the Spanish charts" is used at least twice. From 1699 until 1762, first as a merchant company outpost and later as a royal province, the area was under French control. That French influence is apparent in the names on the map. It is an influence that has endured to the present in the area of this map.

The map covers an area with an interesting history as well as a relatively unknown geography. French speakers in the northern colonies of New France were pawns in the great imperial struggle between France and Britain. Beginning in 1754 they were routed from what is now Nova Scotia, but was then called Arcadia. Many of the Arcadians settled in the bayou country of the map. It provided an empty space in which to locate a displaced people. The Arcadians became the Cajuns with their distinctive language (a mixture of old provincial French and English), music, and cuisine. The watery wilderness became the setting for the formation of a uniquely American culture.

Thomas Kitchin's map of 1765 (fig. 17) was printed after the end of the Seven Years War as it was called in Europe, also known as the French and Indian War in North America. It was a global conflict between Britain and France that was fought in Europe, Asia, and America. In North America it gave colonial gentleman like George Washington valuable wartime experience.

The British won the war and at the peace treaty signed in Paris in 1763, France ceded its North American possessions. It kept the valuable sugar islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe but gave up claims to New France and lands in the interior of North America. The land that had been explored by La Salle, Hennepin, and Le Maire and that had been mapped by de L'Isle now fell into the hands of the British. The cartouche proudly proclaims that "Louisiana, as formerly claimed by FRANCE and now containing parts of British America to the east." The great river basin of the Mississippi had been redistributed: land to the east of the river was now British, that to the west was Spanish.

The landscape of the map is populated with Native American tribes. All along the river Native American tribal names and villages are shown; further east at the edge of the map the British colonial presence is recorded in anglicized names. Between the two, the British colonies and the Native American basin, there is a gap, a lack of connection. This would not last for long as westward expansion from British colonies would soon come up against the Native American presence.

This map was published in the London Magazine. In the eighteenth century periodicals flourished. They published articles describing colonial struggles and imperial rivalries. Maps accompanied articles that described military campaigns, battles, and imperial struggles around the world. For the moment, two years after the Paris Treaty, readers of the magazine must have felt that British control of the land east of the Mississippi looked secure, the enduring fruits of an epic struggle with their old European rival, the French.

Sometimes maps tell us a great deal by what they do not show. The map completed in 1772 (fig. 18) is revealing in its inaccuracies. Hazy and imprecise, this map of the West Coast of North America lacks any real under-standing of the region. The old established Spanish presence is apparent in the detail devoted to Nova Granada in the southern region of the map. And there is evidence of some reliance on sailing reports for the names of islands, capes, and bays are recorded on the California coast. However, in general terms it is a map that relies more on outdated historical evidence and old maps. The label Nova Albion, for example, is a reminder of Sir Francis Drake's trip around the world, from 1577 to 1580. In 1570 he anchored near Coos Bay in Oregon and when he returned home, the English claim to the land was noted in maps by the name New Albion. The use of this name persisted for over two hundred years.

This map shows only the names of coastal features. Although the name Sierra Nevada is noted, the interior is more of a blank space. There is no indication of the region's geography. The map is revealing because of its lack of information. Even as late as 1772 the western area of North America was little known.